I strongly believe if a teacher has their degree in Education, they should be required to lecture in class. Having the title of "teacher", it is obvious their role is "to teach." I have a class this semester where it is the student's job to teach themselves all materials. Each class period, students are required to do readings and pair up with a person to teach them the material on the assigned pages.
After completing the inner-teachings with a classmate, we fill out an assessment on how well we feel we know the material and taught each other. On that sheet, we are able to write down areas we want covered in class. The teacher will sometimes shed light on a couple of those questions, but never all of them.
What is the point of taking a non-online class if a student has to learn everything on their own anyways? Teaching ourselves the material seems to create a border between the teacher and student. Students often feel like they can't ask questions, because the teacher has already made it known he hates to lecture. This teaching style has made it difficult for other students and me to feel like we have a full understanding of the material.
This class is crucial for my major and covers a broad range of difficult topics. Maybe if it was simply a GenEd course, I can understand why teachers wouldn't frequently lecture. However, this course covers material that demands direct instruction from teachers. Needless to say, I am very frustrated with the type of teaching the teacher has implemented in the classroom. Or should I say, the type of teaching the teacher hasn't implemented?
I think you're totally right! Can you say something to the teacher?
ReplyDeleteThis university seems to be filled with professors who don't know how to teach. For example, a professor of Visual Media for the Web, which is a course about making web pages, mainly deals with how to put together attractive web sites. However, this "teacher" doesn't know the first thing about HTML and CSS, which are the two main programming languages for making web sites. So instead of actually teaching, she gives us a few "demos" and then has us start to make our own pages. Luckily, I have a pretty strong background in coding for the web, so I am doing just fine. But I feel terrible for the people in class who do not know how it works, because she sure as hell isn't teaching them. She prefer's her teaching job to only include the critiquing part of her responsibilities while at times forcing her students to teach aspects of the class for her.
ReplyDeleteI've had nothing but bad experiences with the MAGD and Visual Media Design program. I am very disappointed with this school.
If you are so disappointed with this school, then get the hell out. No one is forcing you to stay. If you are doing just fine then stop gloating and help other students in your class.
DeleteSeeing as how I have only a few semesters left and my job (which I am very lucky to have obtained) is in Whitewater, leaving isn't really an option. And believe me, I do help other students in class. But it is unfortunate that I am the one that has to do this, not because I don't like doing it, but because a professor worth their salt should be able to answer student's questions about the course material.
DeleteI absolutely know which teacher you are talking about . . . and yes . . . she is terrible.
DeleteI recently graduated from UWW with a MAGD degree in Visual Arts (aka: web design as it apparently is). I wasn't very happy with it either, but I was in the degree too deep to change as well. My goal is to be a colorist for a game or comics company . . . something this school doesn't teach.
My advice for this degree especially . . . do outside research in the field you would like to go in and learn some skills on your own. It sucks and we shouldn't have to do that . . . but I paid out-of-state tuition to this school and I'd be damed if it doesn't get me a job!!
The entire program is going to get re-vamped next year (as told to me by the department head). The main problem the school is having is finding gaming/digital art teachers for the job . . . most people in the gaming/digital art business are busy doing their jobs and don't want to teach. Its also a new degree in general almost everywhere . . . look back 10 years and there was no such thing as a "media arts" degree.
This isn't an excuse for the university, but if you want to get your money's worth (or at least make yourself feel better), you're most likely going to need to do some extra leg-work.
Good luck with your degree! If it works as well for you as its done for me, you'll have a blast :D
Have you ever thought that perhaps your prof wanted you to learn how to find the answers. Students here want to be spoon fed baby food. I see them in my classes just sitting there texting waiting for their baby food. Be appreciative that profs here spent the time to put the program together in the first place. They did not have to do this. So be more appreciative.
DeleteI have to disagree with you 3:57. We pay thousands of dollars to be taught information. I don't want to have to go find the answers to learn the material and then do all of the assignments that go along with it. I want to study the answers to develop deeper understanding. If we have to go find all of the answers ourselves what is the point in even going to college? You may as well invest in a really nice computer and a house near a library and be done with it.
DeleteAlso, professors are paid to put together these programs. So if they'd like to keep their jobs, they'd better put it together. We come to college to be told information so that we're more capable in the work place outside of college. We don't dish out ridiculous amounts of money to teach ourselves, especially because we aren't qualified to teach ourselves or anybody else. That's a professional's job.
Just when I was about to get a post together on this exact subject, you beat me to it!
ReplyDeleteThe problem I have in my class is that the prof expects us to all come to class, having read and understood the material well enough to answer her series of questions she asks us. Her entire lecture is her asking us questions, and then her giving responses (sometimes in the form of another question, instead of a real answer) which are usually vague and somewhat tangential. She rarely puts any notes on the board and has power points but with minimal information presented on them, so all I have to take notes on are the "lectures" which are basically a dialogue between the students and the professor, within which I have an EXTREMELY hard time picking out relevant information and accurate knowledge that I'm expected to be gathering in preparation for exams and such. I'm tired of professors who just won't take time explaining material, and instead, they take a round about way by asking questions and just talking about the text as though every student already has a certain level of understanding of it. Well, sometimes I have a terrible time understanding reading assignments for this class. So even though I've read something once already (and in some cases twice), I still can't answer most of her questions about it, or participate at all in the discussions in a meaningful way. And it sucks because I leave class feeling only slightly more confident, if any more at all, about my understanding of the reading.
So how many times have you met with your prof during her office hours or do you know where her office is even located. Have you ask for a tutor or requested additional readings on the subject or even made the effort to organize a study session?
DeleteNO, its much easier to complain.
Have you ever went to discuss issues with your prof during their office hours? No, all you do is complain and bitch. You can go see your prof each week if you like and have them all to yourself. Try it before you fuck them up on student evaluations.
DeleteShould I really have to take time to do that when I'm already taking time to sit in her class, which is all that should be necessary?
DeleteI'm not going to go to office hours each week so she can re-lecture me on everything we "covered" in class. If I do that, I might as well not even bother showing up for her actual lectures.
Pathetic. You are too busy to even go to your profs office to seek answers to questions you are confused about. Many profs are much better one on one. You seem to be confused over just reading the texts and want her to explain every frigging word in the text. Get off your ass and go discuss some of the issues with her during her office hours instead of throwing frisbees.
DeleteSee you deserve your fate. You do not even have time to go and discuss issues with your prof. Instead you bitch and moan and make lame excuses. Be happy with your D grade and shut up or go visit with your prof with questions you are confused about. You will have them all to yourself because none of your whiners go and visit with your profs anyway. Most profs sit in their office playing with themselves or sleeping because they know that most of the students are out drinking.
DeleteI was also working on a post on this subject.. I am glad that I am not the only one that feels this way. I understand that completely! That is two of my classes this semester! Both important to my major as well! Gah! I just wish the professor would make the sheets a more broad outlook of the content and make the inter-teaches shorter and spend more time going over content from the chapter and questions!
ReplyDeleteDo you ask pertinent questions in class? No, you just sit on your ass waiting to be spoon fed your baby food. Well, get off your ass and be more proactive in the class. Go to see the prof and tell him or her your concerns, most of them are very responsive but they cannot help you if they do not know what the issues are. So, get off your ass and do something.
DeleteSometimes material needs to be spoon fed in some classes. The meaning and overall messages of readings aren't always readily accessible. And I'm sorry if I'm not all excited to rush to the office of a professor who seems invariably apathetic while riding around on a high horse all the time. Maybe that's now how office hours are, but that's all it's been in class, and that's not very appealing nor inviting if you ask me.
DeleteThen stop whining and complaining. You are much too busy to even go and discuss issues with your prof during the office hours. Go and talk to her. Tell her the issues you have discussed on this blog but you are too chicken shit to do this. Instead you will fuck her up on the evaluations. My point is this, get off your ass, go to her office and have a frank discussion with her. Better still, two or three of you go. Is this so fucking hard to do. Man up or woman up children.
DeleteIt is not hard to do when professors are able to put themselves on the students' level and realize the "tough love" method doesn't always work. Learning is a co-operational process between the teacher and student in which it is crucial for the students and professor to always be on the same page and status as equal subjects in a classroom. So if one feels like the prof just blabs and goes on tangents and is vague throughout lectures and needs to give more explanation, well.. you try telling that to someone who acts like your boss and treats you like a child.
DeleteYou are like many students in class who sit on their asses and are too afraid to participate in class. Get off your ass and go visit your prof during her office hours, but don't waste her time, write down the questions you do not understand or ask her for supplemental readings. Is this too difficult for you. There are people on campus who will give you the directions to her office.
ReplyDeleteAre you saying you've never experienced a class in which the professor skirted around any real explanation of the reading assignments in one way or another? You've never been frustrated that you read the readings, go to class, and pay as close attention as you can, but still manage to get nothing coherent written down as far as notes? And still, you leave the classroom feeling like you just wasted an hour and fifteen minutes of your life, and now you realize you have to go home and just re-read and attempt to teach yourself the material? Most of the time, I can't even begin to write out a specific question because I don't even know what the fuck I just read, or what the prof is even talking about at times, because she goes on tangents, an next thing I know, we're completely off-topic and she's bringing up subjects and specific concepts that I'm horribly unfamiliar with, and her train of thought just keeps going and she moves from one thing to the next so quickly I couldn't even write down something meaningful if I tried. And I have a feeling the prof would just laugh if I said, "Can you explain the main points of the reading? I wasn't able to pull them out myself". Because her way is to force us to figure it out on our own and have a foundational understanding prior to coming to class, which makes getting anything out of the lectures impossible if you didn't get establish that foundation. And I just don't get what the hell a professor is for then, other than supplying the materials.
DeleteThen it may be YOU. If you read a required text and do not have a fucking clue on what you just read then the issue is with YOU, not the prof, and going off on tangents is not a bad thing in and of itself. Besides, a prof job is not to explain the fucking text book to you, but to elaborate on it or expand it. You should have enough competence to read the textbook on your own. This is not fucking rocket science here. Most students get it. So if you are confused then get off your ass and go visit with your prof during office hours. Meet with them over coffee. They would love to chat with you about the class and most welcome the feedback.
DeleteDo you even know what kind of literature you are talking about? How do you know most students get it? Maybe your classes are geared towards idiots so your reading is light and quite palatable. What I have to read I think is fairly difficult to understand a lot of times, and it would help to get a brief explanation just so I can at least be guaranteed to be on the same page with the rest of the class once we get into the discussion and evaluation of the reading. Seriously. I can't understand why a professor wouldn't want to give everyone at least a brief summary of sorts just to lay the foundation down so as to facilitate a healthy and substantial discussion.
Deleteomg it totally sounds like some prof went off his meds! lol
Delete10:14, if you are having problems understanding a text, then search for a tutor. Whitewater has tutors for difficult classes. Find one! If you cannot find one, then locate a bright student in your class or major and give him or her a few bucks to help you. Form a study group like Asian students. Ask for supplemental readings from your professor. Go to Itunes University to see if there are comparable classes available for you to download. Finally, go to the publisher's web site where you usually find summaries of chapters and other learning materials related to your class. In short, there are many things that you can do. I still believe that the best thing is to simply go and meet with your prof and ask for assistance.
Delete1:50, you don't see anything wrong with how the professor is conducting class? Yes, the student can visit the prof during office hours but that misses the point. Why have class at all if that is what the teacher is doing? Why pay someone to tell others to teach themselves?
ReplyDeleteNo it does not miss the point. Why don't you try it? What options do you have? None!
DeleteThis is by no way an "excuse" for the university (or any college's, since this rule is the same across the country), but college professors aren't required to have a degree in education to teach. All they need is a master's in their field. Most of them have never taken a teaching class in their life, and have no idea how to explain what they are doing.
ReplyDeleteA good family friend of mine is a college math professor at Northwestern University . . . he's never taken a teaching class, doesn't have a education minor . . . nothing. All he has is a masters in math (though I don't think its called exactly that) and a minor in some sort of science. He knows math inside and out, but he has no idea how people actually learn.
As I've said before, this isn't an excuse for crappy teaching at all . . . but its good to keep in mind that all most of these "teachers" know are their own subjects, and that's about it.
Well....let me chime in here. Most UWW professors have Ph.D's. The general requirement is that professors have the terminal degree in their fields. Some fields like art and business have Masters degrees that are their terminal degrees (MFA and MBA respectively), but there are definitely way more Ph.D's here than Masters.
DeleteWith that said, I completely agree that most professors have not had much, if any, training in teaching. That is a failure of our graduate schools, and it is a bad failure. I also agree, however, that that is not an excuse for crappy teaching.
Fortunately, UWW doesn't just have to hire any ole person who applies for our jobs. We have extensive searches, and since the market has been flooded with Ph.D's over the last five years, we basically have the cream of the crop to choose. Thus, there actually are a bunch of awesome Ph.D's out on the market how are crazy good teachers already, either by natural talent, tons of practice, some actual training, or some combination thereof. So, theoretically, if UWW wanted to become a school known for crazy good teaching, there appears to be a path - start hiring all those crazy good teachers (since they are out there). I recognize your insight that a lot of Ph.D's are not required to take courses on teaching, but there are still plenty of Ph.D's looking for jobs that really are great teachers anyway.
Unfortunately, UWW hiring practices are not always what I would want to see. You see, some departments here consider hiring the person with the most potential for research as paramount, even if the person isn't so good as a teacher. Research potential is important, but that should not come at the expense of good teaching. With the riches out on the market right now, we actually have the luxury of hiring people who are both great at teaching and research. Thus, those departments who just gun for the best researchers without ample consideration for teaching, are just plain stupid. I don't find much practical worth in the person who is super smart and publishes a ton, and yet is unable to engage students and facilitate effective learning.
I don't know how to influence the hiring practices of other departments other than my own. So if you want new hires to be good teachers, you, the students, must speak up when you hear of search committee activities. Talk to your home departments and deans. Email or meet with them about what you want out of your teachers.
No matter how you cut the cake, hiring is a crap shoot.
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