Designing a teaching session 18/08/2019

Things to think about before the session Type of teaching: Lecture, seminar, small group tutorial/ discussion Length of session Number of students The level of the students The resources I will need e.g. presentations, handouts The learning outcomes for my session 18/08/2019

What do I want students to have achieved by the end of my session? Exercise (15 minutes) Plan a session you will be doing or would like to do: Take the green sheet from your pack and make a first attempt at the following: Title topic How long have you got? How many students? Context Aims (what are the 3 most important things you want students to learn/ achieve). 18/08/2019

Writing learning outcomes Think about the behaviour you wish the student to be able to demonstrate at the end of the session. With learning outcomes students should be able to demonstrate their knowledge to others. By the end of the session students should be able to … Assessable outcomes  Non-assessable outcomes  Give examples of… Understand… List… Believe … Describe… Think about … Design… Imagine… Summarise… Be enthusiastic about … 18/08/2019

Devising clear, detailed, appropriate learning outcomes can be a challenge, but it has several important benefits: 1. it foregrounds the student and their learning, rather than the teacher and their teaching 2 it helps to ensure that teaching and learning occur at the appropriate level   3  it provides students (and other interest groups) with a clear, detailed description of what they are expected to know and be able to do - and thus to demonstrate for assessment purposes 4 it enables us to plan teaching in a systematic, effective and efficient manner. 18/08/2019

Activity 2: Writing learning outcomes (10 mins). Have a first attempt at writing 2-3 learning outcomes for your session in the section “How might these translate into ‘learning outcomes’? section on the green sheet. 18/08/2019

Intended Learning Outcomes When writing learning outcomes there should be a clear, consistent alignment between these three elements of the session/ module/course.      What we intend students to learn Intended Learning Outcomes Learning and teaching activities designed to enable achievement of ILOs Assessment methods and criteria designed to assess achievement of ILOs 18/08/2019

Once we have devised clear, detailed outcomes it becomes easier to: identify appropriate learning and teaching activities choose the best ways to assess progress and achievement draw up a plan and timeline for teaching and learning evaluate the effectiveness of the teaching and learning process 18/08/2019

Factors to consider when devising appropriate learning activities 1. The principle of constructive alignment encourages us to devise teaching, learning and assessment activities that are aligned with the intended learning outcomes 2. To achieve complex, varied learning outcomes, students probably need to engage in complex varied activities 3. To learn, people need opportunities to integrate new information and ideas into their thinking, by ‘doing things’ with this ‘material’. Talking plays an important role in this process. 18/08/2019

realistic, relevant, intrinsically interesting 5. Research suggests we should use learning activities that have at least some of these characteristics: realistic, relevant, intrinsically interesting active participation by students opportunities for discussion and collaborative working opportunities to try out new ideas, language and behaviour time for reflection and consolidation   6. Students’ attention and memory are reported to rapidly diminish if they only listen, or listen and take notes during teaching 18/08/2019

“Sustained and unchanging low-level activity lowers concentration “Sustained and unchanging low-level activity lowers concentration. Sitting listening to a lecture is such an activity. Yet it requires concentrated effort to follow lecture content.” “The attention span of students under these conditions can be maintained for about 10-15 minutes after which learning drops off rapidly.” “A short rest . . . or simply a change of activity . . . leads to a restoration of performance almost to the original level. . . . Do not talk for 15-20 minutes unless you are certain you still have their attention.” Biggs, 1999, p99) 18/08/2019

Planning for teaching and learning The ‘quality of learning’ varies over time Student concentration can vary depending on “the students, the skill of the lecturer, the pace of the lecture, the difficulty of the material, the use of educational technology (which involves a change of activity), the time of day and so on”. Biggs, 1999, p100 – 101 drawing on the work of Bligh (1971) we need to think carefully about how best to ‘chunk up’ and use time students need opportunities to work with or manipulate new material (to “make what they learn part of themselves”) variety of activity helps to maintain high levels of engagement 18/08/2019

Planning a teaching session Planning the F2F session We suggest you: think carefully about how best to manage and ‘use’ the time available to you include an introduction stage and conclusion stage use ‘chunks’ of time in multiples of 5 minutes- e.g. 10/15/20/25 avoid using chunks of less than 5 minutes – unless there is a specific reason include a short section towards the end that you can ‘do or ditch’ to allow flexibility If doing a one-off session get a good brief from the module leader. 18/08/2019

Activity 3: Planning your session (15 minutes) Have a first go at: What types of activities might you include in the session? How would these relate to the desired outcomes? Timing What will you [the teacher] be doing? What will the students be doing? Resources needed. 0-15 minutes Introducing the topic of… Listening Making notes Asking questions PowerPoint presentation 15-30 minutes Listening in on group discussions. Providing guidance to students who may be stuck. Discussing the case studies in groups of 3-4 students Handouts with case studies 18/08/2019