Tim Brady
As has already been addressed on this blog, Roman History seminars are very difficult to conduct successfully if students have not done the reading. This can be particularly frustrating in a first year class as neither the difficulty of the reading nor its length is especially taxing. Further, if unaddressed this problem can have an effect on the motivation of more committed students, who may feel they are forced to carry water for the less prepared students.
Failure to adequately prepare for seminars is, obviously, a matter of motivation. To be exact, as seminars are not assessed, it is a matter of what Jaques and Salmon (2007: 60) term ‘intrinsic motivation’. Weimer (2015: 1) suggests that failure to prepare is likely the result of two factors.
A) That first-year students lack the analytical tools to find meaning in academic readings.
B) That they see little purpose in doing the work and they feel they can get by without proper preparation.
I addressed these issues in two ways. Most importantly, the students were provided with several questions and points to consider while they were doing the reading. These questions were provided on the Moodle (along with the readings themselves) as well as given to the students at the end of each session in anticipation of the following seminar. This addressed both of the above factors, as it helped guide the students through their readings and demonstrated the purpose for the assigned passages. To further address the second factor, I made it clear to the students – both explicitly and in practice – that they would be expected to contribute either during the group sessions or the larger class discussion.
While I am not so optimistic as to believe that I was able to get all of the students to do all of the reading, the general engagement of the students and their familiarity with the ancient sources increased in later sessions.
References:
Jaques, D. and Salmon, G. (2007) Learning in Groups
Weimar, M. (2015), Getting Student to do Reading Assignments
I have, in my own discipline, encountered similar issues with encouraging students to do the basic reading. I would imagine that this is a universal problem. A simple strategy I have used is to occasionally surprise students with an exercise at the beginning of class where everyone has to offer a point on the week’s reading. If they know that this is a possibility they tend to err on the side of caution in future weeks.
For theoretical subjects the utility and relevance of what we are made to learn is not immediately evident. On a pedagogical level this is a concern for us as teachers since students can easily become disincetivised if they are unable to see any purpose or meaning to what they are apparently learning. Motivation is a key factor in education and we may observe that when motivation is absent then so too is progress and this invariably leads to even less motivation.[1] One solution to this problem is offered by a phenomenological approach to pedagogy.
Phenomenology provides some ideas which help us to think about our pedagogical methods from otherwise unconsidered perspectives. The key idea is that if we are able to connect what we are learning to our lived experience then we are able to integrate our thoughts on the topic far better. As a consequence we have better memory retention of what we do learn since we have many more points of reference which are intimately connected with our own personal thoughts, emotions and lived experience.[2] A problem with this method is that we often need to adapt our teaching style and methodology to individual students and in new ways every time. The difficulty of utilising this method may also be one of its strengths for it forces the teacher and the students to enter into the present more completely and allow for spontaneity and freedom of choice with regards to how we approach a topic. There is much potential in such techniques for all types of subjects across the sciences and the arts. However, more research is required in order to establish specific techniques for this approach.
Bibliography
Husserl, Edmund. The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology: An Introduction to Phenomenological Philosophy. Translated by David Carr. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1970.
Manen, Max van. Researching Lived Experience: Human Science for an Action Sensitive Pedagogy. 2nd ed. edition. Albany, N.Y.: State University of New York Press, 1990.
Newstead, Stephen, and Sherria Hoskins. “Encouraging Student Motivation.” In A Handbook for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education: Enhancing Academic Practice, edited by Heather Fry, Steve Ketteridge, and Stephanie Marshall. New York: Routledge, 2009.
[1] Stephen Newstead and Sherria Hoskins, “Encouraging Student Motivation,” in A Handbook for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education: Enhancing Academic Practice, ed. Heather Fry, Steve Ketteridge, and Stephanie Marshall (New York: Routledge, 2009), 64.
[2] Edmund Husserl, The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology: An Introduction to Phenomenological Philosophy, trans. David Carr (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1970); cf. also Max van Manen, Researching Lived Experience: Human Science for an Action Sensitive Pedagogy, 2nd ed. edition (Albany, N.Y.: State University of New York Press, 1990).
Matthew Ward
This year I taught the Intermediate Greek class. One of the biggest challenges in this class was introducing new grammatical concepts as students are expected to learn these very quickly, often within a single session.
The usual method of introducing new grammar is to illustrate the concept, then to apply it by translating Greek examples into English. My concern was that, as a number of studies have shown, having students work passively with examples only results in surface-level learning. This prevents students from generating the ‘inference rules’ that are key to long-term memorisation, and which enable students to creatively apply the concept in question to a wide array of situations (Lang 2016, 139ff; Langer 2016, 85ff; Renkl 2014; Chi, Bassok, Lewis, Reimann, and Glaser 1989).
How could I encourage my students to move beyond passive learning, and help them to think about grammatical constructions in a mindful way that would lead to long-term memorisation?
My solution was to introduce an element that has fallen out of favour in classical-language teaching (with the notable exception of Dickey 2016): prose composition.
My hope was that encouraging students to think consciously about grammatical constructions via a novel activity (English > Greek) would foster the kind of active learning that improves understanding (Langer 2016, 113-135; Bertsch and Pesta 2014). I kept the exercises short, and provided vocabulary so that the students were not intimidated. The following illustrative example is taken from a session on indirect statements:
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Exercise III.
Use the vocabulary below to translate the following English indirect statements into Greek:
1. He said that he had not sacrificed.
2. He says that he is sacrificing.
3. He said that he was sacrificing.
Vocabulary
λέγω, ἐρῶ, εἶπον, εἴρηκα, εἰρημαι, ἐρρήθην: I say
θύω, θύσω, ἔθυσα, τέθυκα, τέθυμαι, ἐτύθην: I sacrifice
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Students reported orally that they found the exercises useful, and I saw a positive result emerge in their weekly quizzes. I would recommend that those teaching classical languages incorporate an element of prose-composition into their classes.
What do you think?
References:
Bertsch, S., and Pesta, B. J. 2014. Generating Active Learning. In V. A. Benassi, C. E. Overson, and C. M. Hakala eds., Applying Science of Learning in Education. Society
for Psychology. 71-77.
Brown, P. C., Roediger, H. L., and McDaniel, M. A. 2014. make it stick: The Science of Successful Learning. London and Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press.
Chi, M. T. H., Bassok, M., Lewis, M. W., Reimann, P., and Glaser, R. 1989. Self-Explanations: How students study and use examples in learning to solve problems. Cognitive
Science 13: 145-182.
Dickey, E. 2016. An Introduction to the Composition and Analysis of Greek Prose. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Lang, J. M. 2016. Small Teaching: Everyday Lessons from the Science of Learning. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Langer, E. J. 2016. The Power of Mindful Learning. 2nd ed. Boston: Merloyd Lawrence.
Renkl, A. 2014. Learning from Worked Examples: How to Prepare Students for Meaningful Problem Solving. In V. A. Benassi, C. E. Overson, and C. M. Hakala eds.,
Applying Science of Learning in Education. Society for Psychology. 118-58.
I found this post very useful! I completely agree with you that prose-composition is the best method to foster students' learning and understanding of Greek (or Latin) grammar rules. Besides, I think that by translating from English into Ancient Greek (rather than the opposite) students can perceive more clearly the 'usefulness' of the classical-language. I would also argue that such an exercise help students to consolidate their knowledge of English grammar structures too. I will for sure adopt this practice in a Greek or Latin language class.
-Giulia
I’m convinced that learning by doing is one of the best approaches. Taking machinery apart will tell you one thing, but putting it back together will tell you a good deal more. And good to see a more user-friendly approach with the vocab and tense/mood lists; hopefully the students might be less likely to end up shouting ‘ Ah bloody can’t I’ve gorra Latin prose’ (Tony Harrison –Me Tarzan).
Kim Burton
I could not agree more that prose composition is a vital aspect of classical language learning. At early levels it is an excellent way to reinforce the mechanics of grammar, particularly the formation and uses of the various inflections. At more advanced levels it helps students learn to recognise the nuance Greek and Latin are capable of and can serve the same purpose as conversation does in the learning of modern languages. Additionally, at the risk of sounding too Catonian, it has a substantial pedigree and would not have been an integral part of language learning for centuries if it wasn’t effective.
-Tim
Giulia Maltagliati
The merits of Small Group Teaching (SGT) have long been recognised. Dennick and Exley (2004: 3) for instance notice how “in a small group students can be encouraged to talk, think, and share much more readily than in a larger group”. Overall, I think my very first experience as seminar leader of a first-year undergraduate course has proven such a statement right. Distributed in groups of four or five, students were generally willing to contribute to the group conversation; yet, especially during the first seminars, not everybody would pay attention, and some students would let their peers do most of the talking. In later seminars, I thus tried to:
1) Provide Framework: in his book about “Small Teaching” (2016: 167ff.), Lang observes that reminding students why they are studying certain topics increases their motivation, and, consequently, their attention. In this sense, I have personally found it useful to start the seminars by referring to the previous lectures relating to the seminars. I would thus ask the students what they remembered about the lecture preceding the seminar, and I would anticipate the links between the lecture and the seminar materials. In this way, students could retrieve and consolidate their knowledge, but also better understand the usefulness of the seminar itself.
2) Join the discussion: coming from a quite hierarchical teaching system, I have been used to teachers who exclusively adopted an “instructor role” (cf. Jacques, Salmon 1984: 173). Yet, as Dennick and Exley notice (2004: 18), joining the students’ discussion helps to keep their levels of attention high. Seminar leaders are thus usually advised to adopt the role of “democratic facilitators”: they should collaborate with the group, and intervene “to keep the group dynamic oriented in a positive direction” (36). I found that moving around the groups and sitting with the students indeed facilitated the discussion, and kept their interest alive.
3) Summarising: closure is surely a key feature of teaching, and it is particularly important in SGT (Dennick, Exley: 48). Particularly, Lang observes how closing questions are an effective small teaching strategy, which helps students focus on key concepts (2016: 32). At the end of the session, I would address each of the groups with questions aimed at helping them summarize the main points stemming from their previous discussion. In a sort of “Pyramid”, students would thus turn from their small group to a larger one, sharing their findings with the rest of the class.
Have others adopted the same “strategies”? Do any of you have any other suggestions?
Works cited
Exley, K. and R. Dennick (2004), Small Group Teaching. Routledge.
Jacques, D. and G. Salmon (1984), Learning in Groups. A Handbook for face-to-face and online environments. Routledge.
Lang, C. (2016), Small Teaching. Wiley.
Very interesting. I particularly like your first 'strategy' (Provide Framework); too often we can be tempted to treat a seminar as an isolated event without emphasising how it fits into the wider design of the course. Incorporating this into the beginning of your seminar allows you to (i) situate the current session with the broader context, and (ii) encourage students to start to draw their own connections between the course material. I wonder whether some element of non-assessed 'quizzing' might further facilitate knowledge retrieval and consolidate understanding? I will certainly try something similar in my seminars.
- Matt
I consider this post extremely interesting: the strategies listed above can be adopted in every small class, independently from the subject. For example, in my Book Club I often considered to be just a ‘democratic facilitator’ motivating positively students to develop their critical thinking and considering the book and the story as a starting point for their ideas. Furthermore, I often used ‘closing questions’ to help students to focus on essential concepts, avoiding, at the same time, a natural lack of concentration, especially in the second part of the lesson. –
Martina Borghi
Fabrizio Biglino
During my last class (seminar-style) in Key Themes in Roman History, both my observer and I noticed that a good part of the students did not read the assigned material, a common issue primarily caused, as highlighted by Weimar (2015: 1), by lack of “pay off” from the students as their main purpose is “getting through” the course. As my students were first year undergraduates, their main concern was most likely successfully pass their exams by employing a maximum outcome with minimum efforts kind of mentality with their classes. Having been an undergraduate myself I can understand this, as I have been guilty of the same mistake. However, it is very important to remember what Weimer adds: “…undergraduates are also forming academic habits that will have a lasting influence on their behavior, so it’s especially important to form in them the right academic habits.”
For this reason, I decided to focus our class on a more general discussion rather than strictly following the reading material. The fact that the class’ topic encouraged more general discussions helped this decision. I tried to involve the whole group in participating and acted more as a moderator rather than a teacher by employing what Golding (2011: 361) calls “thought-encouraging questions”, by asking “why do you think that?” “Can you elaborate?” to encourage students’ critical thinking on certain topics, and, at the same time, trying to involve the whole group asking “What do you guys think about that?”
I noticed that this helped the students to become progressively more confident and more willing to participate and join the discussion.
This approach later received positive feedback from my observer, as he appreciated my numerous efforts to encourage the students to participate to the discussion, and that, by the end of the class, all of the students have answered/contributed more than once.
In following classes it can prove helpful to apply one of the three different methods suggested by Barbi Honeycutt: ask students to create an outline of the reading, give students 10-15 minutes to write a “what’s next” response or an alternate ending to the reading, and in groups, pairs, or individually, ask students to choose the most _ quote from the reading.
These strategies would surely encourage students to read the assigned material, and also stimulate their focus, creativity and, when necessary, team-work.
References
- Golding, C. (2011), Educating for Critical Thinking: thought-encouraging questions in a community of inquiry, Higher Education Research and Development, 30:3
- Honeycutt, B., 3 Things Students can do with Reading Assignments During Class
- Weimar, M. (2015), Getting Students to do Reading Assignments
Pietro Morlacchi
On one of my last one-hour seminars on Latin Literature, I was expecting roughly the double number of students than the six who finally showed up in the classroom. Although at first I felt that a smaller group of people would lower the quality of our discussion on the set text – particularly given the fact that my class was generally quite shy and silent and that the more talkative students were absent –, having a reduced group actually turned out to be beneficial, as I could test a slightly longer activity (20 mins) than the usual “working in pair” one (5-10 mins).
Whilst I think that “working in pair” grows the students' confidence (they're less worried to report to the class what they've been discussing with their partner), I noticed it also makes them interact with the same peer (the friend sitting next) and reduces their opportunity of building an actual dialogue with the rest of the students. Therefore, on that seminar, I divided the six students into two triads (abc + def) and let each choose two topic out of an initial “brainstorming”. After discussing the first topic with his/her group, a member of each group (or “delegate”) had to discuss the second topic first with two members of other group (aef + dbc) and then report the discussion back to his/her own group.
This kind of “cross-over” proved very effective: while discussing the second topic, each group was stimulated to mix their own ideas with the ones coming from the exchange between their “delegate” and the other group's members. The second topic was also more developed and richer and I think the students realised the importance of interacting with more peers rather than the usual ones. Whereas Baume&Baume (1996:14) list the “cross-overs” strategy within “large group discussions” (in which, with more groups than just two, it's perhaps easier to remix all the students with each other), I think that they also work well in smaller contexts, as they allow a more hybrid, more open and more engaging discussion than that developed within a closed group/between a pair.
Works cited:
Baume, D., & C. Baume, (1996), Learning to Teach: Running tutorials and seminars, Oxford: Oxford Centre for Staff Development.
Cross-overs may be very helpful in small groups as, essentially, more voices are heard and more opinions shared with the class. What fascinated me in the post is the fact that there was a vibrant conversation in class although the more talkative students were absent. I have noticed in my seminars that the more confident and willing-to-speak students can sometimes dominate class conversation while creating a 'safe way out' for the less talkative students who may not be as confident or may not have prepared for class. In my personal experience, when I ran a seminar in which a couple of confident students were absent, I was excited to see the quiet ones slowly starting to show more interest and take part to the conversation. It may be the case that they were feeling bit intimidated by the bold opinions of their peers up until that moment, and that they just needed some space to thrive themselves, to be heard. 'Cross-overs' activities as well as the educators' sensitivity and perception, the awareness of personality dynamics in class, can contribute to the creation of an open and interactive learning environment.
Reference:
Evans, L., & Abbott, Ian, (1998), Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, London and New York: Cassell.
Angeliki Tsanikidou, Drama,Theatre&Dance