Kampala University Graduate School: Masters of Education Management and Administration

KAMPALA UNIVERSITY
GRADUATE SCHOOL
Masters of Education
Management and
Administration
EFFECTIVE METHODS
OF
TEACHING AND LEARNING
Prince Jamil Wasajja

EFFECTIVE METHODS OF TEACHING
INTRODUCTION
Teachers beliefs, practices and attitudes
Teachers beliefs, practices and attitudes are important for understanding
and improving educational processes. They are closely linked to teachers
strategies for coping with challenges in their daily professional life and to
their general well-being, and they shape students learning environment
and influence student motivation and achievement.
Furthermore they can be expected to mediate the effects of job-related

policies such as changes in curricula for teachers initial education or
professional development on student learning. While examining a
variety of beliefs, practices and attitudes in previous research, these have
been shown to be relevant to the improvement and effectiveness of
schools.
Effective teaching as a result of professional development
Professional development is generally associated with more (reported) use

of specific instructional practices. This means that teachers who engage
in professional learning tend to use specified practices more often.
The kind of professional development a teacher participates in is more
important than the amount of time invested. The net effects of days of
professional development are small and only significant in a few
countries, whereas indicators of participation in networks and mentoring
(and in some countries also in workshops and/ or courses) have

significant and stronger net associations with teaching practices in a
majority of countries.
Professional development activities that take place at regular intervals
and involve teachers in a rather stable social and collaborative context
(i.e. networks or mentoring) have a significantly stronger association with
teaching practices than regular workshops and courses.
Student-oriented practices and enhanced activities are more strongly
associated with professional development than structuring practices. Net
effects of indicators of attendance at professional development activities
are stronger and significant in a larger number of countries for studentoriented practices and enhanced activities than for structuring practices.
It should be noted that, although teacher background variables (gender,

experience, level of education and subject taught in the target class) are
controlled for, the associations found here should not be interpreted as
causal effects of professional development on the respective teaching
practices.
Results
may
indicate
that
professional
development
particularly mentoring and networks for professional development are

effective in instructing and inspiring teachers to use modern and
multifaceted
practices,
especially
student-oriented
practices
and
enhanced activities. But it may just as well be that teachers who report
using student-oriented practices and enhanced activities relatively often
are generally more motivated to learn and apply innovative teaching
strategies and thus engage in more professional development.
In many countries, professional development is more and more

implemented at the school level, with in-house training addressing the
teaching staff as a group rather than individual teachers. It is thought
that besides changing teachers personal beliefs and individual
practices directly professional development can help foster collaboration
and co-operation among teachers and have indirect effects on beliefs and
practices and a more general impact on school quality. Table 4.8 provides
data that help judge the realisation of this goal.
Professional Competences
Instructional practices, in turn, depend on what teachers bring to the
classroom. Professional competence is believed to be a crucial factor in
classroom and school practices (Shulman, 1987, Campbell et al., 2004;
Baumert and Kunter, 2006). To study this, a number of authors have
used, for example, measures of the effects of constructivist compared
with reception/direct transmission beliefs on teaching and learning,
developed by Peterson et al. (1989).
Teachers professional knowledge
and actual practices may differ not only among countries but also among
teachers within a country. To gain an understanding of the prevalence of
certain beliefs and practices it is therefore important to examine how
they relate to the characteristics of teachers and classrooms. For
example, previous research suggests that the beliefs and practices of
female and male teachers may systematically differ (e.g. Singer, 1996).
From the perspective of education policy, however, it is even more

relevant to look at the impact on teachers beliefs, practices and attitudes
3
of professional background factors such as type of training, certification

and professional development, subject taught, employment status (parttime versus full-time) and length of tenure. It is important to note that
any of these relationships can have different causal interpretations. For
example, professional development activities may change beliefs and
attitudes, but participation in such activities may itself be due to certain
beliefs. Good instruction, of course, is not determined just by the
teachers background, beliefs and attitudes; it should also be responsive
to
students
needs
and
various
student,
classroom
and
school
background factors. We can look at whether teaching practices adapt to

students social and language background, grade level, achievement level,
and class size. For example studies on aptitude-treatment interactions
suggest that students with low intellectual abilities profit more from
structured,
teacher-centred
instruction,
while
students
with
high
intellectual abilities may gain more from less structured and more
complex instruction (Snow and Lohman, 1984).
Teachers do not act only in the classroom where they instruct students
more or less in isolation from other classes and teachers. A modern view
of teaching also includes professional activities on the school level, such
as co-operating in teams, building professional learning communities,
participating in school development, and evaluating and changing
working conditions (Darling-Hammond et al. 2005). These activities
shape the learning environment on the school level, i.e. the school
climate, ethos and culture, and thus directly and indirectly (via
classroom-level
processes)
affect
student
learning.
Research
distinguishes between two kinds of co-operation by a schools teaching

staff:
exchange
and
co-ordination
for
teaching
(e.g.
exchanging
instructional material or discussing learning problems of individual

students) versus more general and more innovative kinds of professional
collaboration (e.g. observing other teachers classes and giving feedback).
It is assumed that both kinds of co-operative activities will be influenced
by school-level context variables such as a schools teacher evaluation
policies and the schools leadership, which are covered in chapters 5 and
6 respectively of this report. As is known from research on the
effectiveness of schools (Scheerens and Bosker, 1997; Hopkins, 2005; Lee
and Williams, 2006; Harris and Chrispeels, 2006), the quality of the
learning environment is the factor affecting student learning and
outcomes that is most readily modified, given that background variables
such
as
cognitive
and
motivational
capacities,
socio-economic
background, social and cultural capital are mostly beyond the control of
teachers and schools. Research captures students background by asking
teachers and principals about the social composition and the relative
achievement level of the student population they serve. A more important
task for our research is to assess quality, as perceived by teachers, at the
classroom as well as the school level. However, as the environment
generally varies between subjects and teachers, it is not easy to identify
domain-general indicators. Also, classroom climate is used because of its
strong impact on cognitive as well as motivational aspects of student
learning in different subjects. The method used here is adapted from
PISA and focuses on the disciplinary aspect. For example, the statement
When the lesson begins, I have to wait quite a long time for the students
to quiet down indicates a low level of classroom discipline. It has been
shown that classroom discipline, aggregated to the school level, is a core

element of instructional quality.
In PISA, it is positively related to the schools mean student achievement

in many participating countries (Kliemeand Rakoczy, 2003). Also, it has
been shown that unlike other features of classroom instruction there
is a high level of agreement about this indicator among teachers,
students and observers (Clausen, 2002). In addition to the environment
at the classroom level, school climate is used as an indicator for the
school environment. Here, school climate is defined as the quality of
social relations between students and teachers (including the quality of
support teachers give to students), which is known to have a direct
influence on motivational factors, such as student commitment to school,
learning motivation and student satisfaction, and perhaps a more
indirect influence on student achievement (see Cohen, 2006, for a review
of related research). The triarchic model of instructional quality
mentioned above (Klieme et al., 2006; Lipowsky et al., 2008; Rakoczy et
al., 2007) suggests specific relations between teaching practices and the
two
climate
factors:
structure-oriented
teaching
practices
should
primarily relate to high levels of classroom climate, while studentoriented practices should be linked with positive social relations.
BELIEFS ABOUT THE NATURE OF TEACHING AND LEARNING

The beliefs about the nature of teaching and learning which are the focus
of our discussion include direct transmission beliefs about learning and
instruction and constructivist beliefs about learning and instruction.
6
These dimensions of these beliefs are well established in educational

research at least in Western countries and have also received support
elsewhere (e.g. Kim, 2005).
The direct transmission view of student learning implies that a

teachers role is to communicate knowledge in a clear and structured
way, to explain correct solutions, to give students clear and resolvable
problems, and to ensure calm and concentration in the classroom. In
contrast, a constructivist view focuses on students not as passive
recipients but as active participants in the process of acquiring
knowledge. Teachers holding this view emphasise facilitating student
inquiry, prefer to give students the chance to develop solutions to
problems on their own, and allow students to play active role in
instructional activities. Here, the development of thinking and reasoning
processes is stressed more than the acquisition of specific knowledge
(Staub and Stern, 2002).
It is important to note the difference between beliefs on the one hand,

and practices, on the other. Both practices and beliefs are shaped by
pedagogical and cultural traditions. They represent different though
related parts of the pedagogical context for student learning.
The two indices for teachers beliefs about teaching comprise the
following questionnaire items:
Direct transmission beliefs about teaching

Effective/good teachers demonstrate the correct way to solve a problem.
7
Instruction should be built around problems with clear, correct

answers, and around ideas that most students can grasp quickly.
How much students learn depends on how much background
knowledge they have; that is why teaching facts is so necessary.
A quiet classroom is generally needed for effective learning.
Constructivist beliefs about teaching

My role as a teacher is to facilitate students own inquiry.
Students learn best by finding solutions to problems on their own.
Students should be allowed to think of solutions to practical problems
themselves before the teacher shows them how they are solved.
Thinking and reasoning processes are more important than specific
curriculum content.
Learning Styles as a factor in Effective Teaching and Learning

Learning Styles. Learning styles are characteristic cognitive, affective,
and psychological behaviors that serve as relatively stable indicators of
how learners perceive, interact with, and respond to the learning
environment. The concept of learning styles has been applied to a wide
variety of student attributes and differences. Some students are
comfortable with theories and abstractions; others feel much more at
home with facts and observable phenomena; some prefer active learning
and others lean toward introspection; some prefer visual presentation of
information and others prefer verbal explanations. One learning style is
neither preferable nor inferior to another, but is simply different, with
different characteristic strengths and weaknesses. A goal of instruction
should be to equip students with the skills associated with every learning
style category, regardless of the students personal preferences, since
they will need all of those skills to function effectively as professionals.
Approaches to Learning and Orientations to Studying.

Students may be inclined to approach their courses in one of three ways.
Those with a reproducing orientation tend to take a surface approach to
learning,
relying
on
rote
memorization
and
mechanical
formula
substitution and making little or no effort to understand the material

being taught. Those with a meaning orientation tend to adopt a deep
approach,
probing
and
questioning
and
exploring
the
limits
of
applicability of new material. Those with an achieving orientation tend to

use a strategic approach, doing whatever is necessary to get the highest
grade they can, taking a surface approach if that suffices and a deep
approach when necessary. A goal of instruction should be to induce
students to adopt a deep approach to subjects that are important for
their professional or personal development.
Intellectual Development. Most students undergo a developmental

progression from a belief in the certainty of knowledge and the
omniscience of authorities to an acknowledgment of the uncertainty and
contextual nature of knowledge, acceptance of personal responsibility for
determining truth, inclination and ability to gather supporting evidence
for judgments, and openness to change if new evidence is forthcoming. At
the highest developmental level normally seen in college students (but
not in many of them), individuals display thinking patterns resembling
those of expert scientists and engineers. A goal of instruction should be

to advance students to that level by the time they graduate.
Learning and Teaching Styles:

A Perspective of Language Education
Students learn in many waysby seeing and hearing; reflecting and
acting; reasoning logically and intuitively; memorizing and visualizing.
Teaching
methods
also
vary.
Some
instructors
lecture,
others
demonstrate or discuss; some focus on rules and others on examples;

some emphasize memory and others understanding. How much a given
student learns in a class is governed in part by that students native
ability and prior preparation but also by the compatibility of his or her
characteristic approach to learning and the instructors characteristic
approach to teaching.
The ways in which an individual characteristically acquires, retains, and

retrieves information are collectively termed the individuals learning
style. Learning styles have been extensively discussed in the educational
psychology literature (Claxton & Murrell 1987; Schmeck 1988) and
specifically in the context of language learning by Oxford and her
colleagues (Oxford 1990; Oxford et al. 1991; Wallace and Oxford 1992;
Oxford & Ehrman 1993), and over 30 learning style assessment
instruments have been developed in the past three decades (Guild &
Garger 1985; Jensen 1987).
Serious mismatches may occur between the learning styles of students in

a class and the teaching style of the instructor (Felder & Silverman 1988;
10
Lawrence 1993; Oxford et al. 1991; Schmeck 1988), with unfortunate

potential consequences. The students tend to be bored and inattentive in
class, do poorly on tests, get discouraged about the course, and may
conclude that they are no good at the subject of the course and give up
(Felder & Silverman 1988; Godleski 1984; Oxford et al. 1991; Smith &
Renzulli 1984).
Instructors, confronted by low test grades, unresponsive or hostile

classes, poor attendance, and dropouts, may become overly critical of
their students (making things even worse) or begin to question their own
competence as teachers.
In this paper, we will explore the following questions:
1. Which aspects of learning style are particularly significant in foreign

and second language education?
2. Which learning styles are favored by the teaching styles of most
language instructors?
3. What can be done to address the educational needs of all students in
language classes?
Dimensions of Learning Style

In the sections that follow, we describe five dichotomous learning style
dimensions derived from work of Felder et al. (1988, 1993), indicating the
ways in which the educational needs of students with strong preferences
for certain poles of the dimensions are not met by traditional approaches
to language instruction.
11
The concluding section offers a summary of suggestions for meeting the

needs of those students.
The proposed learning style dimensions may be defined in terms of the
answers to the following five questions:
1. What type of information does the student preferentially perceive:
sensorysights, sounds, physical sensations, or intuitive memories,
ideas, insights?
2. Through which modality is sensory information most effectively
perceived: visual pictures, diagrams, graphs, demonstrations, or verbal
written and spoken words and formulas?
3. How does the student prefer to process information: activelythrough
engagement in physical activity or discussion, or reflectively through
introspection?
4. How does the student progress toward understanding: sequentiallyin
a logical progression of small incremental steps, or globallyin large
jumps, holistically?
5. With which organization of information is the student most
comfortable: inductive facts and observations are given, underlying
principles are inferred, or deductiveprinciples are given, consequences
and applications are deduced?
Sensing and Intuitive Learners

In his theory of psychological types, Jung (1971) introduced sensation
and intuition as the two ways in which people tend to perceive the world.
Sensing involves observing, gathering data through the senses; intuition
involves indirect perception by way of the subconscious accessing
memory, speculating, imagining. Everyone uses both faculties constantly,
12
but most people tend to favor one over the other. The strength of this
preference has been assessed for millions of people using the MyersBriggs Type Indicator (MBTI) (Myers & McCaulley 1985; Myers and Myers
1980), and the different ways in which sensors and intuitors approach
learning have been characterized (Lawrence 1993). Sensorintuitor
differences in language learning have been explored by Moody (1988) and
Ehrman and Oxford (1990).
Sensors tend to be concrete and methodical, intuitors to be abstract and

imaginative. Sensors like facts, data, and experimentation; intuitors deal
better with principles, concepts, and theories. Sensors are patient with
detail but do not like complications; intuitors are bored by detail and
welcome complications. Sensors are more inclined than intuitors to rely
on memorization as a learning strategy and are more comfortable
learning and following rules and standard procedures. lntuitors like
variety, dislike repetition, and tend to be better equipped than sensors to
accommodate new concepts and exceptions to rules. Sensors are careful
but may be slow; intuitors are quick but may be careless.
Moody (1988) administered the MBTI to 491 college language students at

the first- and second-year levels. Fifty-nine percent of the students were
intuitors, substantially more than the 40 percent found for a sample of
18,592 general college students (Myers & McCaulley1985). This pattern
is not altogether surprising if one presumes that a substantial number of
the students were either majoring in a language or taking the courses as
electives. As Moody notes, language is by its nature symbolic, which
13
would tend to make it more attractive to intuitors than to the more

concrete and literal minded sensors.
Ehrman and Oxford (1990) studied learning strategies and teaching

approaches preferred by sensors and intuitors in an intensive language
training program. The sensors used a variety of memorization strategies
like internal drills and flash cards, liked class material that might better
be described as practical than fanciful, and liked highly structured and
well organized classes with clear goals and milestones for achievement.
Intuitors preferred teaching approaches that involved greater complexity
and variety, tended to be bored with drills, and were better able than
sensors to learn independently of the instructors teaching style.
Basic language instruction that involves a great deal of repetitive drill

and memorization of vocabulary and grammar (the sort of teaching style
often found in pre-college and community college classes) is better suited
to sensors than intuitors. If there is too much of this sort of thing
without a break, the intuitors who constitute the majority of the class,
if Moodys results are representativemay become bored with the subject
and their course performance may consequently deteriorate. On the
other hand, strongly intuitive language instructors may tend to move too
quickly through the basic vocabulary and rules of grammar in their
eagerness to get to the more interesting materialgrammatical
complexities, nuances of translation, linguistic concepts, and cultural
considerations. While the intuitive students may enjoy these topics,
overemphasizing such material may result in insufficient grounding in
the building blocks of the language.
14
The sensors, in particular, maythen start to fall behind and do poorly on

homework and tests.
Effective instruction reaches out to all students, not just those with one
particular learning
style.
Students
entirely with methods
taught
antithetical to their learning style may be made too uncomfortable to

learn effectively, but they should have at least some exposure to those
methods to develop a full range of learning skills and strategies (Smith &
Renzulli 1984).
To be effective, language instruction should therefore contain elements

that appeal to sensors and other elements that appeal to intuitors. The
material presented in every class should be a blend of concrete
information
(word
(syntactical
and
definitions,
semantic
grammatical
information,
rules)
and
concepts
linguistic
and
cultural
background information), with the percentage of each being chosen to fit

the level of the course (beginning, intermediate, or advanced) and the age
and level of sophistication of the students.
Visual and Verbal Learners

We propose to classify the ways people receive sensory information as
visual, verbal, and other (tactile, gustatory, olfactory). Visual learners
prefer that information be presented visuallyin pictures, diagrams, flow
charts, time lines, films, and demonstrationsrather than in spoken or
written words. Verbal learners prefer spoken or written explanations to
visual presentations. The third category (touch, taste, smell) plays at
15
most a marginal role in language instruction and will not be addressed

further.
This categorization is somewhat unconventional in the context of the

learning style literature (e.g., Barbe & Swassing 1979; Dunn, Dunn, &
Price 1978), in which sensory modalities are classified as visual,
auditory, and kinesthetic. Since the five human senses are seeing,
hearing, touching, tasting, and smelling, we suggest that kinesthetic
does not properly belong on a list of sensory input modalities. A students
preference for motion or physical activity of some sort during the learning
process belongs in a separate learning style category: our proposed
system and Kolbs (1984) model place it in the active/reflective
dimension, and the familiar model based on Jungs typology (Lawrence
1993) includes it in the extravert-introvert dimension.
The
distinction
between
the
visual-auditory
and
visual-verbal
classifications has to do with whether reading prose is more closely

related to seeing pictures (which leads to the visual auditory contrast) or
to hearing speech (visualverbal). Three mechanisms have been proposed
for the process of extracting lexical significance from written words
(Martin 1978): direct access (the reader jumps directly from the printed
form of the word to its lexical meaning), indirect access (the printed
words are translated internally into sounds before information about
their meaning can be located in lexical memory), and dual encoding
(lexical memory can be reached either directly or indirectly). An extensive
body of research supports a form of the dual encoding hypothesis.
16
Direct access is possible when words are familiar or when artificial

conditions imposed in a research setting make speech encoding
inefficient; however, when material is unfamiliar or difficult, lexical
memory is speechaccessed (Crowder & Wagner 1992). The implication is
that expository prose of the sort one finds in books and on classroom
chalkboards is much more likely to be speech-mediated than directly
accessed when silently read, and so belongs in the verbal rather than the
visual category.
Most
people
extract
and
retain
more
information
from
visual
presentations than from written or spoken prose (Dale 1969), while most
language instruction is verbal, involving predominantly lectures, writing
in texts and on chalkboards, and audiotapes in language laboratories.
Given the preference of most students for visual input, one would expect
the last of these modes of presentation in particular to be unpopular, an
expectation borne out in research cited by Moody (1988). When
community college students were asked to rank-order 13 instructional
modes, including lectures, discussion, slides, field trips, and audiotapes,
audiotapes ranked at or near the bottom for the overwhelming majority of
students surveyed.
Recent studies of learning styles in foreign language education (e.g.,

Oxford & Ehrman 1993) consistently place reading in the visual category,
implying that instructors can meet the needs of visual learners solely by
relying on written instructional material. Certainly visual learners learn
better if they see and hear words in the target language, but so do
auditory learners: presenting the same material in different ways
17
invariably has a reinforcing effect on retention. The challenge to language

instructors is to devise ways of augmenting their verbal classroom
presentation with nonverbal visual materialfor example, showing
photographs, drawings, sketches, and cartoons to reinforce presentation
of vocabulary words, and using films, videotapes, and dramatizations to
illustrate lessons in dialogue and pronunciation.
Active and Reflective Learners

The complex mental processes by which perceived information is
converted into knowledge can be conveniently grouped into two
categories: active experimentation and reflective observation (Kolb 1984).
Active processing involves doing something in the external world with the
informationdiscussing it or explaining it or testing it in some wayand
reflective
processing
involves
examining
and
manipulating
the
information introspectively.
An active learner is someone with more of a natural tendency toward

active experimentation than toward reflective observation, and conversely
for a reflective learner. Active learners learn well in situations that enable
them to do something physical and reflective learners learn well in
situations that provide them with opportunities to think about the
information being presented. The more opportunities students have to
both participate and reflect in class, the better they will learn new
material and the longer they are likely to retain it (KoIb 1984; McCarthy
1987).
18
Language classes in which all students are relegated to passive roles,

listening to and observing the instructor and taking notes, do little to
promote learning for either active or reflective learners. Language classes
should therefore include a variety of active learning experiences, such as
conversations, enactment of dialogues and minidramas, and team
competitions, and reflective experiences, such as brief writing exercises
and question formulation exercises. Small-group exercises can be
extremely effective for both active and reflective learners (Johnson et al.
1991). Pose a question or problem (Translate this sentence. Whats
wrong with what I just wrote? How many synonyms for happy can you
think of in 30 seconds? What question do you have about what we
covered today?) and have students come up with answers working in
groups of three, with one group member acting as recorder. Such
exercises engage all the students, not just the small minority who
typically participate in class, and are a rich source of responses and
material for subsequent discussion. The exercises also relieve the
monotony of continuous lectures. In our experience, as little as five
minutes of group work in a 50-minute period can be enough to maintain
the students attention for the entire class.
Group work must be used with care, however: simply telling students to
work together on problems or projects can do more harm than good.
Most references on cooperative learning (e.g., Johnson et al. 1991) point
out that students often respond negatively to group work at first, and
that the benefits of the approach are fully realized when the group work
is structured to assure such features as positive interdependence,
individual accountability, and appropriate uses of teamwork and
19
interpersonal skills. Reid (1987) studied students from a variety of ethnic

backgrounds and found that every background expressed a minor or
negative preference for group work, with English speakers giving it the
lowest rating. When language students have been taught cooperative
skills, however, they showed positive results in both language skill and
altruism (Gunderson & Johnson 1980; Jacob & Mattson 1987).
Sequential and Global Learners

Sequential learners absorb information and acquire understanding of
material in small connected chunks, and global learners take in
information
in
seemingly
unconnected
fragments
and
achieve
understanding in large holistic leaps. on homework and tests until they

grasp the total picture, but once they have it they can often see
connections that escape sequential learners. On the other hand,
sequential learners can function with incomplete understanding of
course material, but they may lack a grasp of the broad context of a body
of knowledge and its interrelationships with other subjects and
disciplines.
Many authors who have done research on cognitive or learning styles

have noted the importance of this dichotomous pairing, and various
terms have been used to describe categories that appear to have points
in common with what we term the sequential and global categories:
analytic and global (Kirby
1988; Schmeck 1988); field-independent and field-dependent (Witkin &
Goodenough 1981); serialistic and holistic (Pask 1988); left-brained and
right-brained
(Kane
1984);
atomistic
and
holistic
(Marton
1988);
20
sequential and random (Gregorc 1982). Lurias (1980) working brain

model postulates successive and simultaneous modes of processing, and
Pask (1988) similarly distinguishes between stringing and clumping
modes of coding information and structuring responses. Schmeck (1988)
believes that the analytic/global dimension encompasses all other
cognitive styles, a belief shared by Oxford et al. (1991).
Oxford (1990) proposes that this learning style dimension can be tapped
through studies of brain hemisphericity. She cites studies of Leaver
(1986) suggesting that left-brain (sequential) thinkers deal more easily
with grammatical structure and contrastive analysis, while right-brain
(global) thinkers are better at learning language intonation and rhythms.
Sequential learners gravitate toward strategies that involve dissecting
words and sentences into component parts and are comfortable with
structured teaching approaches that stress grammatical analysis; global
learners prefer holistic strategies such as guessing at words and
searching
for
main
ideas,
and
may
respond
well
to
relatively
unstructured approaches like community language learning that might

not appeal to sequential learners.
Pedagogical Implications and Potential Misuses of Learning Styles
Studies have shown that greater learning may occur when teaching styles
match learning styles than when they are mismatched but the point of
identifying learning styles is not to label individual students and tailor
instruction to fit their preferences. To function effectively as engineers or
members of any other profession, students will need skills characteristic
of each type of learner: the powers of observation and attention to detail
21
of the sensor and the imagination and abstract thinking ability of the
intuitor; the abilities to comprehend information presented both visually
and verbally, the systematic analysis skills of the sequential learner and
the multidisciplinary synthesis skills of the global learner, and so on.
If instruction is heavily biased toward one category of a learning style
dimension, mismatched students may be too uncomfortable to learn
effectively, while the students whose learning styles match the teaching
style will not be helped to develop critical skills in their less preferred
learning style categories.
The optimal teaching style is a balanced one that sometimes matches

students preferences, so their discomfort level is not too great for them to
learn effectively, and sometimes goes against their preferences, forcing
them to stretch and grow in directions they might be inclined to avoid if
given the option.
The preceding paragraph suggests what we believe to be the most
important application of learning styles, which is to help instructors
design a balanced teaching approach that addresses the learning needs
of all of their students. Designing such an approach does not require
assessing the students' learning style preferences: it is enough for
instructors to select a model and attempt to address all of its categories
(in Kolb model terms, to teach around the cycle), knowing that every
class probably contains students with every preference [14]. Assessing
the learning style profile of a class with an instrument such as the
Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, the Kolb Learning Style Inventory, or the
Index of Learning Styleswithout being overly concerned about which
students have which preferences can provide additional support for
22
effective instructional design. For example, knowing that a large majority

of students in a class are sensing and visual learners canand should
motivate the instructor to find concrete and visual ways to supplement
the presentation of material that might normally be presented entirely
abstractly
and
verbally.
Many
specific
suggestions
for
designing
instruction to address the full spectrum of learning styles are given by

Felder and Silverman
What about identifying individual students' learning styles and sharing

the results with them? Doing so can provide them with valuable clues
about their possible strengths and weaknesses and indications of ways
they might improve their academic performance. Precautions should be
taken if students are told their learning styles, however. The instructor
should emphasize that no learning style instrument is infallible, and if
the students perceptions of how they learn best differ from what the
instrument says, they should not discount their own judgment. They
should also be assured that their learning style preferences are not
reliable indicators of what they are and are not capable of doing, and
that people with every possible learning style can succeed in any
profession or endeavor. If a student is assessed as, say, a sensing learner,
it says nothing about his or her intuitive skills (or sensing skills, for that
matter); it does not mean that he or she is unsuited to be an engineer or
scientist or mathematician; and it does not excuse the low grade he or
she made on the last exam. Instructors or advisers who use learning
styles as a basis for recommending curriculum or career choices are
misusing the concept and could be doing serious disservices to their
students and advisees.
23
Questions about learning styles

As previously noted, learning styles are controversial, with questions
commonly being raised regarding their meaning and even their existence.
Much work needs to be done to resolve these questions and also to
determine the validity of different learning style models for engineering
students and to confirm or refute claims regarding the effectiveness of a
balanced teaching approach. The following questions merit investigation:
1. Does an assessed learning style preference indicate (a) the type of
instruction a student is most comfortable with or (b) the type of
instruction most likely to lead to more effective learning? To what
extent are the two coincident?
2. Do any learning style preferences depend on students ethnic and
cultural backgrounds? Which preferences, and what are the nature
and extent of the dependences?
3. To what extent does teaching exclusively to a students learning
style
preference
lead
to
(a)
greater
student
satisfaction,
(b)
improvement in skills associated with that preference, (c) lack of

improvement in skills associated with the opposite preference?
4. Does a curriculum heavily biased toward a particular learning
style increase the incidence of dropouts of students with conflicting
styles? To what extent does more balanced instruction reduce attrition
and improve academic performance of those students?
5. Is the provision of choice over learning tasks an effective strategy
for accommodating different learning style preferences? How much
choice should be provided and what kind?
24
6. How effective is instructional technology that provides alternative

pathways through a body of material, with the pathways being
designed to appeal to different learning style preferences?
7. How should learning style preferences be incorporated in advising?
How effective are interventions that take learning style into account?
8. Does mixing learning styles when forming project teams lead to
better team products? Does it lead to increased interpersonal conflict?
If the answer to each question is yes, do the improved products
compensate for the greater conflict risk? Do making team members
aware of their learning style differences lower the potential for
conflict?
9. How helpful to students is discussion of learning styles in class?
10. To what extent are preferences on comparable scales of different
instruments correlated?
11. To what extent do the answers to any of the preceding questions
depend on the strength of students learning style preferences?
APPROACHES TO LEARNING AND ORIENTATIONS TO STUDYING

A. Definitions and Assessment
Marton and Slj [64] define three different approaches to learninga
surface approach, a deep approach, and a strategic approach. Students
who adopt a surface approach to learning memorize facts but do not try
to fit them into a larger context, and they follow routine solution
procedures without trying to understand their origins and limitations.
These students commonly exhibit an extrinsic motivation to learn (Ive
got to learn this to pass the course, to graduate, to get a good job) and an
unquestioning acceptance of everything in the textbook and in lectures.
25
To them, studying means scouring their texts for worked-out examples

that look like the homework problems so they can simply copy the
solutions. They either ignore the text outside of the examples or they
scan through it with a highlighter, looking for factual information that
the instructor might consider important, which they will attempt to
memorize before the exam. Students who take a deep approach do not
simply rely on memorization of course material but focus instead on
understanding it.
They have an intrinsic motivation to learn, with intellectual curiosity

rather than the possibility of external reward driving their efforts. They
cast a critical eye on each statement or formula or analytical procedure
they encounter in class or in the text and do whatever they think might
help them understand it, such as restating text passages in their own
words and trying to relate the new material to things they have
previously learned or to everyday experience. Once the information
makes sense, they try to fit it into a coherent body of knowledge.
Students who adopt a strategic approach do whatever it takes to get the
top grade. They are well organized and efficient in their studying. They
carefully assess the level of effort they need to exert to achieve their
ambition, and if they can do it by staying superficial they will do so, but
if the instructors assignments and tests demand a deep approach they
will respond to the demand.
A student may adopt different approaches to learning in different courses

and even for different topics within a single course. An orientation to
26
studying is a tendency to adopt one of the approaches in a broad range of

situations and learning environments. Students who habitually adopt a
surface approach have a reproducing orientation; those who usually adopt
a deep approach have a meaning orientation; and those inclined to take a
strategic
approach
have
an
achieving
orientation.
The
Lancaster
Approaches to Studying Questionnaire (LASQ) is a sixty-four-item

questionnaire that involves twelve subscales relevant to the three
orientations and four additional subscales. Shorter forms of the LASQ
that provide less detailed information are referenced by Woods et al., and
an alternative to the LASQ is the Study Process Questionnaire developed
by Biggs .Woods et al. Report on a study in which one of the short forms
of the LASQ was administered to 1,387 engineering students.
The strongest inclination of the students was toward a strategic

approach, followed in order by a surface approach and a deep approach.
Bertrand and Knapper report LASQ results for students in other
disciplines.
Bertrand and Knapper also report on three groups of
students in two multidisciplinary curriculastudents in the second and

fourth years of a project-based environmental resource studies program
and students in a problem-based program on the impact of new
materials. All three groups showed relatively strong inclinations toward a
deep approach. There was little difference in the profiles of the secondand fourth-year students, suggesting that the results might reflect the
orientations of the students selecting into the programs more than the
influence of the programs.
27
There are similarities between orientations to studying and learning

styles. Both represent tendencies that are situationally dependent, as
opposed
to fixed
traits like
gender
or handedness
that
always
characterize an individual. Just as a student who is a strong intuitor may

function like a sensor in certain situations and vice versa, a student with
a pronounced meaning orientation may under some circumstances adopt
a surface approach to learning, and a strongly reproducing student may
sometimes be motivated to dig deep. Similarly, just as students may be
reasonably balanced in a learning style preference, frequently functioning
in ways characteristic of, say, both sensors and intuitors, some students
may be almost equally likely to adopt deep and surface approaches.
Deep Approach to Learning

The teachers job is to create conditions that lead students to construct
accurate representations of the concepts being studied, first abandoning
prior misconceptions if any exist.
Certain features of classroom instruction have been found to be
constructively aligned with the adoption of a deep approach to learning,
while other features have the opposite effect:
1. Interest in and background knowledge of the subject encourage a deep
approach; lack of interest and inadequate background discourage it.
2. Clearly stated expectations and clear feedback on progress encourage
a deep approach; poor or absent feedback discourages it.
28
3. Assessment methods that emphasize conceptual understanding

encourage a deep approach; methods that emphasize recall or the
application of routine procedural knowledge discourage it.
4. Teaching methods that foster active and long-term engagement with
learning tasks encourage a deep approach.
5. Opportunities to exercise responsible choice in the content and
method of study encourage a deep approach.
6. Stimulating and caring teaching encourages a deep approach;
apathetic or inconsiderate teaching discourages it. A corollary is that
students who perceive that teaching is good are more likely to adopt a
deep approach than students with the opposite perception.
7. An excessive amount of material in the curriculum and an
unreasonable workload discourage a deep approach.
8. Previous experiences with educational settings that encouraged deep
approaches further encourage deep approaches. A similar statement can
be made regarding surface approaches.
Well-established instructional strategies can be used to achieve these

conditions. Inductive teaching methods such as problem- based and
project-based learning can motivate students by helping to make the
subject matter relevant to their prior experience and interests and they
also
emphasize
conceptual
understanding
and
de-emphasize
rote
memorization . An excellent way to make expectations clear is to

articulate them in the form of instructional objectives statements of
observable actions students should be able to do (define, explain,
calculate, derive, model, design) once they have completed a section of a
course.
29
Several student-centered teaching approaches accomplish the goal of

actively involving students in learning tasks , notably active learning
(engaging students in class activities other than listening to lectures) and
cooperative learning (getting students to work in small teams on projects
or homework under conditions that hold all team members accountable
for the learning objectives associated with the assignment). Trigwell et al.
found a positive correlation between an instructors use of such
instructional methods and students adoption of a deep approach to
learning.
Other references provide numerous examples of teaching in a stimulating

caring manner , providing clear feedback by, among other ways,
designing appropriate tests , and providing choice in learning tasks.
Several of the references cited in this paragraph and the preceding one
also
summarize
research
connecting
the
instructional
methods
mentioned with a variety of positive learning outcomes.

Inductive and Deductive Learners:
A Perspective on the Language
Learning/Acquisition Dichotomy
Induction is a reasoning progression that proceeds from particulars
(observations, measurements, data) to generalities (rules, laws, theories).
Deduction proceeds in the opposite direction. In inductive presentation of
classroom material, one makes observations and infers governing or
correlating principles; in deductive presentation one starts with axioms,
principles, or rules, deduces consequences, and formulates applications.
30
As with the previous dimensions, students may have moderate or strong

preferences for one or the other presentation mode; in particular, they
may prefer deductive presentation because of its relatively high level of
structure.
A large percentage of classroom teaching in every subject is primarily or

exclusively deductive, probably because deduction is an efficient and
elegant way to organize and present material that is already understood.
However, there is considerable evidence that incorporating a substantial
inductive component into teaching promotes effective learning. Inductive
reasoning is thought to be an important component in academic
achievement (Ropo 1987). Current cognitive research emphasizes the
importance of prior knowledge in learning (Glaser 1984); introducing new
material by linking it to observed or previously known material is
essentially inductive. The benefits claimed for inductive instructional
approaches (e.g., discovery or inquiry learning) include increased
academic achievement and enhanced abstract reasoning skills (Taba
1966), longer retention of information (McConnell 1934; Swenson 1949),
and improved ability to apply principles (Lahti 1986).
Insofar as foreign languages are concerned, we propose that the

distinction between induction and deduction is akin to the distinction
between language acquisition and learning. To acquire a language means
to pick it up gradually, gaining the ability to communicate with it without
necessarily being able to articulate the rules. Individuals absorb what
they can from the abundant and continuous input that bombards them;
they cannot grasp all they hear, but each day increases their ability to
31
understand, retain, and use in conversation what they have taken in.
Throughout the process they gain in their ability to transfer strategies,
make assumptions about the new language system, formulate and test
rules, and either keep or abandon them. They continue this process
(most of which is subconscious) until they fossilize, which they may do as
soon as they feel they have learned what they need to in order to
communicate in the language (Coulter 1983). In its progression from
specifics to generalizations, acquisition is an inductive process.
On the other hand, language learning is a largely conscious process that

involves formal exposure to rules of syntax and semantics followed by
specific applications of the rules, with corrective feedback reinforcing
correct usage and discouraging incorrect usage. The flow of the learning
process from general to specific suggests its characterization as a
deductive process.
Three
well-known
approaches
illustrate
deductive
and
inductive
approaches to language instruction. The first is the grammar translation

method, rooted in the formal teaching of Latin and Greek that prevailed
in Europe for many centuries (Rivers 1968). This method involves the
translation of literary texts followed by explanation (in the students
native language) of rules of grammar. As Corder notes, grammartranslation is the most deductive approach (Allen & Corder 1975,13). A
later approach is the direct method, in which classes are taught entirely
in the target language; grammar is taught inferentially and plays a
secondary role to oral communication. This approach, which was in
32
vogue in many countries throughout the nineteenth century (Allen &

Corder 1975, 18), is almost purely inductive.
The third approach is the audio-oral method, according to which language

is a set of habits with vocabulary being of secondary concern. In this
method, which was influenced by behavioral psychology and structural
linguistics,
students
learn
by
repeating
structural
patterns
and
eventually automatize the structures, aided by positive reinforcement

provided by the teacher. This approach combines acquired verbal skills
(inductive) with learned reading and writing skills (deductive), with
emphasis on the former. As Allen and Corder point out, Advocates of the
oral method have assumed that language learning is an inductive rather
than a deductive process. (Allen & Corder 1975, 46). Many common
instructional techniques (e.g., the silent way, suggestopaedia, community
language learning, the total physical response, the communicative
approach) essentially fall into this category, although all may involve
some deductive elements.
A long-standing controversy in language education has to do with

whether languages can be acquired in the classroom or only learned.
Brown (1980, 7), McLaughlin (1987, 20), and
Gregg (1987) believe that both learning and acquisition may go on in
classrooms. Krashen and Terrell (1983, 18) hold that acquisition can only
occur in natural settings, but later admit that despite our conclusion
that language teaching is directed at learning and not acquisition, we
think that it is possible to encourage acquisition very effectively in the
classroom (Krashen & Terrell 1983, 27). We agree, and believe that the
33
key question facing language educators is, what classroom conditions

and procedures facilitate the occurrence of language acquisition?
An important consideration in attacking this question has to do with the

use to which an acquired or learned language is likely to be applied. By
its very nature, language acquisition is more likely to manifest in oral
fluency than in correct utilization of the written language and conversely
for language learning.
Complete command of a language thus involves both acquisitionan
inductive process, required to speak fluentlyand learninga deductive
process, required to write grammatically. The two processes are not
competitive
but
complementary,
just
as
inductive
and
deductive
reasoning are essential and coequal components of the scientific method.

By analogy, it would appear that an ideal classroom setting for teaching a
foreign language would be one that stimulates and facilitates both
inductive and deductive learning processes, both acquisition and
learning. We return to this theme in the concluding section of the paper.
Collaborative Learning
Collaborative learning is an umbrella term for a variety of educational
approaches involving joint intellectual effort by students, or students and
teachers together. Usually, students are working in groups of two or
more, mutually searching for understanding, solutions, or meanings, or
creating a product. Collaborative learning activities vary widely, but most
center on students exploration or application of the course material, not
simply the teachers presentation or explication of it.
34
Collaborative learning represents a significant shift away from the typical

teachercentered or lecture-centered milieu in college classrooms. In
collaborative classrooms, the lecturing/ listening/note-taking process
may not disappear entirely, but it lives alongside other processes that are
based in students discussion and active work with the course material.
Teachers who use collaborative learning approaches tend to think of
themselves less as expert transmitters of knowledge to students, and
more as expert designers of intellectual experiences for students-as
coaches or mid-wives of a more emergent learning process.
Assumptions about Learning

Though collaborative learning takes on a variety of forms and is practiced
by teachers of different disciplinary backgrounds and teaching traditions,
the field is tied together by a number of important assumptions about
learners and the learning process.
Learning is an active, constructive process: To learn new information,

ideas or skills, our students have to work actively with them in
purposeful ways. They need to integrate this new material with what they
already know-or use it to reorganize what they thought they knew. In
collaborative learning situations, our students are not simply taking in
new information or ideas. They are creating something new with the
information and ideas.
These acts of intellectual processing- of constructing meaning or creating
something new-are crucial to learning.
35
Learning depends on rich contexts: Recent research suggests learning

is fundamentally influenced by the context and activity in which it is
embedded (Brown, Collins and Duguid, 1989). Collaborative learning
activities immerse students in challenging tasks or questions. Rather
than beginning with facts and ideas and then moving to applications,
collaborative learning activities frequently begin with problems, for which
students must marshal pertinent facts and ideas. Instead of being
distant observers of questions and answers, or problems and solutions,
students become immediate practitioners. Rich contexts challenge
students to practice and develop higher order reasoning and problem
solving skills.
Learners are diverse: Our students bring multiple perspectives to the

classroom-diverse
backgrounds,
learning
styles,
experiences,
and
aspirations. As teachers, we can no longer assume a one-size-fits- all

approach. When students work together on their learning in class, we get
a direct and immediate sense of how they are learning, and what
experiences and ideas they bring to their work. The diverse perspectives
that emerge in collaborative activities are clarifying but not just for us.
They are illuminating for our students as well.
Learning is inherently social: As Jeff Golub points out, Collaborative

learning has as its main feature a structure that allows for student talk:
students are supposed to talk with ach other....and it is in this talking
that much of the learning occurs. (Golub, 1988)
36
Collaborative learning produces intellectual synergy of many minds

coming to bear on a problem, and the social stimulation of mutual
engagement in a common endeavor. This mutual exploration, meaningmaking, and feedback often leads to better understanding on he part of
students, and to the creation of new understandings for all of us.
Goals for Education

While we use collaborative learning because we believe it helps students
learn more effectively, many of us also place a high premium on teaching
strategies that go beyond ere mastery of content and ideas. We believe
collaborative learning promotes a larger educational agenda, one that
encompasses several intertwined rationales.
Involvement. Calls to involve students more actively in their learning are

coming from virtually every quarter of higher education (Astin, 1985;
Bonwell and Eison, 1991; Kuh, 990; Study Group on the Conditions of
Excellence in Higher Education, 1984).
Involvement
in
learning,
involvement
with
other
students,
and
involvement with faculty e factors that make an overwhelming difference

in student retention and success in college. By its very nature,
collaborative learning is both socially and intellectually involving. It
invites students to build closer connections to other students, their
faculty, heir courses and their learning.
Cooperation and teamwork. In collaborative endeavors, students

inevitably encounter difference, and must grapple with recognizing and
working with it. Building the capacities for tolerating or resolving
37
differences, for building agreement that honors all the voices in a group,
for caring how others are doing -- these abilities are crucial aspects of
living in a community. Too often the development of these values and
skills is relegated to the Student Life side of the campus. Cultivation of
teamwork, community building, and leadership skills are legitimate and
valuable classroom goals, not just extracurricular ones.
Civic Responsibility: If democracy is to endure in any meaningful way,

our educational system must foster habits of participation in and
responsibility to the larger community. Collaborative learning encourages
students to acquire an active voice in shaping their ideas and values and
a sensitive ear in hearing others. Dialogue, deliberation, and consensusbuilding out of differences are strong threads in the fabric of
collaborative learning, and in civic life as well.
Collaborative Learning Approaches

Collaborative learning covers a broad territory of approaches with wide
variability in the amount of in-class or out-of-class time built around
group
work.
Collaborative
activities
can
range
from
classroom
discussions interspersed with short lectures, through entire class

periods, to study on research teams that last a whole term or year. The
goals and processes of collaborative activities also vary widely. Some
faculty members design small group work around specific sequential
steps, or tightly structured tasks. Others prefer a more spontaneous
agenda developing out of student interests or questions. In some
collaborative learning settings, the students task is to create a clearly
delineated product; in others, the task is not to produce a product, but
38
rather to participate in a process, an exercise of responding to each

others work or engaging in analysis and meaning-making.
Cooperative Learning
Cooperative learning represents the most carefully structured end of the
collaborative learning continuum. Defined as the instructional use of
small groups so that students work together to maximize their own and
each others learning (Johnson et al. 1990), cooperative learning is
based on the social interdependence theories of Kurt Lewin andMorton
Deutsch (Deutsch, 1949; Lewin, 1935). These theories and associated
research explore the influence of the structure of social interdependence
on individual interaction within a given situation which, in turn, affects
the outcomes of that interaction (Johnson and Johnson, 1989). Pioneers
in cooperative learning, David and Roger Johnson at the University of
Minnesota, Robert Slavin at Johns Hopkins University, and Elizabeth
Cohen at Stanford, have devoted years of detailed research and analysis
to clarify the conditions under which cooperative, competitive, or
individualized goal structures affect or increase student achievement,
psychological adjustment, self-esteem, and social skills.
In cooperative learning, the development of interpersonal skills is as

important as the learning itself. The development of social skills in group
work-learning to cooperate is key to high quality group work. Many
cooperative learning tasks are put to students with both academic
objectives and social skills objectives. Many of the strategies involve
assigning roles within each small group (such as recorder, participation
encourager, summarizer) to ensure the positive interdependence of group
39
participants and to enable students to practice different teamwork skills.

Built into cooperative learning work is regular group processing, a
debriefing time where students reflect on how they are doing in order to
learn how to become more effective in group learning settings (Johnson,
Johnson and Holubec, 1990).
Problem-Centered Instruction
Problem-centered instruction, widely used in professional education,
frequently is built around collaborative learning strategies. Many of these
spring from common roots, especially the work of John Dewey in the
early part of this century. Dewey endorsed discussion-based teaching
and believed strongly in the importance of giving students challenges to
own discovery.
EFFECTIVE TEACHING AND LEARNING IN LARGE CLASSES
Introduction and General Objectives

Introduction
The expansion in enrolment in higher institutions in
Africa in the midst of limited resources translated in the
1980s and 1990s into more numbers in classes. The
phenomenon of large classes is fast becoming one to be
contended with in most higher institutions in the region.
The outlook for the future? Many more large classes. But
of course, large classes are found in institutions the world
over. Since we cannot wish large classes away, we have to
What counts is
not the size of the
class, but the
quality of the
teaching.
Research
suggests that the
key to effective
instruction and
student learning,
regardless of
class size, is
engaging
students in 40
active
learning.
devise techniques for delivering good quality education in such settings.

This module is to assist those teachers who have responsibility for
teaching large classes to do so with a smile!
We often think that learning occurs in proportion to class size: the
smaller the class, the more students learn. However, while research
shows that small classes provide more opportunities for feedback and
discussion than large classes, as well as greater student satisfaction, it
does not suggest that class size is necessarily a correlate of student
learning. What counts is not the size of the class, but the quality of the
teaching. Research suggests that the key to effective instruction and
student learning, regardless of class size, is engaging students in active
learning.
At the end of this module, you should have:
developed a working definition of a large class; and
acquired basic techniques of teaching large classes for GENERAL

OBJECTIVES
optimal learning.
What is a Large Class?
Putting first things first, the question to be addressed as we start our

study of this module is what is a large class? This question was put to
some senior academics attending a UNESCO Regional Workshop on
Teaching and Learning in Higher Education at Moi University, Eldoret,
Kenya. Here are excerpts of views expressed.
41
There is nothing like a large class. The large class is only in the mind
of the orthodox teacher
A large class is one with more students than available facilities can
support
Large classes have more than 100 students enrolled
There is no fixed number. The large class depends on the disciplinesmaller number for engineering, science and medicine and larger
number for the arts, humanities, and social sciences
What are other views on large classes? There is no agreed definition of a

large class in the literature, nor should there be. One persons large class
is what some others consider as regular, small or normal. Some
teachers simply define "large" as "too many students to learn names by
the end of the term or semester." Whether something feels like a large
class is partly a matter of the resources put into teaching it and of the
skill employed by the teacher. For example, a social science lecturer who
works alone with a class of 40-50 and who grades students on
coursework essays and essay-type examinations finds this to be a large
class. However, a language lecturer may not think 50 students makes for
a large class. So, lets say that a large class is one that feels large and
that a sign of this will often be that you feel that the size of the class
stops you from working in your preferred way. This module is about
making large classes feel smaller; about weakening feelings that the
number of students is disempowering the professor; and about helping
students to feel better about the large classes that are likely to greet them
in their first year at the higher institution.
42
For our purpose, we suggest that a large class is one that feels large.
Signs that the class is large can be:
The class is significantly larger than you are used to.
The resources can no longer cope with the number of students if

you desire individual attention for the students.
One thing is sure. Whether we have a working definition or not, the

phenomenon exists. Since we have identified some of the characteristics,
we should now proceed with how to cope with it.
Reflect on the concept of a large class.

Organise a discussion in your department on
Activity 5.1
the meaning of a large class. What are the
main similarities and differences in the
definitions provided during the discussion?
How Does Class Size Make a Difference?
Studies on the effects of class size have been conducted since the
1920's. Results have often been mixed, with some methods of instruction
favouring small classes and other methods being as or more effective in
large classes. Large classes are as effective as small classes when the
goals involve learning factual information and comprehending that
information. When traditional achievement tests are used to measure
learning, large classes compare well with smaller classes.
Smaller classes have been found more effective when instructional
goals involve higher level cognitive skills including application, analysis,
and synthesis. Smaller classes provide for greater contact between
43
students and lecturer, which appears to be most needed for students

with low motivation, those with little knowledge of the subject matter, or
those who have difficulty grasping conceptual material. Smaller classes
are also more effective than large ones in affecting student attitudes. In
sum, the optimal size of a class depends on the instructional goals being
pursued. The main advantage smaller classes have over larger ones is
that they provide students with greater opportunities for interaction with
subject matter, with the professor and with one another.
Now to the down side of large classes. Teaching large classes has
been found to adversely affect morale, motivation and self-esteem of
teachers. Although many teachers could manage a class of almost any
size successfully, this could often be at the expense of the teacher's own
well being and the range of learning experiences offered to students.
Many teachers of large classes feel they spend too much time on
organising and managing class activities and not enough on meeting the
needs of individual children. Large classes and overcrowded classrooms
have negative effects on students' behaviour and learning.
Some other problems with large classes are:
Students become faces instead of people
It is harder to give individual advice and guidance to students
Organisational problems are compounded, making it difficult to

schedule tutorials, laboratory sessions, and fieldwork
There can be technical problems working with large classes e.g.

difficulties in projecting slides that are clearly visible to all
students.
Monitoring of attendance can be difficult, thus encouraging

students to cut classes
44
Coping with large numbers of assignments and examination

scripts is a source of difficulty
The quality of feedback to students can be much reduced in large

classes.
Table 5.1 gives some comparison between small and large classes.
Table 5.1 Comparing Large and Small Classes
Teachers' views on teaching larger and smaller classes
Larger classes
Smaller classes
Students receive less individual
Students receive more individual attention
attention
A more restricted range of teaching
Flexibility to vary teaching and learning
and learning activities
activities
Whole-class teaching sometimes
Whole-class teaching employed when
employed for control and keeping
appropriate to the activity
students on task
Group work hard to manage because Group work can be employed effectively and
of too many or too large groups
flexibly
Restricted opportunities for student Better quality assessment and feedback to
assessment and individual feedback students
Limitations to practical activities
More opportunities for active learning
Teachers work extremely hard to offset More reasonable workloads enabling teachers to
the effects of larger class size
put their energies into meeting the needs of
students
No doubt these obstacles are numerous. Since we cannot wish large

classes away, we have to devise techniques for coping and ensure that
our students benefit from participation in a large class. Let us now
examine how we go about this.
Developing and Implementing

Curriculum for Large Classes
45
Introduction
Should we organise learning experiences for small classes and large ones
in the same way? Clearly not. Since the demands of large classes are
different from those of small classes, we need to prepare our programme
to take the differences in demands into consideration. What demands are
we talking about here? We are referring to the demands of space,
equipment, and the demands of evaluation. We are proceeding with the
assumption that our objectives for the course or programme are the
same irrespective of whether or not we are faced with a large class or a
small class.
At the end of this Unit, you should be able to:
SPECIFIC
OBJECTIVES
plan a course of work for students in a large class considering the

demands of space, equipment and evaluation;
organise practical work for students in large classes; and
recognise the need for equity in implementing a programme for large

classes.
Taking Demand of Space into Consideration
The learning experiences we have planned for our students in a course

46
for example in science or the languages need not be watered down on

account of presentation to a large rather than to a small class when
space comes in as a limitation. Space here could mean lecture room,
laboratory or workshop space. Our institution probably has room to
accommodate 50 students for the course. In the next several years, we
have been compelled to enrol 300 students for the same course. Or we
have been asked to prepare a new programme for a course which has an
outlook of high enrolment, yet space in our institution is limiting. Taking
another example, a rather common one, how do we plan for many of our
introductory courses that have high enrolment but whose space
allotment for lectures and practicals is tight and choked? In all of these,
we should not take any activity out of the normal programme of work.
What we need to tinker with is how we take full advantage of the space
limitation. But how do we do this?
How should we plan for introductory courses

that have high enrolment but whose space
Activity 5.2
allotment for lectures and practicals is tight
and choked? How do you take full advantage
of space limitation in your institution to address the space requirements
of large introductory classes?
Taking Demand of Equipment into Consideration

So we probably have ample space but equipment is short and unable to
go round the large number of students. For example, we have 120
language students for equipment fitted for 35 students in a language
laboratory. Also an engineering workshop with equipment for 30
students; but here we are with 75 students. As we agreed, course content
47
remains the same.
Activity 5.3
How do you organise and implement learning

experiences when your class is large and
equipment is in short supply?
Taking Demand of Evaluation into Consideration

We expect that the progress of students in a large class should be
monitored and reported upon with a rigour that is similar to that of
students in a relatively small class. We expect that every student in the
large class should have opportunities of doing assignments, of doing
tests and of asking questions in class and of having a feedback on his or
her performance.
Activity 5.4
How do we plan our programme to take the

large number of students into consideration
while evaluating large classes?
Organising Practical Work for Large Classes

If there is one issue that keeps teachers in higher institutions nervous
when confronted with large classes, it is how to run practical sessions
with the same fervour as they do for small classes. It is sad to note that
many give up and do either of two things. One, skip the practicals
entirely. The second option is to run what is commonly called theory of
practicals sessions. In these sessions, students go through dry labs
and learn only the theoretically underpinnings of the scheduled practical
work. These two approaches kill the inquiry spirit of science and fail to
48
guarantee Africa the development of a crop of high-quality, Nobel prizewinning scientists. In one breath, we want to advance rapidly in science
and technology, in another breath, we ask our higher institution teachers
to teach science to large numbers of students in laboratories that cannot
accommodate large numbers. How do we maintain a balance in this
context? Experts at the Regional Workshop on Higher Education at Moi
University in Kenya and at a similar workshop in Lagos State University,
Nigeria reached agreement on these strategies:
Cooperative Group Work
In a large class, assigning a set of materials to individual students for

practical work is hardly feasible. Grouping students in the laboratory or
workshop becomes an attractive option. Setting up groups is not as easy
as some think. It is not enough to randomly assign students to groups
without some defined criteria. Studies e.g. Okebukola (1992); Johnson
and Johnson (1996) have shown that cooperative-learning groups
perform better in science practical skills than individualistic and
competitive
groups.
In
setting
up
cooperative-learning
groups,
researchers have suggested mixing on the basis of ability level, gender

and other discriminating variables. How do you achieve this? The
following steps could serve as a guide.
From the class list, group the students into high, average and low
ability in terms of performance in your subject. The ability levels can
be determined using previous test scores and labelling those students
who are in the upper third as high ability, those in the bottom third as
49
low ability and the middle two-thirds as average ability. Indicate H, A,

and L to representing high, average and low, in front of the names of
the students on the class list.
Indicate M and F in front of every name on the class list.
Compose the groups to include (as much as possible) at least one high
ability, two average ability and one low ability student. Also have at
least one female student in the group.
Give students the guidelines for group work. These should include
asking every member of the group to contribute his or her idea to
experimental work and to decision making in the group. Inform them
that it is a sink or swim together situation and that group reward is
for all and not for individual members. A score of 5 for the group will
be the score for each and every member.
Use of the stations approach
This technique assumes that materials and equipment are available only
for a small fraction of the students and that all experiments for the
semester should be carried out by every student. After checking out the
functioning equipment for each experiment, the teacher proceeds to set
these up as work stations. Thus, every station is dedicated to a specific
experiment. If there are seven experiments listed for the semester in say,
a physics course, there will be seven stations, clearly labelled in the
physics laboratory. What next? The next thing is to prepare a practical
time-table for the use of the laboratory. If each station is to be used by
three students, only 21 students are then scheduled for practical work at
a time. Two of such sessions can be held in a day. Thus, 42 students will
50
have practical experience in a day. Yet, we have 75 students. This means

we have to run the sessions on two days. The third thing to do is to
assign students to stations and to sessions and to paste the roster. The
stations approach is ready to run! Will the sessions run automatically?
Definitely not. The teacher and the technicians need to set up every
station before the start of every practical session. They also need to
monitor progress of the students during the practical sessions. And of
course, grade lab notes of the students after each practical session.
The Rotary Approach
This is similar to the stations approach except that the same set of
experiment is carried out every practical session. The rotating aspect is
the student group. In the engineering workshop with equipment for 10
student groups, but with 30 student groups to contend with, students
will do the same experiment in three groups. Time-table schedule will
need to be developed by the teacher indicating student allotment to
groups and when which group will undertake their practicals in the
workshop. It is often useful to keep a set of equipment as backup in an
event of breakage or damage. The number of students in each group
should be small (between 2 and 4) to enhance greater student contact
with experimental materials. The advantage of the rotary approach over
the stations approach is the greater ease of set-up and monitoring. In
the rotary approach, the lecturer and technical assistants deal with a
uniform set of equipment at a time and are able to follow progress of
students in the groups using the same set of criteria. Independent work
is fostered in the stations approach. This gives it an edge over the rotary
51
approach.
Use of Projects
Practical work for a large number of students can be turned into a good
avenue for enquiry and for developing scientific skills. Rather than run
all the practicals designed for a course in a straight-jacket, cookbook-like
way, we can denote some of the experiments as projects. In this case,
students have to proceed in an open-ended way using problem-solving
approaches. They design and implement their own plans for addressing
the research questions and take ownership of their procedures and
results. Students have to look for their materials and may acquire
improvisation skills in the process. Thus, while some of the experiments
for the course can be designed by the teacher and implemented using the
co-operative-learning group, station and rotary approaches, some others
can be in the form of projects assigned to students.
Sharing Resources with Nearby Institutions
If there is a neighbouring institution with facilities that can be used for

your practicals, then collaboration will be the answer to running
practicals for your large class. Collaboration requires agreement on timetabling and the terms of use of space and equipment. If the collaborating
institution is also battling with large classes in the course, then mutual
benefit results. They share what you have and you share what they have.
What will need to be worked out include when to use, what to use, how
to use, how to transport students to the laboratory or workshop in the
52
nearby institution, and inventory taking. If cost is involved (usually the

case) for the use of the facility, then this needs to be sorted out during
the planning process.
Demonstration
With acute shortage of equipment and materials in the face of large

numbers of students, demonstration is an option for practical work,
maybe not the best. There could be four types of demonstration- teacher
demonstration, student demonstration, teacher-student demonstration,
student-student demonstration and guest demonstration. In teacher
demonstration, it is the teacher that presents the experiment to the class
while a student who had practised the experiment conducts the student
demonstration. You may wish to consider asking a woman in the class to
lead the demonstration. Or a disabled student who has agreed to lead. In
the teacher-student model, two people are on stage - the teacher and a
student; while two students (male and female preferably) conduct the
student-student demonstration. A guest teacher can also be requested to
present the demonstration of the experiment to the class.
Try out the approaches to practical work suggested

above. From your record of the effectiveness of the
Activity 5.5
approaches, rank them in the order of suitability
for your needs, objectives of the course and preference of your students.
Promoting Equity in Large Classes

53
When conducting large classes, we should give consideration to

promoting equity along the lines of gender and physical and learning
disabilities. More often than not, inequity is accentuated in large classes
and disadvantaged groups tend to suffer inattention leading to learning
problems. In a large class with few women, the sheer number of men
tends to reduce to the barest minimum, the chances of class
participation of the women if not deliberately induced by the lecturer.
Disabled students are often sidelined and given scant attention in a large
class of normal students. Low ability students can also be buried in the
crowd. The message here is that the lecturer needs to recognise that his
or her class is mixed in terms of student characteristics and efforts need
to be made to engender participation of all categories of students. This
will mean identifying such groups and making deliberate efforts to
involve them in class work- in asking and answering questions, in group
work and in leading discussions. (Please refer to Modules 9 and 10 for
techniques for empowering women and students with special learning
needs).
Teaching Large Classes
Introduction
Large classes are not necessarily less effective than smaller ones,
54
but they do require more conscious effort and planning.
Like other
classes, large classes work best when students take an active interest in
the subject, and when teachers personalise their presentation. However,
while these basic principles of good teaching apply in large as well as
small classes, the sheer number of students in a large class can magnify
some problems that might be much more manageable in a smaller class.
For example, an occasional late student or two in a class of forty is not a
big problem--and if one student comes late to class repeatedly, it is easy
for the teacher to initiate a conversation after class to find a way to
resolve the problem. In a class of four hundred, however, late students
can be more plentiful and disruptive. They could also be more elusive
after class.
At the end of this unit, you should be able to:
provide a variety of experiences for students in a

large-class setting;
acquire skills of making a large class more SPECIFIC
OBJECTIVES
interactive;
present a lecture in a productive way to a large
class; and
evaluate a large class with little stress.
Teaching Large Classes

A teacher with responsibility for teaching a large class, will find the
following tips useful.
Be organised
55
Large classes require more advance preparation and structure than small
classes. Lapses in the flow of the class, while collecting thoughts or
locating instructional materials, can result in loss of student attention.
Before the course begins, prepare or identify a variety of instructional
aids, demonstrations, and activities to support each meeting of the class.
Prepare a syllabus that includes outlines for each class meeting, all
project and activity descriptions, and handouts for the entire course.
Provide structure to the content, and use the structure to organise each
lesson. Inform the students of that structure. Taking roll or distributing
materials during class is not recommended for large class situations.
Student materials or instructions needed for a specific class should be
made available prior to class or located so that students may obtain
them with as little disruption as possible.
Connect with your students
It is important to appear approachable in large classes. Build rapport

with your students, and recognise the individuality of each student. Move
among them when talking. Increase student access to you by getting to
class early to listen to their questions, comments, or complaints. Begin
by inviting students to call out something they know or recall about a
topic. Display the responses as an introduction to the day's activities.
Address some of the anonymity students feel in large classes. Try to learn
some names, and call on those you know by name. Learn something
about as many students as possible. Ask for a few volunteers each day to
help with demonstrations and activities and throughout this process
56
learn some student names.
Provide a variety of experiences
It is appropriate to vary the type of instruction in large classes to

encourage discussion, interaction, and involvement. Do not attempt to
lecture the entire period. Actively involve students during at least a small
part of every class meeting. Form groups of three or four to discuss a
problem or work on a task for a few minutes. Have a question and answer
period at the beginning or end of each class.
Encourage participation
Be aware that students are often reluctant to ask or respond to questions

in large classes, and it is often very difficult to hear their comments in
large lecture halls. Try to be accepting of all questions and responses
from students, and paraphrase or repeat every question or response.
Provide hand-held microphones if acoustics are poor. Invite students to
write questions or comments on index cards and give them to you at the
end of class. Increase the wait time after you ask a question. Encourage
students to indicate in some way when the pace of the class is too fast or
too slow.
Obtain and use feedback
Students in large classes are often reluctant to communicate difficulties

they are having with a course or the teaching strategies. Employ informal
57
assessment techniques frequently to obtain student perceptions and

suggestions. Use this information as a basis for making small changes in
your teaching behaviour before the course is completed. Inform your
students if you make a change as a result of their suggestions. Hold
weekly meetings with teaching assistants, or small groups of students, to
discuss student reactions to your teaching and the course. Ask
individual students after each class meeting how the course is
progressing. Provide a suggestion box, or have an envelope attached to
your office door where students may leave comments about you or the
course.
Create a Small-Class Atmosphere in a Large-Class Setting

One of the challenges of large classes is overcoming the anonymity and
distance that can exist between teacher and students. If students are to
be actively involved in and feel personal accountability for the learning
process, they must be more than anonymous spectators and passive
recipients of information. In order to facilitate discussion, feedback, and
active learning, the teachers of large classes can work to create the kind
of group identity and individual rapport that make smaller classes so
effective and enjoyable. The following techniques can foster a more
comfortable and productive learning environment in large classes.
Learn students' names. You may not be able to learn all the
names, but even learning some will help.
Use a microphone. Not being able to hear clearly will exclude

students from the lecture.
Move around the classroom or lecture hall. Standing behind a
58
podium emphasises the distance between you and the class. On

the other hand, moving into the aisles and around the room makes
the class seem smaller and encourages student involvement.
Elicit student feedback about the course. Have students meet in

groups to provide feedback about the course. Other options include
using a mid-semester student feedback activity or informal
discussions with students to learn their reactions to and
suggestions for the class.
Personalise: Learn and use the names of your students, even in a large
class. As difficult as this is, it goes a long way toward personalising the
class.
Include Active Learning Strategies: This can be done by using 2minute dyad discussion groups, asking students to share personal
experiences related to course content, formalising study groups, giving
group assignments, using peer feedback groups, and asking students to
write answers to discussion questions before class begins.
Give feedback early and often: Students need to know how they are
doing, particularly in a large class. After every fifteen minutes of
lecturing, ask students to discuss a thought question with the person
next to them and have two or three students tell their response to the
whole class. After lecturing for half the class, ask students to write the
most important themes you have mentioned; write your answers on the
overhead and let them compare their lists with yours.
59
In a large class, the teacher must change the method of teaching to

accommodate the number of students. Here are some suggestions to
make large classes more interactive:
Present the subject in a way that it will be of lasting interest

to students. Use examples students will understand e.g.
examples that involve current issues or situations they can
relate to.
Have students make group presentations on a topic covered

in class or of particular interest to them, followed by
questions
and
discussion.
Encourage
creativity
and
originality.
Lecturing Large Classes
Many teachers settle for the lecture method when faced with a large
class. To them, it is the line of least resistance! While some present the
lecture in a rather dull manner, some make their lectures exciting. Here
are a few things teachers who succeed with lecturing large classes do.
Plan the lecture so that you do not talk for the whole time: twentyminute spells are quite long enough. Intersperse your presentation
with active learning techniques; questions for the students to talk
about with their neighbours; two-minute stand up, stretch and
breathe sessions; time for students to review their notes (or
perhaps to review each other's notes); Use a variety of media: e.g.
60
slides overhead projector, handouts, and video clips. All of these

help to break up the monotony that accompanies even the best
presenter who talks too long.
Students like lecturers who explain things clearly. So:
Dont rush.
Do repeat yourself, preferably varying the words.
If possible use examples, similes and metaphors.
Make connections with real life, if possible.
Humour is appreciated. This is a hard one to get right, but is thankfully - not compulsory. Some people begin presentations with a
couple of prepared jokes or stories.
Unless the projection of your overhead transparencies is so poor,

assume students can read. You do not have to read out all the
words on your transparency.
Keep the number of transparencies small rather than large, and

try to limit the number of points on each transparency - a rule of
six slides, each with no more than six points, has been suggested.
It is possible, even with 800 students, to ask and to invite

questions. Some lecturers plant questions in the audience so as to
ease things along.
When asking, wait for answers, look around the audience, repeat
the question, ask the questioners name and thank him or her.
61
When receiving questions, again repeat them for all to hear.
Taking and asking questions means less information can be

covered although better understanding should result. Have some
sense of what you might do if questioning throws you seriously offcourse.
Handouts and support materials can list key points and

connections; contain an outline of the lecture; draw attention to
terms to be learned and to recommended reading.
Implementing good practices in teaching large classes
Organise your lectures carefully, but try to deliver them without

detailed notes so that you can maintain eye contact and get
cues from students as to their understanding.
Give students frequent short assignments and quizzes so that

you and they will know whether they are understanding the
material.
Do not make assumptions. Write out and define not only

technical terms but other words or expressions with which the
students may not be familiar.
Try to refrain from such comments as, "Now, I know you all
know this" (many of them do not). Or "You do not know this?"
(which makes them feel stupid).
Intersperse your lectures with questions to students; this makes

them active participants in learning.
62
Leave the last five minutes for student questions; try taking
several questions at once and responding to them with a minilecture.
Return papers and marked examination scripts promptly and

review them at the next class meeting.
Keep a journal or log of what explanations, techniques, or

assignments worked well and share these with colleagues
teaching the same or similar courses.
Get feedback from students once or twice during the semester

by asking them to write on two or three questions, such as
"What is the most significant thing you have learned in this
course so far?" "What, if anything, is still unclear?" or "What
suggestions do you have for improving the course?"
Acknowledge student feedback at the next class meeting and

indicate which changes you can and which you cannot make
and why.
Sit in on courses taught by those of your colleagues you know

to be especially effective teachers to see what other ideas or
techniques you can pick up.
Making Exercises Count in Large Classes
A technique you can count on when teaching a large class is the

in-class exercise. As you lecture or go through a problem solution,
instead of just posing questions to the class as a whole and enduring the
ensuing time-wasting silences, occasionally assign a task and give the
students anywhere from 30 seconds to five minutes to come up with a
63
response. Anything can serve as a basis for these exercises, including the
same questions you normally ask in lectures and perhaps some others
that might not be part of your current repertoire.
In the exercises you might sometimes ask the students to write
responses individually, sometimes to work in pairs or groups of three,
and sometimes to work alone and then to form pairs and combine and
improve their individual responses. ("think-pair-share"). The more you
vary your methods, the more interesting the class tends to be. Whichever
approach you use for the exercises (individual, pairs, groups, or thinkpair-share), at least some of the time you should call on groups or
individuals to present what they came up with, perhaps landing
disproportionately on students near the back of the room so they know
they cannot hide from you there. If you never do this, students will have
little incentive to work on the exercises when you assign them and many
would not, but if they think they may be called on, they would not want
to be embarrassed and so you will get 90+ percent of them actively
involved in what you are teaching.
The principal benefit of these exercises is that they get students
acting and reflecting, two important ways by which we learn. The
students who succeed in a task will own the knowledge in a way they
never could if you simply handed it to them, and those who try and fail
will be receptive to discovering what they did not know. Group exercises
have the added benefit of giving students an opportunity to meet and
work with one another, a good first step towards building a sense of
community. (You can augment this benefit by periodically asking the
students to sit in different locations and work with students they have
not been with before.)
64
You can also use in-class exercises to wrap up a lecture period.

Ask the students to write down and hand in a brief statement of the
main point of the lecture, or come up with two good questions or test
problems related to what you just presented, or tell you how they think
you could improve the class. You can scan their responses and quickly
see if they got the main idea you were trying to present, identify their
main points of confusion, or discover things you could do that would
make the class better for them, like giving more examples or leaving
material on the board longer or speaking more slowly.
Other Techniques
Prepare handouts far enough ahead of time to make sure that

they will be ready for the class in which they will be used.
After you have taught the course enough times to be

comfortable with your lecture notes, consider having them
duplicated and bound and given out to students. You need to
ensure periodic updates of the notes. Leave gaps in the notes to
be filled in during class or by the students in or out of class,
sprinkle the notes with questions about the contents, promise
the students that some of the gaps and questions will show up
on the tests, and keep your promise. The students will then
actually read the notes.
If you hand out notes or provide a coursepack, do not spend the

lecture
hours
simply
going
over
all
the
derivations,
65
explanations, etc., for the students to follow along. You are

guaranteed to put them to sleep like that. Instead, use the time
to go over the conceptually difficult points, provide additional
examples, fill in some of the gaps and answer some of the
questions in the notes, and carry out some of the active
learning exercises.
To minimise the number of times you have to answer the same

questions, encourage students to come to your office hours in
groups. If you find yourself answering the same questions
repeatedly, create FAQ (frequently asked questions) file with
your responses and insert it in subsequent replies.
Make sure that each part of an assignment or test is graded by

only one grader so you do not have to deal with two students
getting different grades for the identical response.
Out-of-class Group Assignments
When you are teaching a class of 160 students and you give
individual homework weekly, that's 160 papers to grade every week. If
the students complete the assignments in teams of four and only one
solution is handed in by each team, that is 40 papers to grade every
week. The difference has a major impact on the feasibility of collecting
homework at all. Unless you have a squadron of teaching assistants,
there is no good way to deal with 160 papers every week, and most
lecturers in this situation either give up on collecting homework (which is
66
a pedagogical disaster), confine themselves to multiple-choice problems

that
require
either
memorisation
or
rote
substitution,
or
grade
superficially enough for the homework to lose most of its educational

value. Even if there are enough teaching assistants to do the job,
maintaining quality control on the grading of hundreds of assignments is
next to impossible.
Getting students to work on assignments in fixed teams relieves
the grading problem but introduces another set of problems, most of
which have to do with the fact that the students in a group may have
widely varying levels of ability, work ethics, and sense of responsibility. If
a lecturer simply tells students to get into groups and do the work, more
harm than good may result. In some groups, one or two students will
actually do the work and the others will simply go along for the ride. In
other groups, the students will parcel out the work and staple the
individual products together, with each student understanding only onefourth of the assignment.
To minimise the likelihood of these situations occurring, the
lecturer must structure the assignments to assure that the defining
conditions of cooperative learning are met: (1) positive interdependence
(if one team member fails to meet his or her responsibilities, everyone
loses in some way); (2) individual accountability (each student is held
personally accountable for his or her part and for everyone else's part as
well); (3) face-to-face interaction, at least part of the time; (4) development
and appropriate use of teamwork skills (leadership, time management,
effective communication, and conflict resolution, to name a few), and (5)
periodic self-assessment of group functioning (What are we doing well as a
group? What do we need to do differently?)
67
Individual accountability is promoted by testing individuals on all

of the material covered in group assignments and by factoring individual
effort assessments into team project grading. Positive interdependence is
fostered by assigning rotating roles to team members (coordinator,
recorder, checker), and by offering small bonuses on tests to all members
of teams with average test grades above (say) 80.
Using Multiple-Choice Assessment in Large Classes
Since multiple-choice questions are amenable to speedy marking or

grading, they are well-suited for use in large classes. Efforts should
however be made to minimise, indeed, eliminate cheating. After the
examination is taken, students can exchange their scripts in a random
manner and made to mark. This ensures early feedback to the students
on how well or how badly they have done. Also to the teacher on the level
of success or failure of the class on the topics covered by the test.
Other Assessment Techniques
Suggestions include:
The use of Classroom Assessment Techniques to give both students

and you an idea of their achievements
Self-assessment, which is best done with reference to known

criteria and which leads to the student identifying areas for
attention.
Peer-assessment. As with self-assessment. This can be a very good
way of giving students feedback on drafts of essays, reports, case68

study responses, law case analyses etc.

The three suggestions above have faster (and probably better) feedback
built in to them. Other ways of giving rapid feedback include:
Student
self-assessment
sheets.
These
are
returned
with
comments written on them. That might amount to just one phrase

- I agree.
Work is returned accompanied by a standardised, tick-list feedback

sheet. Free form comments are kept to a minimum.
In student presentations, all other students comment, preferably

using a set of known criteria, and the comments are returned
immediately and directly to the students making the presentation.
Unless it is vital to correct errors, concentrate on giving feedback

about points for improvement that can be applied to the next piece
of work. It may feel very noble to write comments all over a piece of
work, but it seems that students want perhaps two, good pointers
towards getting a better grade next time, not lots of detailed
comment.
Summary and Conclusion
We began a study of this module by arriving at an operational definition

of a large class. We stated that for the purpose of study of this module,
we suggest that a large class is one that feels large. Signs that the class is
large can be:
The class is significantly larger than you are used to.
The resources can no longer cope with the number of students if

you desire individual attention for the students.
69
We identified some of the problems of large classes as:
Students become faces instead of people
It is harder to give individual advice and guidance to students
Organisational problems are compounded, making it difficult to

schedule tutorials, laboratory sessions, and fieldwork
There can be technical problems working with large classes e.g.

difficulties in projecting slides that are clearly visible to all
students.
Monitoring of attendance can be difficult, thus encouraging

students to cut classes
Coping with large numbers of assignments and examination

scripts is a source of difficulty
The quality of feedback to students can be much reduced in large

classes.
In spite of these difficulties, we found practices that are disposing to

meaningful learning in large classes. For practical work, these practices
include:
Cooperative Group Work
Use of the stations approach
The Rotary Approach
Use of Projects
Sharing Resources with Nearby Institutions
Demonstration
We also described how the large class can be organised for greater
70
student-material-teacher interaction and the issue of assessment in large

classes.
Teaching a large class effectively is hard work, but it is possible to do it

even if you are not a big-league entertainer. If you make the necessary
logistical arrangements far enough in advance, provide plenty of active
learning experiences in the classroom instead of relying on straight
lecturing, and take full advantage of the power of teams in both in-class
and out-of-class work, large classes can come close to being as
educationally rewarding as small classes.
Reference
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72

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KAMPALA UNIVERSITY

TEACHING AND LEARNING

Prince Jamil Wasajja

EFFECTIVE METHODS OF TEACHING

Furthermore they can be expected to mediate the effects of job-related

Effective teaching as a result of professional development

Professional development is generally associated with more (reported) use

(and in some countries also in workshops and/ or courses) have

It should be noted that, although teacher background variables (gender,

particularly mentoring and networks for professional development are

Prince Jamil Wasajja

In many countries, professional development is more and more

Teachers professional knowledge

From the perspective of education policy, however, it is even more

of professional background factors such as type of training, certification

background factors. We can look at whether teaching practices adapt to

distinguishes between two kinds of co-operation by a schools teaching

instructional material or discussing learning problems of individual

shown that classroom discipline, aggregated to the school level, is a core

In PISA, it is positively related to the schools mean student achievement

BELIEFS ABOUT THE NATURE OF TEACHING AND LEARNING

These dimensions of these beliefs are well established in educational

The direct transmission view of student learning implies that a

It is important to note the difference between beliefs on the one hand,

Direct transmission beliefs about teaching

Instruction should be built around problems with clear, correct

Constructivist beliefs about teaching

Learning Styles as a factor in Effective Teaching and Learning

Approaches to Learning and Orientations to Studying.

substitution and making little or no effort to understand the material

applicability of new material. Those with an achieving orientation tend to

Intellectual Development. Most students undergo a developmental

those of expert scientists and engineers. A goal of instruction should be

Learning and Teaching Styles:

demonstrate or discuss; some focus on rules and others on examples;

The ways in which an individual characteristically acquires, retains, and

Serious mismatches may occur between the learning styles of students in

Lawrence 1993; Oxford et al. 1991; Schmeck 1988), with unfortunate

Instructors, confronted by low test grades, unresponsive or hostile

1. Which aspects of learning style are particularly significant in foreign

Dimensions of Learning Style

The concluding section offers a summary of suggestions for meeting the

Sensing and Intuitive Learners

Sensors tend to be concrete and methodical, intuitors to be abstract and

Moody (1988) administered the MBTI to 491 college language students at

would tend to make it more attractive to intuitors than to the more

Ehrman and Oxford (1990) studied learning strategies and teaching

Basic language instruction that involves a great deal of repetitive drill

The sensors, in particular, maythen start to fall behind and do poorly on

entirely with methods

antithetical to their learning style may be made too uncomfortable to

To be effective, language instruction should therefore contain elements

background information), with the percentage of each being chosen to fit

Visual and Verbal Learners

most a marginal role in language instruction and will not be addressed

This categorization is somewhat unconventional in the context of the

classifications has to do with whether reading prose is more closely

Direct access is possible when words are familiar or when artificial

Recent studies of learning styles in foreign language education (e.g.,

invariably has a reinforcing effect on retention. The challenge to language

Active and Reflective Learners

An active learner is someone with more of a natural tendency toward

Prince Jamil Wasajja