Resources for Instructors
UWP
Instructor's Guide
Class Activities
When planning in-class activities, you will want to consider the following:
- goals
- relation to out-of-class assignments
- time
- method of instruction
- discussion
- lecture
- peer review
- individual writing
- group work
- quizzes
- presentations
Especially for new instructors, it can be helpful to plan more than one activity for a 50-minute period. Peer review is time consuming, however, so it typically takes at least one class period to complete, especially the first time you do it when you will need to spend some time explaining how it will work and its importance.
Explaining the purpose of an in-class assignment, how it relates to out-of-class assignments, and how students will benefit from it will help to increase student participation. Students may not understand the point of an activity if you don't articulate it.
Leading Discussion
Many new instructors find leading a discussion about an assigned
text particularly challenging. Although you may occasionally have a
great spontaneous discussion, leading discussion well typically
requires some preparation. Have a purpose and direction for your
discussion and analysis. You may find it helpful to write a list of
progressive discussion questions with page numbers to reference for
specific examples. If your discussion questions don't generate the
response you anticipate, sometimes broader, open-ended questions will
get students talking without any pressure to produce the "right"
answer. Once they have opened up a little, you can either go back to
your original plan or decide that this new conversational thread is
even more productive.
Some specific discussion strategies include
- giving students a few questions to consider the class prior to
the discussion; if they are not already in written format, make sure
the students take notes
- having students write about the text at the beginning of class
- giving a quiz about the text
- breaking the students into small groups and assigning each group a discussion question that they will present to the class with examples from the text
Regardless of which approach you choose, don't give up if students
don't respond immediately. Getting a class to talk can take some
patience, and the students may need some time at the beginning of the
semester to feel comfortable talking in front of their peers.
