Lecturing
Lectures are a common teaching strategy in universities. However, to reduce the risk of encouraging students to adopt a reproduction approach to their learning we need to move beyond a merely transmission model of teaching. To encourage higher levels of thinking and reasoning lectures need to be designed to encourage students to utilise and build on their existing understanding and transform what they hear into their own ways of knowing and thinking. This site offers strategies to do so.
Resources
- If you are lecturing for the first time, or are really new to
lecturing, you might wish to download and read the handout "Lecturing
for the First Time"
- Lecture theatre information
- Lecturing
to Large Classes
Strategies for dealing with teaching problems and student problems in large class environments - Guidelines to Lecturing
General introduction to how to organise a lecture to maximise opportunities for student learning. - Planning Effective Lectures
- Delivery Strategies
- Solving Specific Issues
- Teaching
Large Classes
This website is hosted by University of Queensland TEDI website.This AUTC-funded project offers guidelines for managing, teaching and assessing large classes. It offers case studies, reports and relevant links.
This page provides a series of links to pdf documents detailing the technology available in the various lecture theatres on campus. It also includes instruction lists on how to use them
Why Lecture?
In a recent teaching/learning workshop held at Flinders, academic staff discussed their reasons for continuing the tradition of lecturing. One reason was that it is traditional and therefore is expected by the students and teaching staff. But tradition alone is not enough justification for continuing with lectures in these times of heavy workloads. If a lecture is not educationally worthwhile to students then for academics the time spent designing the lecture could be more profitably spent writing a research article. For students the time could be spent more profitably in independent study of the texts. However, in the same teaching workshop the academics also identified that lectures can provide:
- a method of communication of pivotal content material
- an opportunity for academics to communicate their enthusiasm for the discipline, so important for student motivation
- an opportunity to emphasize important ideas
- an opportunity to present the most up to date information
- an opportunity to present academics' personal interpretation of contemporary research and subject matter
- a synthesis of diverse and related information from a variety of sources
- a springboard for development of further understanding
- a "human" face to the discipline
- an opportunity for students to get to know a teaching team
Many academics enjoy the opportunity lecturing provides for them to further explore their discipline on a regular basis. Some are enterprising enough to use this opportunity to begin to develop articles for publication. Others enjoy the chance to impart their knowledge to students and to perform, as many good lectures are also good performances. You may find that there are other benefits and opportunities provided by lectures that are not mentioned here. The point is that we should know why we are adopting a specific teaching/learning strategy and we should ensure that our students are aware of its intentions. Some academics find lecturing a daunting experience. Being a good lecturer is not a natural personality attribute and there are strategies and ways of thinking that can be learnt that can make it a satisfying and effective way of assisting students with their learning.