Letter to a New Teacher

Dear Newbie teacher,

Congratulations.  As a new business teacher you have decided to embark on one of the most rewarding careers possible.  You may not need it but you may find it helpful to cast your eyes over these words of advice.

Firstly my overarching piece of advice is something I was told many years ago.  Always try to be a “reflective practitioner”.  Every time you leave a class, think about what went well and what could have gone better.  Make the time to make a note on your lesson plan to remind you of this the next time you leave the class – by the time it comes round again you will have forgotten – until it happens again.

How should you take the students into consideration?

Never stop being a student yourself.  In addition to being important in terms of keeping your own Continuing Professional Development up to date, this is the best way I know of for you to remain aware of what it feels like to be a student.  On the course I am just completing I have missed deadlines, not always participated fully and not read as widely as I should or wanted to.  It makes me more empathetic of my students to be in their situation once in a while.

Also, you have to take the students as they are, not as you would want them to be or even on occasion, how they should be to take the course you are supposed to teach them.  Figure out what it is they need to achieve what their goals and then help them to achieve them. 

What kinds of teaching and learning strategies might be helpful?

This is a tough one to answer.  The best advice I can give you is to caution you against using the “default” style with which you are most familiar or comfortable.  Personally I think my natural style is as an interactive teacher.  But one of the many things I have learned on this course is that there are times when that is not the appropriate method to maximise student learning.  There are many teaching and learning strategies.  They can all be effective in certain situation depending on the level of the students and the content being delivered. There is often vehement academic argument about their validity and you yourself may feel that one or other should be used because it feels more in line with your views about what education “should” be.  Try to avoid that trap.  Bear in mind that what you are trying to achieve is for your students to master the material in the current course and also to develop skills which will help them become independent learners.  Often it will seem that these two goals are mutually exclusive.  They usually are not – try to figure out the solution.

How and what should be assessed?

As you are teaching courses with a highly practical element in the real world make your assessments as real as possible.  Try to think of assessments that bear relation to what the student would be required to do in a job they are likely to acquire.

I once taught a course in Financial Services to students looking to join a bank at a junior level.  The course involved teaching them how to open a bank account for a customer.  The best way to assess that is for the assessment to be a role play where they do exactly that.  The worst way I can think of is to give them a sheet of paper with a case study about a potential customer who wants to open a bank account and ask the student to transfer the information from the case study to the application form.  Guess which of the 2 methods was selected?  Apparently this was because it was quicker and easier to assess.  Ease of administration is an important factor in any assessment but it should never trump the appropriateness of the method.

What special characteristics does for teaching business have?

You will need to remain at the forefront of your career in both business and teaching.  This takes twice the effort and commitment than for many academic subjects.  You will need to keep up to date with all the latest research and practice in teaching but also business. A few years ago I taught a course where my students had to set interest rates to manage a bank.  If they got the rates wrong then their bank could go bankrupt.  Students could never understand how this could happen.  I used to show them a clip from “Its a Wonderful Life” to demonstrate what a run on the bank looked like.  Since 2008 all students have been aware that banks can go bankrupt and as a teacher you have to adapt to these changes in the real world.

As a new business teacher I am sure there will be many times when you will be incredibly frustrated and demotivated but they will be temporary.  Your chosen career will also give you many moments of affirmation. Good luck!

Andrew

How Effective was the Selected Teaching Strategy?

It has been interesting watching the progress of my students after I used the different teaching strategies.

 

With Direct Instruction, the students seemed to feel very comfortable with this format. This took me by surprise to a certain extent but it seems to have been popular for 2 reasons.  Firstly, they are quite familiar with this format from the school and other education, so possibly are within their own educational comfort zone.  Secondly, as long as I am telling them what they have to do and how they have to do it, they do not seem to have such a fear of failure (or more truthfully making themselves feel or appear foolish).  This has reinforced to me the need to be aware of the students own educational experiences and expectations when planning learning materials.  The majority of students who compelted the survey stated they felt much more comfortable about using the online format because of the DI session that took place

 

On collaboration, the strategy does not seem to have been fully successful.  The students never seemed interested in contributing to the work of others or giving and receiving feedback.  Again, this may be largely due to their previous experiences.  During an end of course survey I asked them about this point and although the majority agreed that they enjoyed the format they did not feel that this would help them to prepare for an individually graded timed exam. However, I feel that in future, if I build this in to the structure of the course at the outset, it will have much greater success

Trying New Strategies

Learning about the various teaching methodologies has been interesting for me.  I've never thought of it before but I would say that my default teaching methodology is as an Interactive Lecturer - I think I fall into quite a common group with that.

The 2 strategies I decided to try were Collaborative and Direct Instruction.  I introduced collaborative by asking students to work together on a wiki to produce a specimen answer to past exam papers of an exam they are sitting in January.  Each student had to write an attempted answer on one question and then edit and improve the work of their colleagues.  What I found interesting was that although nearly all students did "their" question, nobody did the editing until I chased them up about it.  They almost seemed quite surprised when I checked up on it but once they realised I was serious, they participated.

This led me to decide to use Direct Instruction in one element of the course- specifically on coaching students how to use the various aspects of moodle.  I realised after talking to students that for many, using an LMS was a very new experience for them.  One student told me she did not want to "make a fool of herself".  I found this very enlightening and decided to use DI to talk people through the process of using Moodle for contributing to a discussion. 

I think that what I have realise from this is that very often, my "natural" style is just my comfort zone.  I need to consider the best approach to effectively deliver the material for students to learn.  It has actually made my planning more complex, but in an enjoyable and stimulating kind of way.

Teaching Strategies - Individual Reflection

What I found most interesting in working on this project was that for the first time I realised the importance of the connection between the methodology of how you teach something and how you assess it.  Its pretty obvious really but I have never thought about it before in a coherent way.  At its core it is a pretty simple sequence:

• What do you want the students to be able to do?
• How are you going to teach it?
• How are you going to assess it?

In a grown up world, all of those things would be planned at the outset, but we all know that the world doesn’t work that way.  I now realise that the course delivery is an integral part of that process but I haven’t thought of it before.

As regards the different methodologies I now realise that I have used all of them to greater or lesser effect at various stages, but what I have never done is to coherently plan to do so, based on what the Learning Outcomes were.  I will definitely try to do this in future.

For example, although it is controversial, I feel Direct Instruction definitely has a place in certain aspects.  Where you need observable outcomes and a definite body of knowledge, or dealing with students who are having difficulty mastering basic concepts, DI has a role.  As an example it strikes me that completion of the bubble  sheets on the facesheet of the CEPA exam would be an ideal thing to teach by DI. The growing popularity of “cultural literacy” as promoted by ED Hirsch is also promoted by proponents of DI.   

I find myself feeling conflicted about Interactive Teaching.  I think it is the teaching style that I probably feel most at home with (I guess I am not alone in that).  However  on reading the work of the other group I could not help but come to the conclusion that the methodology was really just Direct Instruction that had been jazzed up a bit to make it more interesting for the students.  It is claimed that this methodology increases retention rates.  Retention of what?  There is still a body of knowledge that we want the students to know and we want them to be able to do the thing in the way we want them to do it.  I may be wrong but I was left with the feeling that this methodology was really for the 2^nd type of teacher in the videos we watched at the beginning of the module.

Collaborative learning seems to be not about the content but about the process.  We need to be aware of the distinction between cooperation and collaboration.  I think most of the group projects I have been involved in as a teacher were really cooperative projects.  I also find it interesting that at the time of writing, the one methodology that has so far not been presented is the group work on collaboration! J However, most institutions have Graduate Outcomes as well as Course Learning Outcomes and in order to truly achieve these, there needs to be an effort to integrate collaborative methodology into the curriculum

I found Problem Based Learning to be an interesting methodology.  It seems to be great for development of soft skills.  It can also be used to teach and develop other skills.  I needed to use them to see the work of the group as they had put it in Softchalk, which required me to download and run some additional software which my computer did not have.  I had a problem doing this which I still haven’t solved and ended up reading their work in html format.  I solved the problem to the level I needed to, but probably not to what would have given me a good grade if I was being assessed on it.

I would also suspect that PBL is very useful to teach and develop the higher levels of the taxonomy such as synthesize and evaluate.  I think it can be particularly effective where there is no “right answer” that the teacher is looking for.  However, using it inappropriately runs great risks.  If the course being delivered is really about a body of content knowledge then tying PBL into a coherent assessment strategy is extremely difficult.  How do you grade a student based on the work of another student?

I have written about the methodologies in the order that they seem to fit within Bloom’s Taxonomy.

1. Direct Instruction
2. Interactive Teaching
3. Collaborative Learning
4. Problem Based Learning

However, there is a danger in doing that.  The danger is that the perception could be that lower level courses should be taught by DI with the other methodologies being used as things get more complex.  But the truth is far more complex – as the “Hole in the Wall” example shows.  Students with very little knowledge of a subject can be taught aspects of it using various methods.  And students also need to be exposed to how to learn using different methodologies - otherwise how will they be able to function effectively later on?

So, in summary completion of this module has made me realise that there are a variety of teaching methodologies that can each play a role.  And I think that each of these methodologies could have been effectively utilised within parts of any course which I have ever taught.

My job as a teacher is to identify when, where and how to use them for the benefit of my students.

Aligning Goals With My Course

Before I start I have 3 issues with statements made within the videos:

Ø  Susan as a Deep learner “teaches herself.” So she gets no value from the teacher? If the lesson was different, she would.  The teacher also has a responsibility to maximise the benefit of the lesson for Susan.

Ø  Robert as a Strategic learner “will cut any corner to achieve his goal with minimum effort”.  This is said as if it is a bad thing.  Sorry, but that is basic common sense.  So will Susan – its just her goals are different to Robert’s.  If anyone ever does otherwise they are wasting resources.  The problem only occurs when the goals are inappropriate.  For example, what are my goals in doing this course? I certainly want to achieve them with the minimum of effort but if my only goal in doing the course is to obtain the qualification, I am missing an opportunity to develop skills which will help me in my career and hopefully increase my job satisfaction because my students will do better.  If my only goal is to get the qualification, in the long run that will serve neither me nor the awarding institution as the value of their credentials will be undermined.

  Ø  The last line of the 3^rd video states that the aim is to get “Robert to behave like Susan”.  To me that is wrong.  In a Level 3 teacher’s class, both Susan and Robert are behaving differently because the context is different.  Maybe by participating in different activities Susan will learn social skills that will help her develop and perform better in her career.

Anyway, now that my rant is over I better address the issue.  

One of the courses I am involved with this term is a module in International Business Environment which is part of a course in a Graduate Diploma in Management.  The awarding body sets the learning outcomes which mainly fall within applying and understanding in Bloom’s Taxonomy.  We have the opportunity to define the topics covered during the course

The awarding body also sets the method of assessment – which is one 3 hour exam worth 100% of the course grade.  We set the exam and write the exam questions which must be sent to and validated by the awarding body before the exam.  To me there are two very real dangers in delivering a course like this.  The first is that the lectures and lesson activities are engaging and the students get a good understanding of the subject - but the teacher forgets that the students need to write a 3 hour paper so they end up doing badly in the exam.  The second is that the teacher focusses on the exam so the students effectively memorise what they need to get it down on paper.  Neither of these is satisfactory

The next time the course is run I will insist that during the first lesson we do a brainstorm activity and get the students to select the topics for study during the term.  This term, the lead teacher chose them.  I feel the students will feel much more connected to the course if they have played an active role in selecting the topics within International Business which are covered.  This will mean that it is far more likely that they will select topics of which they have previous experience – so there will be more chance of them constructing knowledge on top of what they already know.  As the exam is to choose and answer 5 questions from a given 8, I would hope that all students will have sufficient opportunity  to be examined on topics of which they have experience.

As we have no choice over the method of assessment, I need to identify and implement opportunities through the course for formative assessment.  Fortunately we use Moodle as our LMS so I intend to utilise this as much as possible.  Opportunities for formative assessment are:

On line and in class discussion forums on selected topics

Requesting students to summarise and discuss academic literature and/or current events relevant to the topics

Ungraded exam practise or essay planning activities.  

Some of our students have not been in an academic environment for many years so they do need to be given the opportunity for exam practise – Moodle can create this opportunity by me setting exam type questions and asking them to try to answer it within 45 minutes at home and submit it on line for my feedback

I can also give positive feedback on their forum postings and ask them to consider further thoughts on the topic as appropriate.

This process is a really important part of the course planning process.  In future I want to ensure that all of the courses I am involved with plan their course structure around this framework.

100 Ideas for Assessment

Unfortunately we didn’t get to 100, and a lot of ideas were kind of the same.  It got me thinking about a couple of issues:

1.   What do we mean by assessment?  I think the ideas generated indicated that we are kind of trapped in an HCT mindset where all assessment has to count towards the student grade.  It doesn’t of course but within HCT the perceived reality seems to be that if it doesn’t count towards the final grade, students won’t do it.  Having left HCT I am now in an environment where that is not the case.  Externally set exams or assignments are how the grade is determined but there is a lot of other “assessment” that goes on  - both formal and informal such as discussions, peer review, self assessment of achievement of learning outcomes
2. Who is assessment for?  There are many possible answers to this.  The institution, teachers, students, society at large.
3. What is assessment for?  What does it actually tell us that is meaningful?  It seems to me that college has 2 main functions.  The traditional university environment as a place where people actually seek out new knowledge but also as a kind of greenhouse where students develop supposedly real world skills in a protected and speeded up environment.  But in reality what is it that our students can do in the real world.  And more importantly what will they do ? And how do we assess that?  We are all working on this qualification and hopefully we will get it.  What does attainment of the qualification mean -not only in terms of what I can do but also and more importantly in terms of what I will do?  I always felt the UK driving test is a pretty good assessment of driving competence.  But every day I see UK qualified drivers driving badly.  Once we have got the qualification, every day many of us drive in a way which, if we had done it on the day of the test, would have meant we failed.  The same probably applies to many qualifications – even teaching.  Many professions have a process of continual assessment – such as airline pilots.  They have to do a simulation of a flight every 6 months.  If they don’t pass, they can’t fly a plane.  Should other professions such as teaching be similar?

Module 3 Blog 1

Having left HCT in the summer the nature of my students and the motivations for learning has changed.  The vast majority are working students who come to study once a week in the evenings.  They are studying for professional qualifications to enhance their career prospects.  Ireland has been greatly affected by financial crisis has affected every family in the country.   I suppose also a number of students are doing the qualification for the same reason that I am doing this qualification – to have a better skill set to do the job that I do at present, and also hopefully because I want to be as good as I can be at what I do.

Most of my students are now studying professional qualifications so I and my institution are not in control of the nature of the summative assessment.  An example of this is the students taking the Post Graduate Diploma in Management, awarded by a UK body known as the Institute of Commercial Management.  Most of the modules are assessed by the students completing an assignment of about 4000 words.  The ICM gives a very clear assignment brief and grading criteria with each assignment and also enables the students to access past papers.  They also give general feedback on how students have performed previously so that lecturers and new students can see what the issues are that need to be watched for.

This all works because the assignments themselves actually set demanding tasks which clearly set out a level of knowledge and application in the learning outcomes.  The students can work together in groups to do the preparatory work but must complete the assignment individually.  Students completing this assignment have an ability to do something meaningful in a real world setting – its not just about revising for exams.

This is really helpful for me as a teacher because during the course I can set the students formative tasks throughout the course to give them the chance to develop the skills they need to have to be successful on the summative assignment.  They buy in to these tasks because although they realise the task in itself does not count towards their grade, the relevant skill will do so.