Breaking up a 4.5 hour block of time
I am a new instructor and I will be teaching an evening course which runs for 4.5 hours. Of course we will take breaks but this is a tremendous amount of time to fill. This is an Anatomy and Physiology
course, however it does not include any sort of lab.....so basically it is all lecture.
I like the idea of the 10-16 min mini lectures but even so I will need to find many ways to break up this block of time to keep the students engaged. I am open to comments and suggestions.
Hi Linda,
I think this is a good idea. Would give students an opportunity to be creative and apply their new knowledge. If you try this I would be very interested in what you come up with from your students.
Gary
I think it would be interesting to add a small section to each day under the title "How does today's lesson apply to real life?" to keep the student's interest and to help them understand that while it might be horrendously boring (e.g., math) there is a reason why you are learning it.
Interesting thought/observation about not having time to assimilate before moving on. I recently heard that there is actually something to the convention of "sleeping on it" -- that something happens cognitively when we learn something, sleep on it, and go back to it. We all know that when we can't figure out a problem (be it a crossword puzzle or some other type of project) if we put it down and look at it the next morning, it seems simple. I'm really interested in your question, especially as it applies to a subject like math.
I have made comments elsewhere about those weekly 4-5 hour classes, but whether they can be managed reasonably with breaks and still cover the required material will largely depend on the actual content area. I taught algebra in the fall, and one section was 4 hours long. Since algebra builds on previous material learned (and mastered), it was difficult to keep introducing new material during the one 4-hour period. I broke it up by having students practice what they just learned in between mini lectures, but then, I could not cover as much material as if the class met every day, 50 minutes each. In the latter case, students presumably have time at home after class to reflect, digest, understand, and practice what they learned in the previous 50 minute class, in preparation for the next day's class, where they would be learning new material that builds on the previous one. Especially to those older adult learners who have been away from school math does not come easily, so they require a great deal of time to assimilate the material by repetitively doing practice exercises (a.k.a. homework), and class time is too short for that.
I have taught the same course in both a weekly 4 hour session and a biweekly 2 hour session. I find the students and I do much better with one, longer weekly session. However, it all depends on how the material is presented. Breaking up your class time into short, manageable activities, and having these activities written out clearly on the board so that the students can visualize the progress of the evening, is very helpful.
Our courses have a similar problem, with some classes 2.5 hours, others 5 hours. We have attempted to break it up into sections, with short breaks for the shorter classes, and a two short and one long break for the 5 hour courses. You can see their attention effectively "end" about 45 minutes into a lecture!
I attempt to get students to ask a lot of questions about the subject matter. I will even sometimes field questions that are not direct to the subject matter, but indirectly related, if it won't take too long and I can sense the class is interested. But I agree in that I make efforts to break up the lectures with activities in groups or at an individual level.
Hi Candice,
Welcome to the profession. I wish you much teaching success. You have a tough assignment as a new instructor with this much time to fill. You have a good start with your idea of doing mini-lectures. I would break out the evening in these segments of 15-20 minutes and then do an activity. The activities can be anything that lets the students internalize the information that you just covered. Example--lecture, Q&A session, lecture, word game, lecture, small group, lecture, case study, etc.. Along with the breaks you find the evening will move along nicely.
Gary
