The reading for this week was My Freshman Year By Rebekah Nathan also known as Cathy Small. As an anthropologist she decided to take a closer look at the freshman population of a University to get to know why they do what they do.
What was the most surprising aspect of the book, and why did it surprise you?
The most surprising part of this book for me was the section called Who Eats with Whom: A Study of Student Dining starting on page 61. I think that it was surprising for me because I usually ate with groups of mixed ethnicity during much of my freshman year. There were usually a few distinct groups that I ate with, mostly Chemistry nerds and people from hall government. The NDSU Chemistry program has many different cultures represented and it would be very difficult to go to a meal with a group and not have different ethnicities present. With a dining background like this, I was not really aware that it was common to have such separations. I think that it makes sense in general though. As a freshman I was a little shy and nervous about moving and doing things. It seems logical that people might try to find things that are familiar, and a shared language or culture is comforting. I have never seen people take their food to go and eat in their dorm. I didn’t sit and watch people for hours, but I feel confident that this didn’t happen very often which leads to my surprise.
I was an RA for a year when I was an undergraduate and I think that the book did a fairly good job of getting the motivation behind the programs that the RAs did, but I don’t think that I have ever heard of a dorm with this much going on at once. It seemed like she must have really tried to hit up all of the events that she could. It is good to be involved, but if you want the true college experience you would want to pick just a few and go to those. RAs know full well that most people have other things to do and they are not surprised when nobody shows up for programs. The goal is really just to get people talking to each other, but once everybody reaches a comfort level they resist change. People will form their clans and do things with them because it is easier than trying to do too much with a big group of strangers.
In light of the challenges faced by undergraduate students highlighted in the book, what advice would you give new college instructors?
First they should understand that there are a lot of different time commitments to which students need to allocate their attention. If a teacher just looks at the credit load that students have they may think that there is plenty of time to study, but there are things like work, organizations, and clubs that students do as well. The longer I have been in college the more I found that the grades really don’t matter. They are a bad tool for evaluating students potential. The real benefit comes in making connections. Most of the information a person needs can be learned on ones own if they are motivated, and a potential employer looks at what reference letters and experience the candidate has. This, of course, doesn’t count when considering pre-med or pre-pharm students, but for most other students there is a lot of leeway. This makes some of the professional organizations and clubs very important for students.
With that in mind a teacher should only assign reading or work that is important. On page 122 the author comments that “82 percent of seniors said that they sometimes, often, or very often come to class without completing readings or assignments.” She goes on to explain a few of the reasons on page 137. If the material is not important or needed for later in the class it is not going to get any attention. Furthermore, if there is some reading that you feel is very important it should be mentioned in a manner that suggests just how important it really is. I would suggest that this varies, because a teacher always saying something will be on the test gets a little old and makes people fear the monster of a test that you must be thinking of.
I would also suggest that new college instructors make sure they know that many cultures have different views on how education works. If an instructor has trouble getting through to some students they should try and figure out what they can reasonably do to accommodate them. It doesn’t need to be a mystery. If there is a problem the easiest way to approach the problem is to ask. There may be a sense of the student not wanting to disagree with you, but from the experience that I have had with foreign students, they will quickly come to learn that talking to the teacher is not a bad thing.
Has this book changed your perspective on undergraduate students? If no, why not? If so, how so?
The book really didn’t change my opinion of undergraduate students. It did enlighten me with a few statistics that made me a little more aware of why undergrads do what they do. I think that I had a pretty varied undergraduate career that ended fairly recently, though. I was an RA, I switched majors, I talked with students of different cultures that were in my majors, and I grumbled about how unfair the professors were. I even took the wicked easy Human Sexuality class that she mentions. While I didn’t pay as close of attention as the author, I did have a fairly similar undergraduate experience. I will admit that there were differences, and that her freshman year covered much of the things that I did through my whole undergrad career.
Monday, November 16, 2009
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Blog entry #10
This week's readings covered helping students become better more strategic learners, the ethics of teaching, and the ability to sustain teaching growth for a long time.
Helping students become more strategic learners involves several strategies, but the ones I want to focus on from the reading are the importance of goals and self reflection as well as the use of existing knowledge to learn new things. Students need to have gaols for learning in all classes. With no target they are likely to just drift along aimlessly on a sea of facts. Many students don't feel that they really want to take a class, so they simply tolerate it and try to get by. It is a teachers job to kindle the fire of their curiosity and make them try to get something out of the course. By breaking the course topics into small more manageable areas of discussion a student is more likely to find something interesting to them and will set a goal for learning that. When compared to a huge monolithic idea it is easy to see how small topics are embraceable. Many classes are required for a major and the students need to take them, but don't want to. For this sort of class I would try to find a few interesting areas that will keep students interested or at the very least make them see the importance of the class. Pre-med students need to take a class covering some class of animal. They usually take the class that is easiest, not the most beneficial. To get people interested in mammalogy for example I could have a few topics that cover physiology and always compare different mammalian orders back to humans. There could be a topic on how mammals interact as invasive species for ECS majors. To get people interested is the best way to help them learn, but I would settle for students at least seeing a need to learn the information. Desire is difficult to instill, but reason is usually effective for changing minds.
I would also like to mention the use of previous knowledge to build new ideas. This is a common theme in the sciences. Students need to take certain courses because they will need to know things before there is synthesis into new higher level topics. For the most part this is direct relation of one idea to another, but it is important to look at analogies. When you look at a topic from a different perspective it is common to see things that were missed in the straight forward approach. For my evolution course I would likely have topics from economics to illustrate points. Survival of the fittest can be a difficult thing to look at in terms of living organisms, but to look at it in terms of financial institutions it may resonate.
Ethics in school is always seen as a touchy subject. When it is brought up there is always a mention of plagiarism and cheating, but what of the ethics the teacher must show. There is a need for teachers to set their ethical standards and stick to them. In this way they can maintain their responsibility to the students. The course that I am designing is a touchy subject. Each student has their own ingrained notion of what is right and wrong. The problem comes in managing how all of these views can be dealt with in a class of differing opinions. I think that by sticking with a matter of fact approach and not discounting any one theory I can keep students from being discouraged. In this part of the US there is still a lot of resistance to an evolution course and angering the students by belittling their cultural beliefs is counterproductive. I have had teachers that have done this, and I lost respect for them even though I personally agreed with them. This will be my fine line to walk. There is a site that has information regarding psychology students worries about teaching that have many similar questions raised that I might have about my teaching.
To maintain a passion for teaching is important for how I will keep teaching as long as some of the faculty in my department. This can be done by reading scientific journals, continuing to discuss issues with peers, and to keep up with other researchers work. Peer and student review is important for keeping your teaching skills honed. The real goal in my mind is to keep from getting to stale. Things need to be changed at times in science courses because there is always a different facet that is updated. As science is fluid, so must my teaching be. To keep along the same course without update is a recipe for disaster. Not only must the information change, but the way the information is presented must change. For better or worse other things must be tried to keep things interesting. The classes that I have taken in which the teacher tried a new way of teaching have been at times annoying, but they were significantly better than the courses in which the teacher was riding out the rest of his tenure before he could retire. I owe it to the students to try and learn each semester as much as they do. Linked here is a site that talks about teacher burnout and ways to prevent it.
Helping students become more strategic learners involves several strategies, but the ones I want to focus on from the reading are the importance of goals and self reflection as well as the use of existing knowledge to learn new things. Students need to have gaols for learning in all classes. With no target they are likely to just drift along aimlessly on a sea of facts. Many students don't feel that they really want to take a class, so they simply tolerate it and try to get by. It is a teachers job to kindle the fire of their curiosity and make them try to get something out of the course. By breaking the course topics into small more manageable areas of discussion a student is more likely to find something interesting to them and will set a goal for learning that. When compared to a huge monolithic idea it is easy to see how small topics are embraceable. Many classes are required for a major and the students need to take them, but don't want to. For this sort of class I would try to find a few interesting areas that will keep students interested or at the very least make them see the importance of the class. Pre-med students need to take a class covering some class of animal. They usually take the class that is easiest, not the most beneficial. To get people interested in mammalogy for example I could have a few topics that cover physiology and always compare different mammalian orders back to humans. There could be a topic on how mammals interact as invasive species for ECS majors. To get people interested is the best way to help them learn, but I would settle for students at least seeing a need to learn the information. Desire is difficult to instill, but reason is usually effective for changing minds.
I would also like to mention the use of previous knowledge to build new ideas. This is a common theme in the sciences. Students need to take certain courses because they will need to know things before there is synthesis into new higher level topics. For the most part this is direct relation of one idea to another, but it is important to look at analogies. When you look at a topic from a different perspective it is common to see things that were missed in the straight forward approach. For my evolution course I would likely have topics from economics to illustrate points. Survival of the fittest can be a difficult thing to look at in terms of living organisms, but to look at it in terms of financial institutions it may resonate.
Ethics in school is always seen as a touchy subject. When it is brought up there is always a mention of plagiarism and cheating, but what of the ethics the teacher must show. There is a need for teachers to set their ethical standards and stick to them. In this way they can maintain their responsibility to the students. The course that I am designing is a touchy subject. Each student has their own ingrained notion of what is right and wrong. The problem comes in managing how all of these views can be dealt with in a class of differing opinions. I think that by sticking with a matter of fact approach and not discounting any one theory I can keep students from being discouraged. In this part of the US there is still a lot of resistance to an evolution course and angering the students by belittling their cultural beliefs is counterproductive. I have had teachers that have done this, and I lost respect for them even though I personally agreed with them. This will be my fine line to walk. There is a site that has information regarding psychology students worries about teaching that have many similar questions raised that I might have about my teaching.
To maintain a passion for teaching is important for how I will keep teaching as long as some of the faculty in my department. This can be done by reading scientific journals, continuing to discuss issues with peers, and to keep up with other researchers work. Peer and student review is important for keeping your teaching skills honed. The real goal in my mind is to keep from getting to stale. Things need to be changed at times in science courses because there is always a different facet that is updated. As science is fluid, so must my teaching be. To keep along the same course without update is a recipe for disaster. Not only must the information change, but the way the information is presented must change. For better or worse other things must be tried to keep things interesting. The classes that I have taken in which the teacher tried a new way of teaching have been at times annoying, but they were significantly better than the courses in which the teacher was riding out the rest of his tenure before he could retire. I owe it to the students to try and learn each semester as much as they do. Linked here is a site that talks about teacher burnout and ways to prevent it.
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