12 tips for talking to science faculty about new teaching strategies
Attention education researchers: Here are some tips about interacting with science faculty. I’ve noticed that this genre uses a lot of lists. So, here’s a list:
Lose the acronyms.
Lose the jargon. You can use Bloom’s Taxonomy without actually calling it that. You can ask us to use formative assessments without calling them that.
We’re not going to spend more time on new approaches to teaching, unless this new thing will save us more time down the road.
Our fundamental attitudes towards students and the educational system are unlikely to change.
Some scientists just don’t place their students first. Those are the ones you really need to reach. Don’t judge us as a group because that judgment can’t fix the problem.
Don’t prescribe changes in curriculum.
If you say it works, then show us data. Anecdotes are subject to suspicion.
Data are also subject to scrutiny, too. You win skeptical people over with data and letting them draw their own conclusions. Among scientists, skepticism is a virtue.
Don’t push technology as a solution to a pedagogical challenge. We’d like to see what works, but not to have it marketed to us. (For example, tell us about clickers. But don’t claim that they make students learn better, because they don’t. They promote active learning, problem-solving and reflection, which causes learning. Scientists dislike false claims that often accompany technological promises.)
Go easy on the Venn diagrams. One or two are okay, as long as they’re not insipid.
Tread carefully when claiming that current practices are downright unethical. It’s hard to win people over to your cause when you start with the premise that they are making unethical choices.
Accept that this list is chock full of hypocrisy. Scientists love their own jargon, and love their technology, and are not education experts. But get over it if you want us to get on board and teach better by listening to your advice. That’s what it’ll take to get most of us to listen.
This list makes it sounds like I’m speaking for all scientists, but for all I know I’m off base on most of these items. I’m not in much of a position to speak for the motivations of others. I don’t have a broad understanding about how education researchers typically interact with science faculty, either. However, people are more apt to pay attention to dumb lists than well-composed longer pieces of writing, so I thought I’d give a shot at this, snappy, oversimplified and condescending form of communication. If you’d like nuance, feel free to drop me a line. And of course, feel free to add new ones in the comments, starting with 13.
Revision 22 Sep 2014: Does this represent my views? No. Does this represent most scientists? I don’t really know. It does represent a bunch of feedback I’ve heard and overheard from faculty after being involved in pedagogical training session. A lot of scientists just flat out tune-out, and if someone managed to follow these tips, I would guess, it’d be more likely that more scientists would listen. I’m all down with the ed-jargon and acronyms and being student-centered and trying new tech when it works. But, I’m the converted, and we can’t improve teaching in universities by preaching to the converted.