Best Practices for Condensed Courses
Modified from a presentation by Traci Freeman, Executive Director of the Colket Center for Academic Excellence at Colorado College and Jen Rouse, Director of the Cornell College Center for Teaching and Learning.
- Depth over Breadth
- Assign fewer readings but ask students to do more with them
- Ask students to describe their problem-solving processes or categorize problems
- Problem-based learning/ project-based learning/ case-based learning
- Space and Enhance Practice
- Spiral course material
- Assign frequent quizzes
- Make quizzes and tests cumulative
- Provide Feedback on Student Learning
- Peer review on papers and assignments
- Think-pair-share
- Clicker questions
- Individual tests followed by group tests
- Oral exams/ oral presentations
- Relationships and Classroom Climate
- Invest in relationship-building activities on day one
- Review syllabus and reading lists
- Acknowledge tensions, ideally in the moment or the next day
- Model and invite self-reflection in heated situations
- Transparent Teaching
- Support high student engagement with course design, goals, activities, criteria for assessment
- Assist students in seeing themselves as learners
- Design courses around the how and why—essential questions, exploring problems
- Invite all to take risks, to invent approaches to the challenge or problem, to be outlier thinkers
- Enduring Understanding
- Address transfer of course concepts and skills to other situations
- Introduce enduring understanding: What will we take with us from this course to make a similar journey? To build on this journey and go further? To create an entirely new journey?
- Spend time with final assignments early in the course to prepare students for the scaffolding and staging you’ll provide along the way
- Invite students to discuss what they will take with them
Tips for Delivery of Condensed Courses
Modified from a presentation by Marcia B. France, Dean of Undergraduate Studies, Duke Kunshan University.
- Build Active/Engaged Learning Communities
- Use ice breakers —> students more likely to ask for help
- Require pre-class activities —> increase participation
- Group work -> build connections
- Structure is Essential
- Use LMS for organization
- Create modules organized by week or day
- Hyper-focus on clarity of assignments and explicit instructions
- Guidelines for group work
- Set rules for checking/responding to email (for both students and instructor)
- Pace Course Evenly
- Use every course day
- Stick to schedule
- Don’t overload the last week
- Recommendation: no more than ~3 hours of assigned daily work per class day.
- Content: Less is More
- Prioritize retention of content over coverage
- Let some topics go
- Deepen key principles, ideas, and skills
- Remember that students with good skills can access specific content elsewhere, when they need it
- Use Backward Course Design to create robust learning objectives
- Link all student work to assignments and objectives
- Use Synchronous Meetings Wisely
- Lecture less than usual
- Focus more on interactions
- Vary activities
- Vary Synchronous Activities
- Team-based problem-solving sessions
- Group presentations (use peer feedback forms)
- Interactive sessions with guest speakers
- Use Asynchronous Activities for Content Delivery and Practice
- Don’t put full burden of content delivery on yourself. Use pre-recorded videos, Coursera, readings, podcasts, adaptive ebooks, TED talks, etc.
- Include some meta-teaching on becoming independent learners
- Provide a framework for synchronous sessions (pre-class assignments, discussion guidelines, study prompts, questions to accompany asynchronous content)
- Hands-on projects/experiments
- Use forums and discussion boards to extend in-class activities
- Provide solutions to homework questions, so students don’t get frustrated when they get stuck
- Increase writing to reflect on materials, organize thoughts
- Consider assigning practice partners