Sharing pedagogy

Seeing as it's now summer break for many of us in the Northern Hemisphere--when many of us take much-needed vacations, but also do research and summer teaching, and prepare for the next academic year--I thought it might be fun to have a thread where we share teaching strategies. I don't know about you, but how often do you really hear about how other people teach? For my part, I hardly have a clue what other people do! Yet learning how other people teach can surely be helpful--not only giving one ideas for changes and innovations that might improve one's performance as a teacher, but also ideas for how to make teaching more fun!

So why not share with each other? This is what I propose we do in this thread. As usual, I'll begin with a summary of some of the things I do as a teacher (and why I do them), and then invite you all to do the same. Sound good? I hope so! 

When I finished my PhD, my idea of teaching was basically standing in front of a classroom and lecturing/having a philosophical conversation. That worked well enough at my first job, a research VAP with a 2/2 teaching load. Given the large lecture halls (100 students), short class-times (50 minutes), and fact that the two courses I had to teach were squarely in my areas of specialization (ethics/political), standing up and talking extemporaneously--without notes or much preparation--was easy. Alas, I found the same approach was positively disastrous when I moved to my current university, a teaching-centered institution with a 3/3 load small class-sizes (15-25 students), unusually long class meetings (2 hours per class per day, twice a week), where I consistently had to teach courses outside of my AOS (e.g. ancient philosophy, biomedical ethics, philosophy of law, morality of warfare, etc.). My first few semesters lecturing, my student evaluations were a disaster--so I had to adapt. 

One of the best pieces of advice I got when I was really struggling came from a somewhat unlikely source: my mother. While she's not an academic, she does have a history of teaching--in preschools and inner-city public high schools when she was a young adult, and in non-profit adult technical education later in life. Anyway, when I told her I was struggling with the length of the two-hour class-sessions I was dealing with, she had a great idea: "Put less weight on yourself, and have your students do more!" By this she meant, broadly speaking, what is now known as a "flipped classroom"--getting students to both do homework relevant to driving class discussion, and then doing in-class work toward the same end. After a few semesters of experimenting (with everything ranging from student presentations to in-class reading quizzes), I slowly but surely developed some practices that seemed to work well. Here are some of them, along with a brief pedagogical rationale for each of them:

1. Daily 4-5 sentence reading responses [graded]: Students are expected to bring a printed out 4-5 sentence paper (i) quoting (and properly citing) a single sentence or short passage from the daily reading that expresses an important argumentative claim by the author (not the conclusion!), (ii) explaining in a sentence or two why the claim is important (viz. its role in the author's argument), and (iii) motivating in a sentence or two a single critical question or skeptical concern about the idea quoted. Students are then invited to volunteer to discuss their paper in class. [Predagogical rationale: The assignment requires students to focus clearly on one idea, something undergrads tend to have trouble with. It also requires them to learn how to cite properly, recognize philosophical premises, distinguish them from conclusions, explain how the author uses the premise--and finally, motivate critical philosophical questions/concerns. All in 4-5 sentences! Plus, it helps me work on their writing day-in, day-out. Finally, it helps ensure that class discussion is not just focused on what I think is important, encouraging students to play with and critically discuss their own ideas about the text]
2. Daily in-class group assignments [graded]: At the beginning of every semester, I randomly sort students into groups of 4-5. They stay in these groups until the first exam, at which point the groups are shuffled; and the same happens after subsequent exams. Each day in class, I have one or two group assignments either asking the group to (a) pull out their books and interpret a passage of text, or else (b) critically evaluate an argument I have posted in premise-conclusion form, (c) provide an original argument of their own (e.g. which principles they think would be rational to agree to from Rawls' original position), and so on. The group is given 10 minutes or so, have to write down a "group answer" to the question, can volunteer it for class discussion, and turn it in for a grade. The assignment is graded solely on the group's logic and evidence they offer, not whether I "agree" with their position [Pedagogical rationale: This requires students to constantly practice a variety of important philosophical skills in class, e.g. textual interpretation, critical evaluation of arguments, and creative original argumentation. It also gets everyone involved, as students are told they will receive no credit if they do not participate equitably. It also enables more advanced students to 'mentor' lower-performing students, helping them to understand and better engage with the course material. It also encourages shy students who do not like to speak in front of the entire class to express their ideas in a smaller, less-intimidating forum with classmates they know].
3. Bonus-credit competitions: One of the more unusual things I do in all of my classes is attach a competition for exam bonus-credit to the group assignments. Basically, the competition works like this. When groups get back their first group assignment of the semester, they get "competition points" corresponding to their group's letter grade (viz. 'A' = 10 competition points, 'AB' = 9 points, 'B' = 8 points, etc.). On all subsequent assignments, groups get to bet competition points on the quality of their answer--and they have to bet before open class discussion. The betting scheme goes like this: if they get an 'A' on their answer, their bet is multiplied by 2 and added to their running tally; if they get an 'AB', their bet is multiplied by 1; if they get a 'B' it is multiplied by zero (so they neither gain nor lose points); but if they get a 'BC' their bet is multiplied by -1; if they get a 'C' it is multiplied by -2, a 'CD' multiplied by -3, and so on (rare A+ grades are multiplied by +3). In other words, what happens over time is that the more successful teams are in getting good grades and reliably predicting which of their answers will be graded well, the more competition points they rack up. Then, when their exam comes around, the 1st place team gets X% points added to their exam grade, 2nd place gets Y% points added, and 3rd place gets Z% points. [Pedagogical rationale: I was initially worried about the competitive aspect of this practice--as though some students might be put off by competing with each others. But this is not what I've found at all. Students love it--and because they love it, it gives them incentive to do a good job, giving good answers on their assignments but above all learning to predict when they have provided a well-reasoned answer. Which is the real pedagogical point of the exercise: the development of meta-cognition, one of the most underdeveloped skills among undergraduates.]
4. Term-paper rewrites: This is one of my longest-running teaching strategies. It's one I got from my undergrad advisor, Dan Dennett. In the very first philosophy course I ever took at Tufts (an honors intro course), Dan allowed us to turn in our term-paper drafts as many times as we wished. Each time, he provided detailed, typed feedback along with a grade. I had to rewrite my first paper 5 times before getting an 'A', and rewrote my other papers several times as well. It was the single best educational experience I ever had, and it made such an impression on me that I resolved that were I to become a professor, I would do the same. It is, quite frankly, a ton of work. Although only maybe half of my students rewrite their term-papers, it's still a lot of grading (e.g. about 75 first-drafts across my 3 courses per semester, plus multiple revisions of maybe half of those). I tend to type 1-2 pages single spaced comments on each draft of each paper, and grade the paper along five separate dimensions, each of which I give a grade and comments on at the end: (i) introduction, (ii) summary, (iii) critical objection, (iv) discussion of objections, and (v) miscellaneous (editing, grammar, organization, etc.). The paper grade is then the average of the grades across the five dimensions. [Pedagogical rationale: Like many of us, I too have heard that undergrads are uninterested and disengaged. While some of them indeed are, I have been continually impressed by how hard many of my students are willing to work, and how complimentary they have been regarding this practice in my student evaluations, saying how much they valued the challenge instead of an easy 'A.' Perhaps the key to student engagement is not on them; it is on us to develop teaching strategies that incentivize them actually reading our comments, improving their work, etc. That, at any rate, is what I believe having utilized this practice for many years].
5. Detailing Teaching Philosophy in Syllabi: A number of years ago, in one of my first years at the University of Tampa, I went to a student-organized forum entitled, "What I wish my professors knew." The most common thing that students on the panel said was this: "I wish my professors told us what their teaching philosophy is." Honestly, I had never thought of that before. But it's a brilliant point. Unless students have some clue why we do the things we do, the things we have them do can seem arbitrary--and so, repugnant. Who wants to arbitrary busy-work? Not I, and I expect, not you either! So, what I do now is make the various elements of my teaching philosophy clear in my syllabi, telling them why I am such a hard grader, why I have them do their daily reading responses, why I let them rewrite their papers many times, etc. [Pedagogical rationale: The more students understand why we do what we do, the more likely they are to care]
6. Detailed Directions and Rubrics: I used to hate rubrics, and sort of still do. Still, for all that, I've found that the clearer one is to students about expectations (particularly undergrads who have never done philosophy before!), the better their work tends to be. [Pedagogical rationale: see what I just wrote. :)].
7. Encouragement, not discouragement: I've found that while it is important to be hard on students' work (I am a brutal grader), it is important to encourage them. I try to do this in two ways. First, by casting paper feedback in positive terms (viz. "You need to do X") rather than negative terms (viz. "You did X wrong. Here's why..."). Second, I try to preempt and address negative reactions. For instance, the first time I had back term-paper drafts (with lots of 'C' and 'D' grades that students are not accustomed to), I have them watch several scenes from the 1980's movie The Karate Kid where Daniel gets pissed at Mr. Miyagi for having him wash Miyagi's cars, paint his fences, etc. I then say that just as Miyagi is training Daniel to do karate, I am training them to be better readers, writers, and thinkers, as well as how to respond positively to obstacles and disappointments--all things that will serve them well in the future. [Pedagogical rationale: Students seem to respond better to constructive feedback and encouragement, using them as motivations to improve, than they do to negative feedback and discouragement, which can lead them to disengage and not improve].
8. Final Presentations [graded]: Although in a few of my courses, I have multiple term-papers, more often I have one term-paper along with a final presentation. In more theory-based courses, such as an upper-division course on Contemporary Ethical Theory, I have students do an APA-style presentation of their final paper--which students find fun, but which also give them an opportunity to get last-minute feedback from me and their classmates. Somewhat differently, in more applied courses--Biomedical Ethics, the Morality of War, Philosophy of Law, etc.--I tend to have students do two-person presentations applying the course material critically to some important problem outside of the course. For instance, in Biomedical Ethics, I have students research and apply biomedical-ethical reasoning to an issue of their choice, which has included everything from the ethics of creating cyborgs, to faculty farming and monoculture, and psychosurgery. In Philosophy of Law, I have students in groups of 2 "try" a Supreme Court case philosophically, with one member defending one "side" of the case and the other member the converse side--much as lawyers might in court, but focusing on using philosophical theory and reasoning. Similarly, in Morality of War, I have students select any war from history, and evaluate all dimensions of the war: jus ad bellum, jus en bello, and jus post bellum. It's fantastic, as I've students evaluate a wide variety of wars throughout history, giving me and their fellow students an important history lesson along with ethical analysis!
9. Short videos + class-generated assignment questions [graded]: One thing that I've only tried once, in an upper-division course on the Philosophies of Race & Gender--and which worked astonishingly well--was beginning each course session with a five-minute video related in some way to the course material for that day. What I then did is challenge groups to spend 3-5 minutes to come up with the best philosophical question(s) they could relating the video to the reading material for that day. Then I would write their questions on the board, and select one or two of them to do a graded group assignment. The very first day I tried it, I feared it would be a disaster. For a couple of moments, none of the groups offered up a question--and I almost threw in the towel right then and there. But I gave it another minute...and sure enough, the groups came up with some excellent questions--and over the course of the term they came up with fascinating questions to work on that I never would have come up with myself! [Pedagogical rationale: Beginning class meetings on race and gender with provocative videos hooked up the course material with the world outside of the classroom. Having students come up with assignment questions made them think critically and creatively, making the class feel much more organic and unexpected that classes often do. I hope to try it again sometime!]
10. Term-paper workshops: Finally, the last few semesters I've experimented with term-paper workshops in a few upper-division courses. Typically, the workshop involves a homework worksheet on some part of the final paper (viz. brainstorming a topic, outlining the paper's summary, outlining the paper's main argument along with evidence, etc.), which the students then bring into class to workshop with one or two peers, each of whom fills out a worksheet of their own to provide their peer feedback, which they then discuss together. They can also approach me in class for feedback too. [Pedagogical rationale: given that in my experience students tend to struggle when given room to come up with their own topics, having them work through a process of putting each element of a paper slowly and deliberately, with peer feedback, seems to me a helpful exercise. However, I am still very much working out the kinks, and it's not clear to me how much it improves the end-result papers turned in. So, more than the other practices I've mentioned, this is one I'm less sure about].

Anyway, these are some of my main teaching strategies nowadays. I don't pretend that they would work for everyone, or be appropriate or feasible in every classroom environment. Still, I thought I'd share what I do, and now ask you what you do and why you do it! Indeed, part of the reason I ask is that I don't want to become too "set in my ways" myself. I never want to become stale as a teacher, and so I'm hoping to learn what you all do--and why you do it--so that perhaps I can rethink what I do and try new things. Hopefully, if a lot of you share (as I'm hoping you will), we can learn together many different possible ways one can teach philosophy well.

Anyone willing to share? 

Comments

[Sara L. Uckelman]

I have now run my 3rd year advanced logic seminar twice, with the same format both times and it's been awesome. It's a two-hour seminar that meets once a week, and after a few initial weeks where I run the seminars, to get everyone all onto the same footing, after that, everyone is expected to run the seminar twice over the year (it's usually two main topics, so I expect one seminar per topic from each). We set the reading a week in advance, and generally solicit volunteers only a week in advance too (saves trying to set a schedule for the entire year at the beginning of the year. Sometimes, though, people will put dibs on specific sub-topics they want to do.) My role in the seminar is to be available to the student in advance as they are preparing, to help them through any tricky material, to answer questions that come up during the seminar that the student can't answer, and to add context and content that they wouldn't get from the textbook alone. Also, if there are no volunteers (usually for the weeks when they all have papers due in their other courses), then I take over and run the seminar.

It has been absolutely brilliant. The amount of work and preparation they put into their presentations is amazing, and many people have said there's a lot more impetus to really learn the material if you're going to be teaching it to others than if you're just going to be doing homeworks. This year, our two topics were Godel's incompleteness results and philosophy of math,and in the latter a number of them wanted to cover Wittgenstein -- someone whose philosophy of math I know very little about. I told them this, that if they wanted a seminar on W. I'd find some reading but they would be mostly on their own. The guy who volunteered to run the seminar was writing his thesis on W. and so came in with a huge amount of context and background material, in addition to the exposition of the texts we were reading, and I learned so much in those two hours.

[Sara L. Uckelman]

As for teaching intro logic, I wrote up a post on that a few months ago: http://diaryofdoctorlogic.blogspot.co.uk/2016/12/how-to-teach-introductory-logic-to.html

[Amanda]

Sara is this an undergraduate seminar?