NUTSHELL NOTES "Teaching tips in a nutshell" - The University of Colorado at Denver's One-page Newsletter for Teaching Excellence

Learning is the most important outcome of our classes, and knowledge surveys are a direct method through which to detail the learning we caused. To create a knowledge survey, take the core objectives of 
your course and the learning objectives of each class meeting and arrange these in the form of test items in the order of course presentation. Students then rate their knowledge to answer each item on a 3 point scale. 

Students cannot answer many high level questions in a reasonable amount of time, nor would an instructor have time to grade ensuing volumes if they could. But students can rate their knowledge through their current ability to answer any item. By giving the survey at the start and end of a term, any instructor can validate the learning that took place as result of their class. In the graph below, the first eleven items cover the core objectives of the course (NN v. 7 n 3), and the others are specific content questions that reveal content coverage, rigor, and level of thinking addressed in the course. For example, questions 24 and 25 are: 

24. A case can be made that asbestos is a deadly hazard. What is the basis for that case? 

25. The case can be made that the "asbestos hazard" is nothing more than a very costly bureaucratic fabrication. What is the basis for that case? 

More on knowledge surveys can be found in NN v. 2, n. 7. Summer is a good time to review the Teaching System series of Nutshell Notes on the web and to build a system that works well for you. With a teaching system, it is easy to produce a review portfolio and a plan for improvement. Best wishes for summer!

 

FACULTY DEVELOPMENT by READING, ANYONE? 

As the semester ends, the frantic pace and pressure-cooker atmosphere makes at least some of us long for the kinds of stimulating activities that promote growth and attracted us into academe. One such activity is reading books and discussing them with interested colleagues. As a trial balloon for the summer, I would like to try forming a small book discussion group--maybe a dozen of us or so as a start, which centers around faculty development. The vision is that my office will furnish the books, and that we'd meet a month or so later for a discussion, possibly in a home or at a place off-campus. For the first title, I am offering Peter Sack's Generation X Goes to College: An Eye-Opening Account of Teaching in Postmodern America, 1996, Open Court Publishing, 222 p.--a book certain to generate lively discussion! 

Peter Sacks is a career journalist—now a tenured professor—who achieved tenure with an attitude and set of values that are disturbing. 

In his own words: "As a journalist turned college professor, I describe in my book coming face to face with Generation X: Many students were jaded, unachieving, and highly demanding, who wore bored looks, ample attitudes and reversed baseball caps. For a minimum of effort, they wanted A's and B's -- and most teachers obliged. For my own professional survival, I relaxed old-fashioned educational standards for entertainment and titillation, and became a spectacular "success" as a college teacher. Following my first-person account, I analyze my experience in the context of recent influences of postmodern life in America. I conclude that Generation X consists of genuine postmoderns, who want desperately to believe in something but have come to distrust almost everything the modern world has deemed important. Reform-minded educators, parents and policy-makers need to understand the postmodern turn and the curious individuals it has begotten."

To join , please contact Ed Nuhfer at 303 556-4915 or by email at enuhfer@carbon.cudenver.edu. We'll probably get books to folks in June and our group together in July. The first dozen responses are in. This is open to anyone who teaches our students--honoraria, faculty, part-timers, etc.

Honoraria faculty received a questionnaire in the mail from which we have received many responses. We originally intended to provide a workshop-event prior to end of the term, but to better meet suggestions of respondents, we are going to reschedule for later this summer. Honoraria who wish to receive the notice at their homes rather than via campus mail can simply send the address to the phone, fax or e-mail on this newsletter's masthead.

I received a grant from System to try an experiment in training a number of new entering freshman students to do HTML programming, web page maintenance, assist with instructional technology, and even some minor hardware maintenance. These students would then be assigned into departments (one to a department) this fall to work approximately 15 hrs/wk on work study to serve these needs. If you want one of these students, contact Ed Nuhfer via info on the masthead.