A DISCIPLINARY COMMONS FOR
DATABASE TEACHING
Too many folk to get on slide
What is a Disciplinary Commons?
• Teaching professionals come together and share teaching
practice and experience
• Monthly meetings which analyse one particular course from
the context of the course thorough to evaluation.
• The participant can reflect on how the teaching is organised,
what is taught and how effective it seems to be
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For developing teaching skills
• And for documenting practice.
• Initiative is led by Josh Tenenberg in the USA and Sally Fincher
in the UK
Who We Are
Les Ball
(University of
Abertay)
Shiela Baron
(Southampton Solent
University),
Charles Boisvert
(Norwich City
College)
Richard Cooper
(University of
Glasgow)
Tugrul Essendal
(De Montfort
University)
Tony Jenkins
(University of Leeds)
Petra Leimich
(University of
Abertay)
Al Monger
(Southampton Solent
University)
David Nelson
(University of
Sunderland)
Thomas Neligwa
(Keele University
James Patterson
(Glasgow Caledonian
University))
Clare Stanier
(Staffordshire
University)
Tony Valsamidis
(University of
Greenwich)
John Wilson
(Strathclyde
University)
Sally Fincher
(University of
Kent)
Aims
• To document and share knowledge about teaching and
student learning on database courses in the UK.
• To establish practices for the scholarship of teaching by
making it public, peer-reviewed, and amenable for future use
and development by other educators: creating a teachingappropriate document of practice equivalent to the researchappropriate journal paper.
• This is achieved by the development of a course portfolio
Benefits to Participation
• Professional development: Critical reflection involved results
in significant and lasting changes to the course and to
subsequent teaching
• Community development: To develop a culture of peer
review and discourse as is common within research
communities
• Documentation of practice: In a course portfolio, participants
will have a persistent, peer-reviewed, documented deliverable
that can be shared with others both inside of, and external to,
their home institution.
Course Portfolio
• A set of documents that "focuses on the unfolding of a single
course, from conception to results
• The "is in revealing how teaching practice and student
performance are connected with each other“
• Typically includes:
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a course's learning objectives
its contents and structure
a rationale for how this course design meets its objectives
and the course's role in a larger degree program
Meetings
• An introductory meeting, understanding the detail and
meeting each other
• Meetings every 4-6 weeks to discuss the various stages
• In addition, participants will visit one another's classrooms
during the academic year to provide additional feedback.
• The final full-day meeting, in June 2010
– for critical reflection
– finalizing dissemination plans
– and examining general issues
The Stages of a Commons
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Context
Content
Instructional Design
Delivery
Assessment
Evaluation
Context
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The Lecturer
The Students
The Place in the Curriculum
The departmental teaching ethos
Content
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What is taught
What is not taught
What order
What is important
Textbooks
Instructional Design
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Lectures
Tutorials
Labs
Coursework
Which material is taught by what method?
What tasks are the students set?
Delivery
• Lectures
Assessment
• Coursework
• Exams
• The mapping of intended learning outcomes
to assessment methods
Evaluation
• Formal evaluation
• Personal evaluation
• How do we determine whether the course has
been successful?
• How does the institution values and makes
use of any evaluation
The Database Commons
• Recruitment
– Through TLAD and the HEA
– Searching departmental web sites
– Many people too busy
• Meetings
– Peripatetic
– Glasgow, Greenwich, Abertay, Leeds, Leeds,
Sunderland, Southampton, Greenwich, Glasgow
Context
• Lecturers
– Almost all took round about route
• Classes
– From first year to masters
– If generalist then still introductory
Content
• From basic introductory material
– ER, basic SQL
• To more thorough treatment of database
principles
• To internet programming
– Database as web site component
• How do we teach normalisation and relational
algebra?
– or should we even try?
A Common Concern
• The database curriculum has been gradually and
systematically eroded at all levels
– in order to accommodate various external factors,
• the lack of teaching resources
• the pressure to keep up-to-date with new technological
developments
• Database modules squeezed in with other topics such as Web
programming and human computer interaction
• The absence of theoretical concepts and mathematical
formalisms is a cause for concern
Delivery
• Lectures or not
• Coursework structure
Assessment
• Coursework tasks
– Like a portfolio or small parts
• Exams
– Or not?
Evaluation
• Formal mechanisms for student feedback
– Staff student meetings
– Questionnaires
• Institutional Feedback Mechanisms
• Results
– Did they do well?
• Personal reflection
– Did it feel right?
Final Thoughts
• Never enough time!
– a stressful addition to an already busy working life
• Lack of timely preparation
– which reduced the amount (and therefore the
value) of peer evaluation
• Theory being lost
• All felt significant benefit
The Future???
• Possible one year on meeting
• But what else?
– Local groupings?
– TLAD