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Assignments

Course Project
Description of Course Project (.pdf)

Written Assignments
Assignment 1 (Due June 11):
Complete the Teaching Goals Inventory:
http://www.uiowa.edu/~centeach/tgi/book.html

Please complete the Teaching Goals Inventory. Choose the course for which you will be preparing the two teaching modules and base your ratings on that course. Write a brief piece (1-2 double-spaced pages) that addresses what you learned about your goals for this course. Were there any surprises? In your written piece, reproduce the summary information that appears at the very beginning of the TGI Report (This is the summary information on the Six TGI Clusters). Be sure to list the name of the course about which you completed the TGI and provide some information about the course (e.g., level; who will be the students). Sometimes instructors use the TGI to compare their goals for a course with those of their students. We have used the results from this exercise to undertake some important meta-teaching. In some areas, students' goals and the instructors' are in close alignment. In others, there are gaps. You might also consider the value of developing course-specific Teaching Goals Inventories that will allow you to gather more targeted information about your goals and students' goals for a specific course.

Your writing assignment must include the following information in the upper left-hand corner of the first page:

Your Name
Assignment #
Date Assignment Submitted

Save your writing assignment as follows: Yourlastname.Assign1.doc. If you use WORD as your word processing program, you're all set. If not, please save your work as a text file.

Please send your assignment to the course instructors via the "Student Drop Box" feature of Blackboard. Click on the "Student Tools" button at your Blackboard main page. At the "Add File to DropBox," locate the file your are going to send to me by clicking the "Browse" button at "File to Upload." Your file will be located somewhere on your computer. After you upload the file, type Assignment One at "Name of Link to File." Finally, send the file to the instructor.

This assignment is due in the Instructor's "Drop Box" by June 11.

Writing Assignment 2 (Due June 18)
Based on K. Patricia Cross, & M. Harris Steadman, Classroom Research: Implementing the Scholarship of Teaching, Jossey-Bass, 1996, Chapter 3. (Also refer to appropriate pages in Angelo and Cross book.)
Three learning issues to consider in the chapter on "The Captive Audience":
 

1. Some students lack motivation for learning physics (Learning Goals).
2. Students are more concerned about getting good grades than about learning physics (Deep and Surface learning).
3. Student ratings of instruction are threatening rather than helpful to the professor (Student Ratings of Instruction).

Corresponding hypotheses may be found starting at:

1. p. 98
2. p. 114
3. p. 141

You have two tasks to complete:

Task 1: For either Hypothesis 1 or Hypothesis 2 (only one), write 3-5 page double-spaced pages that addresses the following issues:

1. Describe one line of research presented in Cross and Steadman that addresses the hypothesis.

2. what are several appropriate CATs that may be used to gather information on the hypothesis? Be sure to explain why you choose these CATs and to list the CAT numbers (and pages from the 1993 Angelo and Cross book where the CATs are described).

3. describe a classroom research approach that would address the hypothesis. (That is, describe an approach that bears on the general issue raised with this hypothesis.)

Task 2: In the section describing Hypothesis 3, the authors provide a summary of research and theory about student evlauations. As a student and/or faculty member, you have probably had experience with student evaluations. Your task is to write 1-2 double-spaced pages that provide a personal response to what others have written about the validity of student evaluations. Do the authors? views on the research match your own experience with student evaluations? Please explain.

Save and send your assignment via the "Drop Box" (as described for Assignment 1) by June 18.

Writing Assignment 3 (Due June 25)
Based on K. Patricia Cross, & M. Harris Steadman, Classroom Research: Implementing the Scholarship of Teaching, Jossey-Bass, 1996, Chapter 4. (Also refer to appropriate pages in Angelo and Cross?s book.)

Task 1: The format of this chapter is somewhat different than that provided in Chapters 2 and 3. Pat Hutchings, the author of this case, observed the class in 1990. Instead of presenting several learning issues, Cross and Steadman provide some of Hutchings? data to illustrate learning issues. Then Cross and Steadman provide brief literature reviews on peer learning groups and on intellectual development and critical thinking. After reading the case and examining the data that Hutchings provided, we ask that you propose one learning issue related to an aspect of the case other than peer learning groups, intellectual development, or critical thinking. (Cross and Steadman also asked their readers to do this on page 168.) Your response should be between 2 and 3 double-spaced pages.

Task 2: For the learning issue that you identified from this case, select one of the CATs described in the Angelo and Cross Classroom Assessment book that would allow the two history professors to collect relevant assessment information from their students. In your response (1 - 2 pages), present the CAT name and number. Describe how you would adapt the CAT to this course.

Save and send your assignment via the "Drop Box" (as described for Assignment 1) by June 25.

Discussion Board Assignments

Is it Working? (Our thanks to Michael Lee, who developed this discussion topic.)

Dear Class:
"But Is It Working?" (Cross and Steadman, Chapter 4) focuses our attention on two issues very important to many of our classroom experiences: the effectiveness of peer learning groups and how knowledge about intellectual development and critical thinking affects course design. After you think about these issues in relation to your own experience as a learner and as an instructor, please take your thinking to a more hypothetical plane and apply some of what you know about these items to a course you might design in the future, using a platform like Blackboard as your primary medium of instruction. Here are some questions to consider:

All responses should be posted by no later than June 26.

Best. Victor Benassi and Gary Goldstein

The Challenge

Based on K. Patricia Cross, & M. Harris Steadman, Classroom Research: Implementing the Scholarship of Teaching, Jossey-Bass, 1996, Chapter 5. (Also refer to appropriate pages in Angelo and Cross book.)

Identify and describe one question and hypothesis regarding a learning issue that is represented in "The Challenge." Based on the hypothesis you propose, identify and describe one CAT or two that a classroom teacher could use to collect information that bears on your hypothesis. The CAT(s) should taken from Angelo and Cross's book. Provide enough information about the CAT(s) so that I know how you propose to adapt it (them) to the case.

Your posting is due by July 2.

Background Knowledge Probe


In Chapter 2, Cross and Steadman described two CATs that may be used to assess students' background knowledge about and preparation for a course they about to begin. Background Knowledge Probes (CAT 1) and Concept Maps (CAT 16) are very popular and useful CATs among college teachers. Other similar CATs are described in the Angelo and Cross text.

There is little doubt that the information teachers gain from properly constructed and administered background knowledge CATs can tell them a lot about what their students know about a course topic as well as about how they think about the topic.

The question we would like you to reflect on, and then to write about, is this:

Once you have gathered, analyzed, and synthesized the results of a background knowledge probe that you administered to members of a class, what would you do with that information? Would it affect the way that you run class, what you cover, how you deal with material, etc? Would it affect the way you deal with individual students?

Please keep your response brief and to the point. We want your classmates to read all postings, not just submit their own and leave it at that.

All responses should be posted by no later than June 13. Every class member should post at least one response. Additional postings are welcome.

Best. Victor Benassi and Gary Goldstein