Barry Westling

Dawn,
Great! Variety alone just makes classes a bit more interesting. With so much media available these days, sometimes it becomes critical to choose the "best" method or resource among many "good" choices. One key to doing this is to look at what is planned for delivery to students from their perspective, given their level of prior learning and current performance. Then we can say, how best can I teach these students, this topic, in this class, at this time (which may be different from past classes).

Barry Westling

Dawn Sleeper

I look for media that have a variety of delivery methods. Usually there is an audio/visual delivery, but I try to include other senses whenever possible. As far as the audio/visual, it must be entertaining/interesting, and I find that when possible, humor helps my students to remember the important parts of the presentation.

Barry Westling

Hi Liza:
Another technique that might work well is to break the students into groups and have them discuss a problem.

Regards, Barry

Barry Westling

Hi Jesse:
Do you find that using this large number of different learning activities takes a lot of work to get ready?

Regards, Barry

Barry Westling

Hi Audrey:
Do you find that adding clips in the way you mention is a very time consuming process in your prep time?

Regards, Barry

Barry Westling

Shawn,
I think PPT slides are best as an outline that touch on major categories and provide a forum for the teacher to expand, amplify, discuss, or provide more in depth instruction. If I want students to read something, I will prepare that for reading (not copies of PPT). I feel I am the teacher, the subject matter expert. No resource or tool is better at sharing information than me. I can (and should) use supplementary resources and activities to reach the students, keep them engaged, and make the class interesting.

If so inclined you could break students into groups, and each group would be responsible for taking extensive notes on selected slides that would be distributed to the rest of the class. All students would be part of a group. This could aslo include additional reference material (web sites, text pages, etc.). When students are activly participating in their studies they will learn better and retain more.

Regards, Barry

shawn naccarato

My selection of instructional media depends on where I am teaching and who my audience is. I try to activate as many senses as I can when I teach adults either in crime scene classes I teach or in dental hygiene classes I teach. I do use powerpoint frequently, and I have struggled at times with the concept of how much text to put into a slide. I generally have a lot of information to pass on to students, and I usually make handouts of the powerpoint slides for them to use as a reference source later. I know that when I attend training one of the worst things is to leave with handouts that contain nothing more than bullet points with no useful information that I can refer to later if needed. Any comments you might have on this would be appreciated.

Barry Westling

Crissia,
Your creative talents are put into full steam for this kind of class. Even so, any time a student can participate, handle, practice, or demonstrate something their learning and retention will be improved. Using discussion and the flipboard seem like good choices for interaction in your particular class.

Regards, Barry

Crissia Reay

I teach programming and interactive media so most of the presentations I do are based on demonstrating how a specific animation is created or how to code a certain function. As a result, most of the time the presentations are on an overhead projector that is connected to the teaching station computer. Again due to the nature of the material, I do very little pure demonstration, usually I demonstrate what I am doing on my computer and either have the students follow along, or repeat the same steps right afterwards. I find that the back-and-forth interactivity of presentation and application seems to work best at both holding student attention and maintaining greater retention of the demonstrated skills.

On the occasions when a different type of content delivery is in order, I generally try to change things up and move away from technology. Since most of the class is spent in front of the computer, I find that pulling away from that and focusing on people interactions every so often is very helpful. I’ll have the students come out from their work stations and circle their chairs in the middle of the room to brainstorm ideas, or work on project planning with either a flip board or just markers and colored paper for everyone to jot down ideas and tasks.

Barry Westling

Hi Noah:
In response to your question, I think the best answer is an absolute NO!!

In other words, lay out the expectations for passing the course on the first day of class, create rubrics to help the students see what those expectations are, create tutoring sessions for students that need help. But NEVER, under any circumstance change the curriculum to accomodate a selcet few. You will totally lose the respect of the students who are already succeeding.

Regards, Barry

Barry Westling

Hi Daniel:
More and more publishers are providing PPT's as instructor resources. As I've indicated, these have useful information but they are not formatted to be real enjoyable to view (plain).

I like to make my own slides, both for sequencing but also for allowing me to stop and discuss, or even do a brief demonstration, then come back to the slides. This not only makes things more interesting but keeps attention, students focused, and allows me to add the information I want to emphasize.

Regards, Barry

Barry Westling

Hi Janelle:
I think ANY instructional media, be it PPT, whiteboard, discussions, etc. - whatever, can be effective if the instructor makes it engaging and fun.

The problem is many instructors don't realize this and drone on and on using the same old dry material they always have.

Worse yet is an attitude by instructors showing an unwillingness to try new things.

Regards, Barry

Daniel Acosta

I like to use PPT presentations. I have never had one provided by publisher, however I make them from lecture notes

Barry Westling

Hi Ken:
You make a strong point - a lot of new instructors don't realize how important that "commentary" you speak of is.

Regards, Barry

Barry Westling

Hi Shawn:
Smart boards are great; however, as you point out, their use is somewhat limited due their availability. I think when planning courses and their accompanying media, we want to focus on how best can we teach this particular group of students the specific material required for the class?

These days there are so many resources we really have to be selective to be sure the right resources are chosen to maximize the instructional time and our teaching effectiveness. I statrt with the cousre objectives and student learning outcomes. I base my choices on what can I use to attain achievement of the desired results.

Regards, Barry

Shawn Foreman

Access to a smart board would be wonderful. They really help make standard lectures more interactive and interesting.

Our campus, however, is primarily limited to powerpoint presentations and videos. Powerpoints are convenient as they allow us to present information in a way that flows with how the class is being taught. Videos tend to be more rigid in that you can't (as easily) skip around to view the pertinent information.

Barry Westling

Hi Reagan:
Variety rules when it comes to selecting media. There are so many resources that might be useable, we have to be creative and thoughtful about which of the many media resources available are the best to teach a given topic.

A common pitfall to watch for is to think about how best to teach the students and avoid using what the teacher likes or prefers teaching. It happens more than most would think.

Regards, Barry

Reagan Jackson

I select my media for content delivery based on the type of information i need to teach. If the knowledge the class needs to acquire is a skill then I like to have hands on activities and models for the students to play with. If it is theoretical information, I like to have a power point presentation with colors and graphics to make it interesting and memorable.

Barry Westling

Hi Emma:
You're right, the selection depends on the topic. In other words, we know what information needs to be taught, Our job then is to decide how best to present it expeditiously so all students can grasp it.

Having extra or back-up exercise can be available so if students are not catching on, we already have an alternative assignment that can be substituted. I thing having more material available than time to present is a good safety factor.

Regards, Barry