Topic: Observation of an Effective Instructor
Name: Tianru Jiang
If I’m asked to name the greatest teacher I have ever known, I would definitely
say “Dr. Ward”, who is a teacher in Purdue University and a researcher at GWU this
year. I was so lucky to attend his class last semester. There was nothing too difficult
in that class, and the main topic was probability introduction. I came to love
statistics because of him, not only his attractive personality, but also his teaching
styles.
There are several things he did in class that impressed me and provided me
guidance in my work as a teaching assistant.
He organized the lecture so well that students easily remembered and absorbed
his lessons. Every time he went to the class, he always did reviews at the beginning
of class and gave a brief preview of what we were going to learn that day. As Ron and
Susan Zemke write in 30 Things We Know For Sure About Adult Learning, “They have
expectations, and it is critical to take time early on to clarify and articulate all
expectations before getting into content”.1 Dr. Ward structured this part the best. He
spared no effort to make sure that students knew their destination and the many
roads leading to it. Thus, sitting in his class, you would feel like there was a map in
1Ron
and Susan Zemke, National Institute for Staff and Organizational Development. Showcasing Popular Issues
Series, 30 things we know for sure about adult learning, Feb 9, 2007, Wol.XXIX, No.4
your mind, and clearly understand what you needed to do step-by-step. An effective
teacher should understand this quote: “With an understanding of the structure of
the discipline they are teaching, teachers can provide cognitive maps of the terrain
to be learned, along with content-specific strategies, examples, analogies, and
diagrams to make material meaningful to students and to address common
misconceptions”.2
Beyond that, Dr. Ward also tried his best to avoid overload. “If the lesson
becomes too complex and stimulating, students will begin to lose the larger message
in the hands”.3 There is a research about how much information people could gain
from a class. We might feel that students may acquire a lot since we can tell from
their eyes that every time professors turn back from the blackboard they seem to
pay their one hundred percent attention. But, unfortunately, the result of that
research shows that a student could only absorb 40 percent of information given in a
class. Is this number depressing? I think yes. “Adults tend to prefer single concept,
single-theory courses that focus heavily on the application of the concept to relevant
problems.”4 In short, KISS – keep it simple, stupid.
Besides his well-organized lecture, another outstanding thing about his class
2 Linda-Darling Hammond, Kim Austin, Suzanne Orcutt, and Jim Rosso, Stanford University School of Education.
How people learn p.13, Sep 27th, 2001
3
Multimodal teaching strategies
4 Ron and Susan Zemke, National Institute for Staff and Organizational Development. Showcasing Popular Issues
Series, 30 things we know for sure about adult learning, Feb 9, 2007, Wol.XXIX, No.4
was the “physically and psychologically comfortable” learning environment.
5
No
one can deny how essential this atmosphere is for efficient work and motivated
study. “Effective teacher can organize the environment to provide students with
active, hands-on learning and authentic tasks and audiences.”6 Dr. Ward is one of
them. He is good at getting all the students involved in class. His patience and
kindness encouraged students to raise their hands and express their opinion. Since
“Adults tend to take errors personally and are more likely to let them affect
self-esteem.” Dr.Ward never said “that’s wrong.” Instead, he always guided students
to step out of the wrong place and let themselves find out what was wrong.
What I listed above is not exhaustive. Actually, it is easy to find other amazing
things about him. Most importantly, he is himself. What I mean by that is he always
kept his own style. A good teacher sometimes should be humorous. “It’s about being
self-deprecating and not taking yourself too seriously. It’s often about making
innocuous jokes, mostly at your own expense, so that the ice breaks and students
learn in a more relaxed atmosphere where you, like them, are human with your own
share of faults and shortcomings.”7 I still remembered the day that Dr. Ward invited
all of his students to his house. His wife cooked a lot of delicious food for us, and we
5 Ron and Susan Zemke, National Institute for Staff and Organizational Development. Showcasing Popular
Issues Series, 30 things we know for sure about adult learning, Feb 9, 2007, Wol.XXIX, No.4
6 Linda-Darling Hammond, Kim Austin, Suzanne Orcutt, and Jim Rosso, Stanford University School of Education.
How people learn p.13, Sep 27th, 2001
7 Association for Experiential Education, Schools & Colleges Professional Group Newsletter, Spring 1999, Vol. 2,
#1
met his two sons and two daughters that day. We had the chance to get really close
and to see the daily life of our professor. That experience was fantastic. Also, in class,
he would like to draw pictures to help us understand and often made jokes about
how his children were surprised to find a lot of cute drawings in graduate-level
notes. All in all, he made the lecture seem like an easy talk between friends, one of
whom happened to be good at stats while another one was not.
“The key to the instructor role is control.”
8
In class, many tasks need to be
finished in an exact time period. How to balance “the presentation of new material,
debate and discussion, sharing of relevant student experiences” counts a lot. It is
often the case that professors make the class seem longer than it should be. However,
Dr. Ward never put students into this terrible situation. He had an incredibly good
control of the clock. It seems that he made maximum use of every single second. I am
not exaggerating here. Every time he finished the final example, time came to an end.
Moreover, he “implemented the use of collaboration and exercises that reinforce
learning”.
9
What surprised me the most about his class was that everyone
complained about how difficult the homework problems were, but nobody blamed
him, instead, they studied hard and enjoyed solving problems. From my perspective,
that might be because of the high connection between theoretical knowledge and
practical problems; Variety of applications always incite students’ interests.
Ron and Susan Zemke, National Institute for Staff and Organizational Development. Showcasing Popular Issues
Series, 30 things we know for sure about adult learning, Feb 9, 2007, Wol.XXIX, No.4
9 Multimodal teaching stratigies
8