I agree that the best was to sell TBL is to give students the positive experience of doing it; yet I do think language is important, especially when one is just starting to use the method, during which time there are bound to be rought spots.

I like the "facilitator" language and have found it helpful to speak of myself as "guide" vs. "instructor."  I also share with them the term "cognitive apprenticeship" found in the literature on learning, and suggest they view themselves as apprentices; my role as guide is to make visible thinking processes that they don't see, and teach them how to apply those processes on their own.

I also have started sharing with students a conversation I had with a student who politely articulated the familiar "you're the expert and I paid good money to hear you talk" argument.  The way she phrased it made me ask, "what exactly do you think I am an expert in?"  As we talked I was able to clarify that I see my expertise not as mastery of a clearly defined body of knowledge, which only those looking from outside could possibly believe can be fully mastered; I pointed out that many of the sources we examine in the course, I only discovered when I was selecting reading materials for the course.  Rather, my expertise is the ability to investigate a broad variety of cultural phenomena to reveal what culture is and what makes it evolve.  I pointed out that it is only by employing TBL, which creates an environment and work practices that allow students to work as apprentices, that I am able to share this expertise, which I have found never get's passed on in a traditional lecture format.

Joël Dubois

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Dr. Joël Dubois, Associate Professor
Humanities & Religious Studies
College of Arts & Letters
(916) 278-5332 // Fax #: (916) 278-7213
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On Jan 24, 2011, at 7:22 PM, Tom DeWitt wrote:

Duane,

I'm convinced that no matter what you do, you'll never be able to get everyone to buy into TBL.  Unless you have other colleagues in the College of Business who practice TBL, you are attempting to single-handedly undo years of programming about what learning is and what their role is in the process. For some, you aren't doing your job unless you're talking most of the time. For others, you may be talking too much.  I certainly see that in my teaching evaluations. I even had one student comment that my teaching had a polarizing effect on people. The reality is that we don't teach a homogeneous group of students, particularly at large state schools such as yours. I find that the students who genuinely want to learn greatly appreciate the TBL approach.

However, one thing you may want to try is to reserve ten minutes at the end of class to have everyone identify at least one thing that they learned from a classmate, discuss what they have learned, and then ask if that learning could have been possible in a pure lecture format. You could then close with a discussion about your role as a facilitator, not a teacher, in the learning process. 

Cheers, Tom



On 1/24/2011 3:48 PM, Stock, Duane R. wrote:
[log in to unmask]" type="cite">

I just received end of semester student evaluations for fall 2010 semester.  Some students did not “buy into” the TBL theory of teaching.

I did my best to explain the justification for using TBL during the first week of class.

 

More specifically, I used

1.)    the process described in the attached document

First-Day Questions for the Learner-Centered Classroom

by Gary A. Smith  (National Teaching and Learning Forum, Sept. 2008)

 

and

 

 

2.)    the  video from U. of Texas  (http://magenta.cit.utexas.edu/largeclasses/#tbl)   .

 

Still, some students think they should be lectured to every class and, also, think they are being short- changed by a professor that uses TBL.

I have interacted with Larry Michaelsen over the years and have watched the videos at

             http://tblc.camp9.org/TBLVideos

Please advise me of things besides the above that will make students better “buy into” the TBL process.

 

Thanks in advance.

 

Duane Stock

Professor of Finance

University of Oklahoma

 

 

 

 

Duane R. Stock, Price Investments Professor

205A  Adams Hall

Price College of Business

University of Oklahoma

Norman, OK  73019

 

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