Researching While Teaching: A Collaborative Action Research Model to Improve College Teaching

Authors

  • Michael Schratz University of Innsbruck Author

Abstract

My students don't prepare for class the way I want them to. What can I do? How can I increase student participation in class? What are some alternative methods for assessing students' learning at the end of the course? How can I introduce material to create a more stimulating classroom atmosphere? Questions like these are frequently asked by faculty regardless of disciplinary background. Unfortunately, faculty do not always reach the people who might be able to offer help in answering such questions (or, one might argue, those who could offer help do not always reach the faculty who need it!). These questions are often raised after committee meetings, during lunch, or at campus recreational activities where faculty members meet informally after classes. In these settings, however, the questions are seldom dealt with professionally, let alone answered to the faculty members' satisfaction. More often, discussions of these issues become lengthy arguments about the lower quality of students in comparison with those of earlier times or other places.

Published

2024-03-23