Samantha Keyser

PD: GTA Pedagogy Conference

The Graduate Teaching Assistant (GTA) Pedagogy Conference had various GTAs from different disciples presenting techniques, activities and approaches they have used or hope to use in their classrooms. One of the presentations that I attended was centered on Interactive Models for Critical Thinking. There were three presenters. Two of the presenters were from the Biology department and the other was from Department of Communication. The first presenter was Devaleena S. Pradhan from the Biology department and she presented her study on Pre, Active and Post: Taking learning beyond the lecture. She clarified this as being an alternative approach to university education. She found that most university students are unprepared when they come to a lecture. They relay to heavily on posted PowerPoints and notes, and their lack of preparation leads them to cram before tests and quizzes. Her research found that only about 5% of material from a lecture is retained after 24 hours. She made some suggestions to help the students take more personal responsibility for learning and discussion and some techniques that she has used in her classes. One requirement that she had for assignments was for the students to submit them a day before, so that the students are not rushing to complete the assignment and they come to class more prepared for the lecture. She also suggested incorporating Internet tools such as Facebook, Dropbox and blogs to encourage discussion of lecture topics and assignments. She encourages the use of puzzles, word games, debates, short films, and poems in order to an active and creative classroom. The teachers role is to control and moderate the topics.

The next presenter was Marwa Nabil also from the Biology department. She presented the idea of Creative learning in science labs. She discussed that students should be involved in the learning process and incorporates doing and collaboration for labs. The students assist with the course design and choose the topics that they would like to study. The students would choose from a topic list provided by the instructor. She stated four possible outcomes of this approach. The students feel more comfortable with the topics, they are more eager and motivated to learn, it encourages critical thinking, and encourages innovation. The final presenter was Charlotte Howell from the Department of Communication and she presented on More than categories: Teaching genre in an introductory film course. In this course, she made spent about a two-week period focused on films made from the 1930s to 1950s. The students studied 10 genres paying close attention to the historical contexts surrounding the making of these films. In these two weeks, the class was put into four teams and they played Family Feud. The students talked in these groups about clips from each genre. She found that by incorporating a competitive game encouraged more discussion and the students were passionate about the subject. The students became excited and competitive even though the prize was a piece of candy that they knew everybody would get. It was nice to hear from teachers in different departments and the kinds of issues they have experienced in their classrooms. I think that no matter the classroom you are always going to have to contend with the approaches that students take to their learning. I like the activities and approaches the teachers presented for making the students more responsible for their learning, as well as the suggestions that they made for creating a

active, creative and fun course that will encourage the students to be more invested in the topics that they are studying.