Resources to Help College Teachers (Professors) Improve Teaching and Increase Student Learning
	By Dr. James Bell, Professor of Psychology

Guided Student Learning:
An Innovative Approach to Increasing Student Learning Based on Educational Research

By Dr. James Bell, Professor of Psychology, Howard Community College 6/23/02

I. Course Goals: The Overt Curriculum

What do I want my students to do by the end of this course?

What do my students want to be able to do by the end of this course?

What do my students need to learn to be successful in this course?

What do my students need to be able to do at the start of this course?

A. Knowledge - Recall key course concepts

B. Understand - Identify examples, summarize

C. Apply - Apply to this course, to other courses, to everyday life

D. Learning Skills

1. Able to follow written directions - find the directions, read and understand the directions, do

2. Improve time management - put aside sufficient study time to accomplish the homework

3. Decrease procrastination - do homework in a timely fashion, not at the last minute

E. Communication Skills

1. Use American Psychological Association citation format

2. Write scientific summaries

3. Proofread written work

4. Explain verbally major course concepts

5. Improve group discussion skills - active listening, paraphrasing, giving feedback

F. Thinking Skills

1. Critically evaluate secondary psychological sources

2. Increase brainstorming ideas

3. Improve creative problem solving

G. Attitudes

1. Increase taking responsibility for learning

2. Increase desire to learn

3. Increase desire to turn in high quality written work

4. Increase desire to ask questions about evidence

H. Have the goals for the course been specified?

1. Do all students have to meet all the course goals?

2. Do students have any choices in which course goals to meet?

3. Can students create some of their own goals?

4. Have the goals been translated into specific learning objectives?

5. Are students taught how to use the learning objectives?

6. Are student provided written learning objectives for each week of the course?

II. Course Goals: The Covert Curriculum

As student learn the content of courses, they also are learning about how to learn which is called the covert curriculum or learning to learn. Covert because students are not helped to understand what they are learning. Hettich (1998, pp. 51-52) in Learning Skills for College and Career attempts to describe the covert curriculum. AThe covert curriculum may be defined as those numerous, routine skill-related activities, behaviors, and attitudes that are transacted inside and outside of classrooms. Collectively, they reflect a student’s overall work orientation and habits. Sometimes these experiences are called life/learning or lifelong skills. The overt curriculum focuses primarily on the communication of content, such as facts, concepts, and theory. The covert curriculum focuses primarily on the processes involved in learning skill-related behaviors and attitudes.

A. Here are some examples of the covert curriculum.

1. Submitting an assignment of the day it is due

2. Taking organized and legible notes

3. Listening attentively in class

4. Increasing your reading speed and comprehension

5. Maintaining an appointment book that lists dates of tests, assignments, and special events.

6. Analyzing the attitudes and behavior of role models (for example, student leaders, teachers, administrators, peers)

7. Learning how to cope with stress

8. Changing the physical environment to strengthen your concentration

9. Practicing techniques to improve your memory

10. Accepting responsibility for your behavior and attitudes

11. Seeking and using feedback about your behavior.

B. Each example is a familiar part of the college experience. Each reflects an activity that we often ignore or take for granted. Think of the cover curriculum as a collection of unscheduled, self-taught, non-credit minicourses that helps you succeed in the overt curriculum and in your non-academic experiences.

III. Written Instructions For Homework

What homework assignments do students need to complete before coming to class? What kinds of assignments will best help students learn?

A. Rationale for guided student learning through homework

1. Class time can be used more effectively if students are prepared for class by having completed preliminary work with course topics.

2. Class activities can use active learning to engage students and adjust for some individual differences.

3. The homework following a class can be more effective if it builds on class activities.

B. Guided Homework requires clear and detailed written instructions that start with simple assignments and move to more complex assignments.

C. Students need examples for both the content and format for written work.

D. Answer Keys may be used for some assignments.

E. Students need information about the process of learning which is ordinarily not found in textbooks. Assign students to read, study, and learn about the following topics: from their textbook, textbook supplemental materials, a web site for the textbook, teacher created materials, ideas in the library, ideas on the Internet.

1. How to read, study, and learn from a textbook

2. How to prepare for and take a test

3. How to take notes in class

4. How to write a paper

5. How to manage ones time

6. How to decrease procrastination

7. How to change your own behavior and attitudes

For example, in Tools for Teachers (2002) by Bell see p. 18 for a review sheet over ideas on group discussion, pp. 33-34 on Key to Success put out by Howard Community College, p. 35 on Learning Takes Time from Bell=s SSG (2002), see pp. 41-46 on Self Assessment, pp. 47-49 on Changing Behavior, pp. 50-57 on Procrastination, pp. 58-61 on Test Taking, pp. 62-6 on Self Watching.

IV. Written Instructions for Class Activities

What class activities can be used to introduce new information? What class activities can be used to review previous homework? What class activities do students need to do before doing the next homework assignment? What is the best use of class time to help students learn?

A. Feedback from students about their personal experience of the course

1. Use a Data Sheet to collect information the first day of class about students and their goals.

2. Use written questions to assess student views about the course

a) After the first week (clear on course goals, expectations, and the grading system?)

b) Third week - problems in adjusting to the new structure

c) Midsemester - likes, dislikes, ideas for improving the course

d) Ninth week - how are things going?

e) Twelfth week - how are things going?

f) End of the course - liked, disliked, ideas for improving the course

B. Feedback about learning

1. Use written class activities to practice recall, understanding, and application; and to assess student progress on course objectives: closed book quizzes, pair quizzes, written guide sheets for reviewing the homework in pairs or small groups, written guide sheets for discussing videos seen in class, written guides for class demonstrations, written

2. Use written guide sheets for teaching thinking skills.

C. To Guide Class Learning

1. Written guides for going over the homework

2. Written guides for videos, Power point presentations, computer lessons

3. Written guides for new learnings

D. To confirm understanding of the Grading System provide students with a
Written Contract.

1. State what the instructor will do.

2. State what students are to do.

3. Briefly review the grading system.

4. Request a signed agreement on the Course Expectations. See p. 12 of Tools for Teachers by Bell (2002).

E. Have you tried mastery learning?

V. Research Supported Ideas For Teaching Thinking To Students

What are methods supported by research for teaching thinking skills?

A. Have students write about and discuss what they are learning.

B. Encourage faculty-student contact, in and out of class.

C. Get students working with one another on substantive tasks, in and out of class.

D. Give prompt and frequent feedback to students about their progress.

E. Communicate high expectations.

F. Make standards and grading criteria explicit.

G. Help students to achieve those expectations and criteria.

H. Respect diverse talents and ways of learning.

I. Use problems, questions, or issues, not merely content coverage, as points of entry into the subject and as source of motivation for sustained inquiry.

J. Make courses assignment-centered course rather than the text/lecture/coverage-centered. Then focus on helping students successfully complete the assignments.@ Quoted from Barbara Walvoord and John Breihan (1997), Helping faculty design assignment-centered courses. In D. DeZure (Ed.). To improve the academy, Vol. 16, (pp. 349-372). Stillwater, OK: New Forum Press, p. 354 -- 3 sources are cited.

Thanks to B. Walvoord and the following 5 sources for ideas contained in
this handout:

J. Bean, 1996, Engaging ideas, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

A. Grasha, 1996, Teaching with style, Pittsburgh: Alliance

P. Hettich, 1998, Learning skills for college and career. Pacific Grove, CA: Brooks/Cole.

W. McKeachie, 1999, Teaching tips. Lexington, MA: D. C. Heath.

B. Walvoord & V. Anderson, 1998, Effective grading. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Faculty Resources: All College Teachers | Psychology Teachers |
Teaching Thinking | Increasing Student Learning | Outcomes Assessment | What’s New?

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