What are Your Teaching Objectives?

For the Moment Forget about Technology

A Keynote Address by

David G. Brown, Wake Forest University

at Clayton College & State University, November 3, 1998

Friday, October 30, 1998

Two of Georgia's Smallest Colleges Offer Laptop for Every Student

By JEFFREY R. YOUNG

Electron Microscope Garden Tools

5 Items for the Portfolio for the Dean @ Salary Increase Time

• 1

• 2

• 3

• 4

• 5

Five Phrases That Best Characterize Your Teaching Philosophy

• 1

• 2

• 3

• 4

• 5

Pick Your Top & Next Two Principles of Good Teaching• Encourage contact between students and

faculty

• Develop cooperation among students

• Encourage active learning

• Give prompt feedback

• Emphasize time on task

• Communicate high expectations

• Respect diverse talents and ways of thinking

FIRST YEAR SEMINARThe Economists’ Way of Thinking

A Course Required of All Freshmen

Wake Forest University

• Collaboration among Learners • Frequent student/faculty dialogue• Prompt Feedback• Application of Theory• Student Self Initiatives• Trustful relations• Personal & Individual Teaching

Learning is Enhanced by---

Results: Compared to OtherFirst Year Courses

More Same Less

How much did you learn? 2/3 1/3 --

How much time did you spend? -- 2/3 1/3

How much did you enjoy the course? 3/3 -- --

Presidential Ideas About Learning

• Trust Theory• Infectious Enthusiasm• Rational Civility• Education as Servant of Society• Different Strokes for Different Folks• More Talented Than You Think• Liberal Arts• Education Throughout Life

Results fromWake Forest

Faculty Survey Results from Wake Forest

===83% say “computers are effective for communicating with students about class related work

===91% say “computers are effective for communicating with faculty colleagues

Student Survey Results from Wake Forest

===72% say “computers are effective for communicating with other students about class related work”

===84% say “computers are effective for communicating with faculty about class related work”

===53% interact more with faculty, up from 32%

Computers Enhance My Teaching and/or Learning Via--

PresentationsBetter--20%More Opportunities toPractice & Analyze--35%

More Access to SourceMaterials via Internet--43%

More Communication with Faculty Colleagues, Classmates,and Between Faculty and Students--87%

Computers allow people----

• to belong to more communities• to be more actively engaged in each

community• with more people• over more miles• for more months and years• TO BE MORE COLLABORATIVE

The paradigm shift is the increase in team learning, in collaboration as the standard method for study and work

It is not computers!

Computers are means only.

The Case for Collaborative Learning• #1 Virtually all of the learning gain from computers stems from improved

communication--- Testimony of Wake Forest students and faculty.

• #2 Computers haven’t improved learning. Computers have enabled more collaboration. More collaboration has improved learning!

• #3 The boom in collaborative learning is directly attributable to three very powerful “tools for collaboration” that weren’t around until the computer appeared.

• #4 Use of these three tools is easily learned. Spend your time on these 3 tools. Leave the fancier (more expensive, more difficult) stuff for later! Your students will feel the results immediately!

The “Low Hanging Fruit” among the New “Garden Tools”for Collaborative Learning

#1. E-mail #2. Web Pages (for each course)#3. Internet URLs

Vignettes from Yahoo’s 100 Most Wired Campuses

• Intermediate German. Dartmouth• International Political Economy. Middlebury• Systems Analysis. NYU• Global Telecommunications. Temple• Writing. U of Missouri @ Rolla• Senior Biology Seminar. Hendrix• Physics for 500. Michigan State• Costume Museum Archives. Virginia• Anthropology. SUNY-Potsdam

David G. BrownVice President and DeanInternational Center for

Computer Enhanced LearningWake Forest University

Winston-Salem, N.C. 27109336-758-4878

e-mail: brown@wfu.eduhttp//:www.wfu.edu/~brown

fax: 336-758-4875