{"id":8809,"date":"2018-08-02T11:00:12","date_gmt":"2018-08-02T01:00:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sydney.edu.au\/education-portfolio\/ei\/teaching@sydney\/?p=8809"},"modified":"2018-08-02T18:35:14","modified_gmt":"2018-08-02T08:35:14","slug":"on-the-wire-0818","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/educational-innovation.sydney.edu.au\/teaching@sydney\/on-the-wire-0818\/","title":{"rendered":"On the wire – highlights from across the web"},"content":{"rendered":"

The month\u2019s highlights on higher-ed from across the web<\/h2>\n
\n

1. How to Prepare for Class Without Overpreparing<\/a><\/h3>\n

\"\"If you have ever had the experience of pouring hours into preparing for a class only to find it fall flat on its face, then you will already know that, in the case of prep and planning, that you can have too much of a good thing. As lecturers we are more at risk of doing this at the beginning of semester when students are new and ambitions are high. As such this article in July\u2019s Chronicle of Higher Education <\/em><\/a>is not only useful but timely. Written by James Lang, author of the highly accessible book Small Teaching<\/em><\/a> (also discussed on this blog<\/a>), the article offers applicable strategies that will help you make better use of your time, and that of your students.<\/p>\n

2. How to Teach Information Literacy in an Era of Lies<\/a><\/h3>\n

\"\"In this article for The Chronicle of Higher Education<\/a>,<\/em> David Gooblar<\/a>, lecturer in rhetoric at the University of Iowa and author of\u00a0 Pedagogy Unbound<\/em><\/a>\u00a0, describes information literacy as: \u2018one of those meta-skills that lurk behind the ability to master any subject. How can students succeed in any intellectual pursuit if they cannot tell what\u2019s true from what\u2019s false?\u2019 While most of us would agree with this, knowing how exactly we teach it may be new \u2013 especially given the large scale changes that the web has brought to the information landscape. This is a quick read that not only advocates for information literacy but provides some concrete suggestions for how to teach it.<\/p>\n

3. Study raises concerns over assessment methods in UK universities [$]<\/a><\/h3>\n

\"\"An article in this month’s\u00a0The Times Higher Education Supplement<\/a>\u00a0<\/em>summarises the findings of a large UK study of assessment at teaching-intensive and research-intensive universities. Amongst the key findings are that research-intensive universities were found to have a greater proportion of exams, whereas teaching-intensives were found to have a higher variety of assessment types such as projects or portfolios. The study highlights the problem with both<\/em> of these approaches. While the benefits and problems of traditional exams are well known (Pros: perceived rigor, prevention of plagiarism; Cons: stress, rote-learning etc.) it is interesting to note that more varied assessment can also be problematic; though assessment variety is inclusive and recognises different types of learning, too much variation can cause student confusion, meaning that students never quite get the opportunity to master what is required of them. The full study, published in the scholarly journal Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education<\/a> <\/em>makes a few recommendations namely that assessment should be reduced in quantity with attention paid to a better balance of types of assessment and quality feedback. This approach may also mean planning assessment more holistically over the course of a degree or program, instead of it being solely determined within individual units or subjects.<\/p>\n

4. Using oral feedback to complement written\u00a0feedback<\/a><\/h3>\n

\"\"Over on\u00a0The Thesis Whisperer<\/a> <\/em>is a great article on ways to improve the way we give feedback, not only to benefit the student but to avoid what Dr Davina Tauber<\/a> refers to as the academic \u2018reader rage\u2019: \u201cI know I responded to this in the last draft, but here it is again\u2026unchanged.\u201d Though targeted at doctoral supervision, the article offers a thoughtful discussion on the nature of feedback and some nice practical suggestions that could easily translate into taught undergraduate or postgraduate programs. Tauber\u2019s point about the limits of academic shorthand, marginal notes that proclaim something as \u201cconfusing\u201d or \u201cunclear\u201d, draws attention to the cognitive leap that students have to take to interpret this by \u201crecreating the scene of the reader\u2019s confusion, [\u2026] to experience the text from the reader\u2019s point of view\u201d. Since the advance of Canvas tools in speedgrader, the suggestion of using oral, or even video, feedback to augment our scribblings makes for a feasible alternative.<\/p>\n

5. Hundreds of academics give advice to their younger selves<\/a><\/h3>\n

\"\"Lastly, on matters regarding academic life, Associate Professor Nathan Hall (@prof_nch<\/span><\/a>) used Twitter to\u00a0<\/b><\/span>ask academics to give career advice to their younger selves. Hundreds of academics have since contributed to this thread and with a mix of honesty, cynicism and humour shine a light onto the various facets of academic life. If you\u2019re not on Twitter or don\u2019t have time or inclination to explore the thread in full then the Times Higher Education Supplement <\/em><\/a>has compiled a summary of the main themes and\u00a0 the sharpest tweets.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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