Problem-Based Learning Pedagogy Fosters Students’ Critical Thinking About Writing

Convinced of the power of PBL to promote students’ critical thinking as demonstrated by its application across disciplines, we designed a series of problems for students in a second-year writing course. We collected samples of their writing before and after implementation of the problems. We were concerned about whether PBL pedagogy would negatively influence second-year students’ writing. However, our preliminary findings suggest that students’ critical thinking about writing improved with the use of PBL pedagogy

Benefits of Using Lesson Study for SoTL, Cross-Disciplinary Research, and Assessment

Lesson study is a technique that helps faculty examine student learning that encourages scholarly teaching. In lesson study, faculty identify a concept and develop a lesson plan to support student learning of the concept. The opportunity to collaborate on lesson development and to examine student learning opens up a space for faculty to exchange ideas about effective teaching. Most faculty do not have opportunities to collaborate on their teaching at this deeper level, but a lesson study project provides guidance for instructors to explore student learning in-depth. This article examines how lesson study provides opportunities for college faculty to engage in cross-disciplinary Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) projects. In addition to structuring SoTL projects, lesson study can aid faculty in the development of assessment plans to improve student learning

Improving Student Learning Outcomes: Lesson Study

Lesson study, an intensive professional development activity used in Japan to improve instruction in K-12 schools, is now being implemented at the university level in places like the University of Wisconsin. It requires teachers to move beyond their unconscious expectations for teaching to examining in-depth each stage of the process. The lesson study team cooperatively develops a lesson called the research lesson by exploring their own experiences, ideas they have heard, and researching the literature relevant to the lesson. In this presentation, attendees will learn how to initiate and facilitate SoTL projects through lesson study at their institution. We will demonstrate how we implemented lesson study with interdisciplinary faculty at our university and will share samples of their work. We will discuss how we are continuing this process with junior faculty in our department to promote SoTL work as part of their Reappointment, Promotion and Tenure documentation

A faculty learning community’s reflection on implementing servicelearning goals

Implementing service-learning is challenging in light of issues such as changes in student demographics and pressure from existing curricula goals. However, closer community engagement is increasingly important in the long-term goals of our universities. Members of a faculty learning community at an open-access college reflect on the process of implementing the official university definition of service-learning in their English program. The implications of using servicelearning as a teaching tool are critically discussed

Can We Teach Students to Integrate Sources in Their Writing?

We discuss the results of a Lesson Study examining source integration in student writing in Freshman Composition and Business Communication. We were concerned about the students’ ability to effectively integrate sources and their tendency to string quotes together in their writing. An interdisciplinary team of five faculty collaborated to find more effective instructional strategies to develop students’ ability to cite sources. We collected student writing to analyze instructional effectiveness. Our findings suggest that students can better integrate citations when they are shown how, practice, and reflect, but students continue to struggle with citation without instructor guidance