THE TYRANNY OF DEAD IDEAS IN TEACHING AND LEARNING: Midwest Sociological Society Presidential Address 2010

Clinging to dead ideas about teaching and learning limits our practice as professors. The resulting tyranny means we fail to educate our students as effectively as we might. This address challenges faculty to reconsider their understanding and habits in three areas: the preparedness of students, the impact of grading policies on learning motivation, and the role of technology in teaching. The good news is that learned behaviors, sociologically informed reflection, and the application of the research in the scholarship of teaching and learning can liberate us and improve the experiences of teachers and learners alike.     

Technology-Enhanced Active Learning Classrooms: New Directions for Social Work Education

Social work educators are increasingly exploring how to effectively use technology in their classrooms. The purpose of this study was to explore how a technology-enhanced active learning classroom influenced social work students’ engagement and overall learning experiences. An online survey was conducted with 125 social work students from micro and macro courses. When compared to macro courses, students from micro social work courses more positively reported active participation, effective teaching, and technical skills as benefits of the classroom. Furthermore, the dynamic learning environment and instructors’ effective teaching significantly affected students’ positive learning experience. Social work programs should develop various teaching methods for active learning classrooms to develop students’ practice skills that can be transferred to the real world.     

四级网考对大学英语教学的反拨作用研究

四级网考是大学英语改革的一项重要内容，是计算机网络技术背景下大学英语等级考试的必然发展趋势。通过对四级网考试卷构成、考试内容、题型设计、考试难度等方面的具体特点分析，探讨实施网考将对大学英语教学产生的反拨作用，并总结了网络考试对大学英语教学的几点启示，以期对大学英语教学有一定的指导作用和帮助。     

Backing Australia's Future: Teaching and Learning in Social Work

Abstract

It is universally expected that universities will strive for quality in teaching and learning. Over the past 25 years, massive changes to higher education have impacted on these institutions. We now have a mass higher education system, a knowledge-based economy, increased technology, and the internationalization of education accompanied by increased student enrolments and political expectations of enhanced graduate outcome measures. These changes pose challenges to developing, updating, and improving the quality of teaching and learning. This new policy environment confronts social work educators as they determine how best to deliver quality professional education. The present paper discusses the concepts underpinning the Australian government's paper Our Universities: Backing Australia's Future as a background to exploring the tensions arising in current professional expectations and criteria for social work programs as they make the transition from old to new paradigms in classroom teaching and field education.     

Technology-Enhanced Practice Courses and Collaborative Learning in Distance Education

This article describes the use of a research-based teaching model using digital technology to enhance self-efficacy and group work practice skills in an undergraduate social work course. Our project focused on the development of group leadership interactional skill training for undergraduate social work students. We present pedagogical and theoretical approaches explaining a teaching model, which is designed to utilize digital technology and collaborative learning strategies in Interactive Video Connected (IVC) and traditional face-to-face classrooms. We explore how the teaching model impacts student perception of self-efficacy regarding group work practice skills.     

INFRASTRUCTURE AND INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE IN THE NETWORKED UNIVERSITY

Many people believe that information technology will bring massive structural changes to the university. This paper draws on concepts from both computer science and social theory to explore what these structural changes might be like. The point of departure is the observation that the interaction between information technology and market economics creates incentives to standardize the world. Standardization can be a force for good or evil, depending on how it is done, and this paper develops normative ideas about the relation between the forces of standardization and the places in which university teaching is done. Information technology allows these places to be more diverse than in the past, and a good rule of thumb is that the places in which learning occurs should be analogous in their structure and workings to the places in which the learned knowledge will be used. Universities can support this increased diversity of learning places with appropriate structural reforms, including decentralized governance and explicit attention to certain aspects of the university organization, such as media services and the career centre, that, historically, have been marginalized.     

高职“药物合成技术”精品课程持续建设研究

探索以学生为主体的"药物合成技术"精品课程的持续建设方法。通过分析药物生产岗位典型的工作任务,确定课程目标,构建以产品生产流程为载体、工作过程系统化的教学体系,校企合作,实施理实一体化教学,让学生参与课程建设,收集反馈信息调控教学,建设"双师"型师资队伍,培养了学生的科研兴趣和创新能力,提高了教学质量。     

Why American business demands twenty-first century learning: A company perspective

Microsoft is an innovative corporation demonstrating the kind and caliber of job skills needed in the twenty-first century. It demonstrates its commitment to twenty-first century skills by holding its employees accountable to a set of core competencies, enabling the company to run effectively. The author explores how Microsoft's core competencies parallel the Partnership for 21st Century Skills learning frameworks. Both require advanced problem-solving skills and a passion for technology, both expect individuals to be able to work in teams, both look for a love of learning, and both call for the self-confidence to honestly self-evaluate. Microsoft also works to cultivate twenty-first century skills among future workers, investing in education to help prepare young people for competitive futures. As the need for digital literacy has become imperative, technology companies have taken the lead in facilitating technology training by partnering with schools and communities. Microsoft is playing a direct role in preparing students for what lies ahead in their careers. To further twenty-first century skills, or core competencies, among the nation's youth, Microsoft has established Partners in Learning, a program that helps education organizations build partnerships that leverage technology to improve teaching and learning. One Partners in Learning grantee is Global Kids, a nonprofit organization that trains students to design online games focused on global social issues resonating with civic and global competencies. As Microsoft believes the challenges of competing in today's economy and teaching today's students are substantial but not insurmountable, such partnerships and investments demonstrate Microsoft's belief in and commitment to twenty-first century skills.     

Application of Web-based learning in teaching social work law

Computer-assisted learning is now well established in many universities and offers a number of virtues that should commend it to social work educators. It offers a unique and valuable way of achieving certain learning outcomes that are of particular value in social work education. This paper presents one attempt to develop its potential by integrating Web-based tutorials into teaching social work law. It is suggested that Web-based learning has a unique and specific contribution to offer in enhancing student learning, but it does need to be carefully planned and integrated into teaching. Resistance to this form of learning needs to be anticipated; and the reasons for it considered for they may partly explain why the use of computer-assisted learning in social work education has, so far, been fairly limited. Nevertheless the 'added value' of Web-based learning is considerable so long as it is not regarded as some kind of cheap or 'soft' teaching option.     

合作学习教学模式在网球教学中的实验研究

通过对网球合作学习教学模式的实验研究,发现合作学习教学模式比常规网球教学模式更有利于提高学生的理论水平,增强学生发现问题、分析问题、解决问题的能力;对改善同学关系、建立师生融洽关系及提高网球学习兴趣有明显促进作用;更有利于提高学生的合作意识、创新意识,促进学生积极主动学习与交流,从而促进网球教学质量的提高。     

Twenty-first century learning in schools: A case study of New Technology High School in Napa, California

The most pertinent question concerning teaching and learning in the twenty-first century is not what knowledge and skills students need--that laundry list was identified over a decade ago--but rather how to foster twenty-first century learning. What curricula, experiences, assessments, environments, and technology best support twenty-first century learning? New Technology High School (NTHS) in Napa, California, is one example of a successful twenty-first century school. In this chapter, the author describes the components of this exemplary high school, illustrating an environment that will cultivate twenty-first century student learning. New Technology High School began by defining eight learning outcomes, aligned with the standards of the Partnership for 21st Century Skills; to graduate, students demonstrate mastery of these outcomes through an online portfolio. To help students achieve the outcomes, NTHS employs project- and problem-based learning. Whereas in traditional classrooms students work alone on short-term assignments that do not lend themselves to deep understanding, the project-based learning approach has students working in teams on long-term, in-depth, rigorous projects. Students' work is supported by the school's workplace-like environment and effectiv use of technology. Meaningful assessment is essential to project-based learning; students receive continuous feedback, helping them become self-directed learners. In fact, NTHS uses outcome-based grading through which students constantly know how they are performing on the twenty-first century outcomes. Research has shown that NTHS graduates are better prepared for postsecondary education, careers, and citizenship than their peers from other schools. To facilitate twenty-first century learning, all schools need to rethink their approach to teaching and learning. New Technology High School is one way to do so.     

A NEW TECHNOLOGY FOR TEACHING/LEARNING MARITAL AND FAMILY THERAPY

A computer technology known as Group Support Systems (GSS) was pilot tested in a doctoral marital and family therapy (MFT) course to explore its usefulness in teaching/learning marital and family therapy. GSS allowed participants to combine face-to-face interaction with dialogue structured by GSS on personal computers. Through linked computers, each participant contributed to group discussions both simultaneously and anonymously. GSS was used to discuss a videotape, to conduct two role plays, and to write this paper. GSS was found to improve brain-storming, enhance collaboration, reduce hierarchical status among participants, increase self-reflection, create a trusting environment, and promote group-supported active learning. Recommendations for further MFT teaching, research, and application of GSS are presented.     

Kashmir and the Kashmir Impasse

Social studies educators are responsible for successfully teaching students the knowledge, skills, and values necessary to be effective citizens. The National Council for the Social Studies urges educators to design technology-enhanced experiences that address social studies content and prepare students for effective citizenship. In this paper, we give examples from a piratical unit designed for a fourth-grade social studies classroom to highlight the role digital technology can play in enhancing social studies teaching and learning. We use Internet workshops as structures for students to meaningfully research social studies content, and we use blogs as technological tools to publish and showcase authentic student work, and ultimately, to develop students' higher order thinking skills and creativity.     

Evaluating Distance Learning in Social Work Education

Fifty-seven MSW students enrolled in two different practice courses were exposed to approximately equal amounts (five 4-hour sessions) of live, in-class instruction and two-way interactive televised instruction. Separate post-course evaluations of both teaching methods, using a previously published measure of instructional quality, significantly favored live instruction over televised distance learning. More empirical research demonstrating the potential benefits of distance learning technology is urgently needed prior to the widespread adoption of these methods.     

Teaching without being taught how: social work practice faculty voices

ABSTRACT

Social work practice faculty have an important role in socializing MSW students to the field and practice of social work. This study, based on interviews with 15 faculty teaching an advanced clinical practice course in the United States, examines how faculty conceptualize teaching and learning. Faculty were asked about the theories or frameworks that guided their teaching, their own journeys to teaching and the resources that support their teaching. The study found that participants drew largely on their own experiences as student learners and social work practitioners and did not have much formal training in teaching and student learning. Furthermore, while half of the participants were able to identify a learning theory that guided their teaching, the other half were not. Finally, while participants articulated the need for support regarding their own teaching, many of the schools did not have formal faculty development opportunities. The paper ends with recommendations for supporting current and new faculty regarding teaching and student learning.     

Hypermedia Computer-Based Education in Social Work Education

Abstract

Hypermedia computer-based education (CBE) is an emerging information technology that makes possible user-directed, nonsequential exploration of, and interaction with, information presented through a variety of media including text, animation, graphics, sound, and video. This article describes hypermedia CBE and briefly reviews the research on its instructional efficacy. A synopsis of the theoretical foundation covers cognitive theory concepts of information networks and associative learning, web teaching principles, andragogical theory as it relates to social work education, and hypermedia CBE structure. Examples of current and potential applications in social work education demonstrate that hypermedia CBE can emulate the dynamic, iterative learning process of knowledge acquisition, knowledge testing, and content integration through practice simulation.     

研讨式教学方法在世界当代史教学中的实践与探索

在突出学为主体的教学方式的转变过程中,结合世界当代史的课程特点,把研讨式的教学方法引入到教学中来,将学生的课外学习与课堂学习结合起来,将知识理论与实际运用结合起来,可以比较充分地调动学生的积极性,培养学生研究性学习的能力,在对学生的考核评价方面采取更加灵活的评价体系,更好地发挥学生的潜能。     

A study on the Application of Information Means Using in Higher Vocational English Teaching

Based on quick development of information technology and hardware device, higher vocational English teaching has put forward more requirements in modern times. This research raises the questions about what are the functions of information means and how to apply information means in higher vocational English teaching. It suggests to pay more attention on arousing students' interest of learning English and to make the English class attractive by make full use of information means and combining traditional and modern teaching method.     

Promoting cultural understandings through song across the Tasman: pre-service primary teacher education

As tertiary music educators across the Tasman we argue that music, particularly song, is an effective medium for teaching and learning about non-western music when preparing generalist primary Pre-Service Teachers (PSTs). Using ‘voice’ as a portable and accessible vehicle to transmit cultural understandings, we draw on the Zimbabwean proverb ‘if you can speak you can learn to sing and if you can walk you can learn to dance’ to foster music creativity and enhance literacy development and confidence in our PSTs. Using narrative methodology, we share our teaching and learning experience at Deakin University (Australia) and the University of Auckland (New Zealand) where we include African and Māori music respectively as effective ways to promote cultural understandings. In our experience, the teaching of song goes beyond teaching a tune or something that is ‘fun’. Rather, it is as an effective context for developing knowledge, skills and understandings about multiculturalism and the importance and need to be ‘inclusive of others’. PSTs gained socially, linguistically, cultural and emotionally, to name a few. We encourage other music educators at all education levels to be culturally and linguistically inclusive and to explore non-western music as a positive teaching and learning experience.     

Digital learning across cultures: an account of activity theory

ABSTRACT

This paper explores a teaching and learning process as it unfolds in an online offshore classroom. The paper reports on teaching and learning narratives distilled from different cultures, namely the cultures of educators and students in the context of digital learning environments. Drawing on activity theory as a conceptual framework to analyse the narrative, we employ self-study as a methodological tool for capturing the dynamism and complexities that unravel in intercultural and technology-enabled teaching activities. The framework explores the relationships, tensions and opportunities of diverse activity elements that constitute the design and delivery of digital pedagogies. In the networked intercultural system, sustaining the position of activity elements and the specific relational circuit that they institutionalise is a key task for understanding digital technologies as an influential tool for effective learning and teaching practices. We argue that seeing the digital platform from the perspective of its role in creating dynamic interrelationships in a complex activity system is one way to move beyond the cultural confines of any particular element in the system.