Always approach teaching as if students, learning matter

January 5, 2007

By John Thompson

Thompson

During fall term, the Provost’s Series on Teaching and Learning provided an impressive array of presentations. From September through early December, 43 U of S faculty and staff presented 13 workshops; 259 people attended. The centerpiece was the Nov. 1-3 McGraw-Hill Ryerson National Conference, “Exemplary Teaching: Inspiring Learner Engagement and Success.” It brought together three international keynotes, 41 presentations by 48 speakers, including 14 U of S faculty and staff, and 235 participants of whom 130 were from the U of S.

The Provost’s Series publicized the opening of the University Learning Centre. It solicited ideas, practices, and support for the forthcoming Foundational Document on Teaching and Learning. It provided a window on significant developments in pedagogical research and practices during the past 30 years. It showcased persons and projects for effective teaching and learning on our campus.

Of all the series events, two presentations on the University Learning Centre, and one each on the Student Focus Group Study and the Student Retention Study attracted 60% of the attendees.  Since some faculty, staff and students attended multiple events, the 250 total attendance number represents considerably fewer persons, continuing, to some extent, “preaching to the choir” about the importance of teaching and learning.  The challenge remains: how can these innovative ideas and effective practices be defused to a significant cross-section of busy faculty, staff, and students?

Here I want to view the Provost Series and our practices through a question and a pedagogical lens that two keynote speakers at the conference held up to our teaching and learning – How do we teach and learn in such a way that learning lasts and makes a difference? That question points to the lens, “deep learning.”

Pedagogical research over the past 30 years has documented significant conclusions about how we learn. Both Ken Bain and Chris Knapper anchored their keynote presentations in “deep learning,” learning rooted in questions and based on intrinsic motivation, student engagement, and understanding. This contrasts with “surface learning” based on extrinsic rewards, memorization, and pursuit of grades.

Bain and Knapper argue that “deep learning” is about meaning, students engaged intellectually, emotionally, socially and ethically, fields of study connected to personal experience, personal development to disciplinary learning, classroom practices to life goals and aspirations. Such learning means active engagement, time, and attention by students and teachers as persons. Such learning changes persons, makes a difference, lasts. Through this lens, teaching is effective only when “deep learning” is the outcome.

What can faculty do to facilitate such learning? Creating a space that encourages inquiry, is safe for risk taking, is collaborative, connects assessment with learning, and relates subject matter to student relevance.

What have I learned from the Provost Series? First, as faculty we have a lot to learn about effective teaching that results in “deep learning.” We need to take the pedagogical research literature seriously.

Second, the sharp separation between academic majors and student education as persons needs to be bridged. The results of the presentations – outstanding retention study and the student focus group study; the impressive work of student disabilities services; the successful design and implementation of an undergraduate program based on outcomes, of an integrated interdisciplinary 18 credit unit course, and of a platform for creating and delivering cross-college interdisciplinary programs; an exciting field course that engages students as researchers with community members and their practices and beliefs; the transforming effect of alternative reading week project; the power of learning communities; the promising sustainability theme as a campus-wide learning priority – are not simply add-ons, but integral to “deep learning.”

Third, I witnessed dedicated faculty and staff on our campus whose scholarship of teaching and learning in developing, implementing, and evaluating teaching and learning practices, within and outside classrooms, have facilitated outcomes of “deep learning.” Though these effective teaching efforts are hidden, the projects and the faculty and staff deserve to be better known. They are effective and inspiring.

What can we do? Several easy things come to mind. First, view the outstanding keynote addresses of Ken Bain and Chris Knapper, available in streaming video on the Gwenna Moss Centre website. Second, invite one or several of the Provost Series presenters to your department or college for a presentation. It would be an hour or two well spent. Third, read the outstanding Retention Study report when it is published.

Finally, drop in with a friend for a tour of the University Learning Centre and the Gwenna Moss Centre for Teaching Effectiveness. You may be surprised at what is happening on our campus to encourage teaching as if students and learning mattered.

_____________

John Thompson is a retired professor of Sociology, a U of S Master Teacher and a 3M Teaching Fellow.