The College Classroom Week 1: Introduction

collegeclassroom.ucsd.edu #tccucsd
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The College Classroom
Image: Greinke and Bob McClure by ChrisM70 on flickr CC
What do you notice?
What do you wonder?

The College Classroom
Tuesday, October1
Thursday, October 3
Fall 2013
Week 1: Introduction

Who Am I – Peter
Peter Newbury
 PhD (Univ. of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada) 1998
in applied math
 Carl Wieman Science Education Initiative, 2008 – 2012
 Associate Director, Center for Teaching Development
since August, 2012
Teaching and learning interests:
 how people learn astronomy, physics, math
 how to motivate instructors to transform the way they teach
 finding the most effective ways to implement peer instruction (clickers)
 Establishing and maintaining an online personal learning network
@polarisdotca peternewbury.org
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Who Am I – Steph
Steph Carmack
 PhD candidate in Stephan Anagnostaras’ lab in the UCSD Division of
Social Sciences
 The College Classroom and Summer Graduate Teaching Scholar alum
(2013)
Research interests:
 The relationship between memory and addiction
 Pychostimulant mechanisms in ADHD
 Moral attitudes toward academic doping
Teaching experience :
 2 accelerated summer classes for high school students (Summer 2012-3)
 Neurobiology of Learning and Memory (Summer 2013)
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Who are you?
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Why are you taking The College Classroom?
A) I’m looking for a tenure-track academic position and
knowing about teaching will help me get a job.
B) I have little/no teaching experience and I want to
get some.
C) I’ve taught before and I want to
become a better instructor.
D) I’m interested in the theory and
pedagogy of teaching and learning.
E) other

A quick survey:
We have people with different backgrounds in our
audience: Raise your hand if this is you:
Who experienced undergraduate education in the US?
Who has had a teaching experience before?
Who has given a technical talk?
Who has English as a second language?
Who has been a student in a large (150+ students) class?
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Introduction to teaching and learning
in higher education

Survey
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Which of these do you associate with a typical
university lecture?
A) listening
B) absorbing
C) note-taking
D) learning
E) other

The traditional lecture is based on the
transmissionist learning model
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(Image by um.dentistry on flickr CC)

Let’s have a learning experience…
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Here is an important new number
system. Please learn it.
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1 = 4 = 7 =
2 = 5 = 8 =
3 = 6 = 9 =

Test
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What is this number?

Scientifically Outdated, a Known
Failure
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We must abandon the tabula rasa
“blank slate” and “students as
empty vessels” models of teaching
and learning.

New Number System
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Here’s the structure of the “tic-tac-toe” code:
1 2 3
4 5 6
7 8 9

Test
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What is this number?

New learning is based on knowledge that you already
hold.
You store things in long term memory
through a set of connections that are
made with your existing memories.
Constructivist Theory of Learning
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(Images by Rebecca-Lee on flickr CC)
Creating memories (aka learning) involves
having neurons fire and neurons link up in
networks or patterns. fMRI is allowing us to
observe learning as it happens.
learning is done
by individuals

How People Learn [1]
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Learning is not about what
professors do.
It’s about what THE LEARNER does!
Corollary:
Students do not LEARN just
by listening to the professor explain

What the best college teachers do [2]
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The best college teachers create environments where
“students encounter safe yet challenging conditions in
which they can
try,
fail,
receive feedback, and
try again
without facing summative evaluation”
a test that counts for marks

What are the goals of TCC?
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Topic-level
LO
Topic-level
LO
Topic-
level LO
Course-level LO #4
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Course-level LO #2
Course-level LO #3Course-level
learning outcome (LO) #1
Topic-level
LO
Topic-level
LO
Topic-level
LO
Topic-level
LO
Topic-level
LO
Topic-level
LO
Topic-level
LOTopic-level
LO
Topic-
level LO
Topic-
level LO
Topic-
level LO
Topic-
level LO
Topic-
level LO
Topic-
level LO
Topic-
level LO
Topic-level
LO
Topic-level
learning outcome

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Course-level learning outcomes (that support, and are
supported by, the topic-level outcomes)
 you’ll be reflective and scholarly about your teaching
 you’ll be able to explain why certain instructional activities are
successful and why others are not
 you’ll be able to identify and support student-centered
learning environments
 you’ll know how to succeed as a professional educator in
higher education
 you’ll be able to recognize and build upon the diversity of
your students

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Many topic-level learning outcomes in
1. modern theory of Constructivist learning
 by the end of the course, you’ll be able to have an
elevator conversation describing the importance of
metacognition in learning.
 and more…

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2. best practices for the college classroom
 by the end of the course, you’ll be able to write a peer
instruction (clicker) question and explain to a colleague the
rationale behind the question and choices and describe
how it can be incorporated into the lesson.
 and more…
Throughout the classes, I’ll be
trying to model best practices
so try to watch how I teach
as well as what I teach.

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3. how to be a successful, professional educator
 by the end of the course, you’ll be able to begin to build
a personal learning network (PLN) by, for example,
posting to a Wordpress blog, collaborating with others
using Google docs and interacting through social media.
 and more…

Traditional classroom
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 first exposure to material is in class, content is
transmitted from instructor to student
 learning occurs later when student struggles alone to
complete homework, essay, project
learn easy
stuff together
learn hard
stuff alone
transfer assimilate

Flipped classroom
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 student learns easy content at home: definitions,
basis skills, simple examples. Frees up class time for...
 students come to class prepared to tackle
challenging concepts in class, with immediate
feedback from peers, instructor
learn hard
stuff together
learn easy
stuff alone
transfer assimilate

What is going to happen in this class
Weekly on Tuesdays at 11:00a -12:30p and repeated on
Thursdays at 12:30 – 1:50p in Center Hall, Room 316:
 1hr 20 min “lecture” – mixture of theory and practice
 interact in small groups (e.g. Peer Instruction)
 If you need to attend a conference, job interview or
something of that nature, attend the other weekly session
and let us know.
To Prepare:
 read research paper(s)
 do an activity (post on the class blog, leave comments on
others’ posts, observe a class, etc.)
Professional career preparation:
 write Teaching Statement,
 create microteaching experience (details later in quarter)
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collegeclassroom.ucsd.edu
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All course information,
presentations, links to
readings, discussions, etc.
will be on the class blog.
Each of you will have a username and password so you
can post to the blog. (You don’t need to login to access
the course materials or leave comments, though.)
(Image by kitsu on flickr CC)

Clicker question
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Which best describes your experience with blogs?
A) I don’t have any experience with blogs.
B) I read blog occasionally
C) I read blogs often and leave comments
D) I’ve written posts on someone else’s blog
E) I have my own blog

Course blog is public so
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 I can only provide links to copyrighted articles, not
the articles (PDF) themselves
 you may need to be on-campus so you can use UCSD
credentials to access subscriptions
 you may be able to connect from home with the UCSD
web proxy server (search Blink for “web proxy”)
 Your posts and comments will be visible to the public:
learn to be careful about what and how you write.
Your posts become part of your digital footprint.
 If you include pictures in your posts, they must not be
protected by copyright (use Creative Commons pix?)

How you will be assessed
The College Classroom is not an official UCSD course.
You will not receive an grade on your transcript.
To receive a completion certificate (and for SGTSs, to
be qualified to teach in the summer), you must
 attend all sessions
 thoughtfully complete all assigned work.
 contribute during class in a professional, collegial
manner.
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Syllabus
Week
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2) How people learn
3) Development of expertise
4) Learning outcomes
5) Assessment
6) Digital identities and
personal learning networks
7) Growth and fixed mindsets
8) Diversity of learners
9) Alternatives to lecture,
cooperative learning strategies
10) Teaching as research,
succeeding in academia,
11) and 12)
(topics and/or order may change as the course progresses)
Microteaching presentations
preparation
Teaching Statements
background
first draft
peer review
second draft
Microteaching presentations

Homework for Week 2:
Visit the course blog. Contact info for Peter and
Stephanie is on the About page.
Find the homework for Week 2 (to be completed before
the Week 2 sessions on Oct 8 and 10.)
You will need the password to access certain items. The
password is ________________.
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References
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1. National Research Council (2000). How People
Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School: Expanded
Edition. J.D. Bransford, A.L Brown & R.R. Cocking
(Eds.),Washington, DC: The National Academies
Press.
2. Bain, K. (2004). What the best college teachers do.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

The College Classroom Week 1: Introduction

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The College Classroom Week 1: Introduction