Engaging students
I enjoyed the Harvard Business School Lectures on engaging students. I like to learn all of my students names, and I usually do a Myers-Briggs Assessment to get to know them better. We read our types aloud and class and discuss how we fit together as a group.
Hi Michelle,
I understand time is of the essence. You may want them to do a take home personality test for a homework assignment.
Patricia Scales
If I had time to administer this test to students, I would! Not only would it help me understand their personality better, but it would help them to feel that the instructor cared enough to get to know them. I think the instructor should take it too and share the results with the class, so the class knows what kind of instructor they are dealing with!
I like to use humor to engage students and tell stories of my real world experience as a therapist to help keep students interested and in a positive mood.
Hi Kim,
It is important to know your students. We need to know how they learn best so that we can provide them with that type of learning, and we also need to know their personality as well.
Patricia Scales
The Myers-Briggs is an excellent tool for students and the instructor to learn about learning styles or preferences. Having preferences is a natural tendency, but I also remind my students that being a more well-rounded learner sometimes requires that we "stay out of our comfort zone". An over-reliance of our preferences can become a disadvantage to learning. It's about encouraging students to be more flexible in how they interact with others and how they present themselves to others. The key to a well-rounded learner is to seek a balance in using all of her/his dominant as well as the auxiliary learning functions. For instance, if I have a class of mostly one particular personality preference, I may say something like, "sounds like we may have a group of good listerners in this class, who probably have a tendency to keep wonderful ideas to themselves (introverts). Since everyone knows his/her personality preferences, I would like to encourage everyone to exercise a greater use of his/her auxiliary functions. We then discuss in class what that might entail for each student.
We play the name game and I allow the student to introduce themselves. When the next person introduces themself they must say one thing about the person before. It is a way to get them engaged with one another.
Hi Ron,
Myers-Briggs is an excellent tool. Students become really interested in it, and I have seen where they go to the length of doing research on this tool.
Patricia Scales
I like to encourage students to talk about some of their interests outside the realm of the course or their career goals. The Myers-Briggs is a very good tool to engage with.
Doing a short version of the Meyers-Briggs is an interesting methodology, but in a 10 week quarter, I can't see taking time out for testing. I can also see students not responding well to this instrument. I do like to go around the room and ask each student to "self-identify" in terms of their learning styles & favorite teaching styles, e.g. aural, written, tactile, etc. It's a great jumping off point for the course at hand. Sometimes even in a career college situation, there are course that can't be tactile - what then? Asking students to reveal what works best for them independently gets a class involved,in my opinion, in the process of teaching. When students know they have direct impact on how they are taught, they feel empowered and respond positively to the instructor. Anyone have suggestions for responding to students who communicate that they are not interested in the course they are taking, but are only there because it is required for their degree? (I have explained it's skills set and how it will assist them in their work life, but some have been led astray by admissions & advisory staff and they don;t realize what their degree is actually going to prepare them for.)
Hi Butch,
It is important to get to know your students. You better know how to deal with each student when you know what type of person he/she is.
Patricia Scales
