This is a good website from UNLV on teaching large classes (60 or more) and encouraging student participation. It focuses on how to make students comfortable in a large group and to personalize the experience for the students. The author gives a series of suggestions for task assignments to include problem identification, problem solving, assignment review, test correction, and notes comparison. The author also suggests ways to reduce student anonymity to include using nametags, seating charts, and flash cards.
http://www.unlv.edu/centers/tlc/pdfs/teachinglargeclassesencouragingstudentparticipation.pdf
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As someone who is horrible at recognizing faces and remembering names, the "creative attendance taking" suggestions were a real help to me personally. I often hesitate to call on people in class to stimulate particpation because I know how embarassing it can be to not have the right answer. Physics is hard for a lot of my students and a lot of time I don't want them to feel uneasy and this squelches particpation. Perhaps this is one place where technology can come in to play: it works to distract students from the task at hand.
Hi Ken,
An interesting article. I think it would be great to see who is participating. One thing that popped into my mind, remembering when I was an undergrad, was the idea of one person bringing in the clickers for thier friends. They could submit the answer for each and be given credit for attendance as well as the activity.
Another question I had was the setup of the study. Why would they concentrate on female high school students but males at the college level. This question does not fall into this class but I would want an even mixture if I did the study.
Ken
Hi Ken, this is Joe (TA)
This is an interesting resource, I'd like to hear your take on how you think specific recommendations would work (or have worked) in your classroom.
Do you think these recommendations would work for small classes as well?
I think that these topics are equally as important in small classes although with class small (less than 25) some of the more creative and inventive ideas might not be needed. I believe that task assignment is important in any size class to include problem identification, problem solving and brainstorming. Modality variation is also important in any size class and it is essential to take regular breaks during lecture and to try alternative teach styles such as group tasks. I also like the idea of using creative attendance taking although some of these ideas such as using group leaders for attendance reporting are necessary only in larger classes. It is also important to reduce student anonymity regardless of the size to include referring to students by name. Luckily, my classes are not large enough where I need to use nametags or flash cards.
Like Joe, I wonder how this would work in a small class. Th ebasic ideas sound great and seem functional, but with a class of 23 students I usually don't have the prolbems that teachers and professors have with closer to 50 or more students.
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