TEACHING ADVICE COLUMN

The following is an excerpt from  Chalk Talk:  E-advice from Jonas Chalk,
Legendary College Teacher. Qualters, D.M. and Diamond, M.R. (ed.s) (2004)
Stillwater,  OK :  New Forums Press Inc.  230 pages. Written in advice
column format and grouped by topic, this book contains research-based
guidance and direction on how to deal with teaching decisions that arise in
this electronic age.

        The Challenge:  How to Improve Teaching

The problem for those interested in changing teaching practice is how to
engage faculty and get them to change old habits in an informed way - in
other words, to have faculty examine what they do in the classroom in light
of current research and then actually make a change.

That was the challenge to the Northeastern University Master Teaching Team.
The College of Engineering in partnership with the College of Arts and
Sciences at Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts received a
three-year grant from the General Electric Learning Excellence Fund to
improve the learning outcomes and the learning experience of engineering
students, especially freshmen.  This grant allowed us to form the Master
Teaching Team comprised of faculty from the School of Engineering and the
School of Arts and Science, along with members of the Center for Effective
University Teaching and the Educational Technology Center.  An
interdisciplinary subset of this group became the Instructional Development
Group and was charged with designing a faculty development plan that would
improve teaching across disciplinary boundaries and introduce new teaching
methods that would be appropriate to a wide variety of disciplines - a
formidable task!

We did have some roadmaps from the organizational change literature to guide
us in this endeavor.  Seminal literature such as Chin and Benne (1969)
developed strategies and models that are particularly adaptable to help
faculty develop as teachers.  They identified strategies that form the
framework of models to engage groups in the change process.  One of the
strategies, called the Normative/Re-educative Approach, engages participants
in the development process by using "real problems" and then having
participants actively involved in the decision-making process on how to
design solutions for these problems.  Today we call this problem based
learning (PBL).  In PBL groups are presented with contextual situations and
asked to define the problem, decide what skills and resources are necessary
to investigate the problem, and then pose possible solutions (Duch, Groh,
and Allen, 2001).  In many ways this is what faculty must do.  They are
confronted with real muddy problems in the context of their class that they
must address.  In essence, like their students, they must define what the
problem is, what do they already know about it, what do they not know, where
can they find the information, and most importantly what can they do.

    Reaching the Target Audience: The Development of an E-Advice Column

Any activity devised would need to be time-efficient and easy to do;
cost-efficient but available to a large number of faculty; cover as many
individuals as possible on the change continuum; provide strategies and
alternatives in an explicit way but with enough options to allow the faculty
member to make the final decision; provide insight to get faculty to think
about their own examined assumptions; be collegial and allow a partnership
to develop between the team and the faculty in improving teaching; and
lastly, share some of the literature on teaching and learning that would
inform faculty as they design environments to maximize student-learning.

Thus was born JONAS CHALK: CHALK TALK.   This electronic teaching advice
column, written collaboratively by the members of the Instructional
Development Group, met all the above criteria.  The team started talking
initially about our own challenges in the classroom and soon found that many
were having the same concerns.  We all struggled with how to get students
engaged in the class, what do to when no one answered our questions, how to
respond to student excuses and so the questions seemed to write themselves.
We soon realized it would take time, knowledge, and experience to
comprehensively answer these questions, but as the questions surfaced we
found ourselves saying, "This is what I do", "I always do this", "Have you
ever tried this?"  Collectively, we had a lot of ideas and tips and that our
experience was quite extensive.  Thus evolved the system of constructing a
group question at our meeting and then soliciting a volunteer  among the
group to be the lead writer.  (Eventually, recipients of the column began
submitting their own questions, as well as opinions.) The writer would draft
an answer and circulate it to the rest of the team over e-mail, where each
person would have a turn adding ideas, citing relevant literature, giving
examples and editing  grammar.  The final copy was deemed "ready to ship"
and e-mailed to faculty on our distribution list.

The columns contained a common "real" problem in teaching that faculty from
any discipline and teaching any group of students might encounter.  Jonas
then would outline the issues in the problem, identify resources and then
suggest possible solutions, always providing a number of options from
different discipline perspectives which team members themselves used to
address the problem.  These columns were kept short and identified the
teaching dilemma in the subject line.  Faculty could quickly open the
e-mail, scan it, and then save it for future reference. This approach gave
faculty a number of techniques from a variety of disciplines and
perspectives to consider.

Sample Chalk Talk Column
Here is a sample column entitled "Unfair Testing"
Dear Jonas,

Yesterday I gave my class a test. At the end of the period only about half
the students had finished the exam.  The students started getting very
vocal, complaining about needing more time, asking whether they could do it
over, claiming that the test wasn't fair, and so on.  So I told them that
for those who didn't finish, I would grade only the part they had completed.
After class, the students who had finished the test came to me and were very
angry.  They said it wasn't fair: since they had finished the test, why
should these other students have less work graded? Now I've got everybody in
the class mad at me.  What should I do?
    - Tested Out

    Dear Tested Out,

First, think about what you might have done to avoid this.  For example, did
you try the test yourself to see how long it took you to do it?  Even though
you're an expert, you often get a feel for how much time it might actually
take if you try to answer your own questions.  It's always best to try any
assignments yourself beforehand so that you have a better understanding of
what's involved in doing the work.  If you have a TA or grad student working
for you, you could ask him or her to take the test and note how long it
took; you can then adjust the questions accordingly. If this happens again,
you can try a couple of strategies.  You could tell students that you're
going to grade the entire test, but because so many students had problems
with it, you're willing to drop one grade this quarter (assuming that you
are sure your future tests can be done in the allotted time).  If you
believe in extra credit, you could give students an opportunity to make up
points.

With this class, you're already in a bind. It's best to be frank with the
group and tell them you were really surprised that they couldn't finish the
test in time.  You might also consider telling them that those who want the
test to count should let you know, and for the others, you'll disregard the
test grade in the final grade calculations.  You should then set the policy
clearly with the class for future tests.  They'll appreciate that you've
heard their concerns and are planning to address them in the future.
Jonas

Quick Tip:  To approximate whether an allotted exam time will be adequate
for students, determine the time it takes you to complete the exam and
multiply by three.
Outcomes and Influences

What are the implications for faculty development?  First, the success of
this program lay in the fact that Jonas was written by faculty for faculty.
The writers knew the current issues and struggles occurring in (and out of)
the classroom at that university.  They understood what responses were
realistic and what actions most professors were unlikely to take.  It was
written in an accessible, collegial format with Jonas often talking about
his struggles as well.

Second, team members themselves gained in knowledge and experience as a
result of participating in the discourse and debate that took place while
collaborating to create a weekly product.  This discourse occurred both in
face-to-face meetings, and during the process of using e-mail to compose,
edit, and revise the columns before they were sent out.  We also created
cross-disciplinary and cross-college connections that improved overall
communication and collaboration.

Third, as this was delivered in an electronic format, a resource on
effective teaching was collected and made accessible for the entire
university, using new technologies.  When a concern arose, faculty could
turn to the electronic list of Jonas columns and quickly get some direction
and ideas about how to handle the issue.

After running weekly columns for two years, we surveyed our targeted
readership of approximately 50 faculty and teaching assistants to get their
feedback on the usefulness of Jonas in changing classroom practices  Our
survey generated a 50% return rate from all the disciplines involved in the
project.    Of the respondents, 92% found Jonas helpful, 59% had spoken to
another colleague about their teaching because of a Chalk Talk column, but
most impressive was the fact that 92% had thought about their teaching
practices and tried at least one new idea.

Faculty respondent comments showed that they were reflecting and thinking
about their practice and choosing to try one or two ideas that Jonas had
presented.  One faculty member told us " (Jonas) helped me recognize some of
the philosophies I hold and the techniques I use".  The concept of
reflection was often raised:  Jonas "helped me think about things", "helped
me deal and think about questions from students and their problems",
"caused me to consider how I do things and possible techniques I can try",
"cause one to reflect on one's own teaching and what one could do better to
improve teaching, how to interact better with students and how to be more
effective as a communicator and teacher".  It would appear that Jonas was
doing what we had hoped in the original conception of the idea; help faculty
think about their teaching practices.   In other words, getting faculty to
be contemplative, and then for those who were in the action phase providing
a variety of techniques from different disciplines that they could
experiment with in their own classes.

The simple, cost-effective process of a collaboratively driven advice column
can be an accessible resource to support the work of faculty on many levels.
Through building community, creating a forum for discourse, and serving as a
resource using technology, e-advice can promote timely and effective
teaching.