HR: 11:50h
AN: ED11C-07    [PDF]
TI: Integrating Research and Education: Preparing Graduate Students to Teach
AU: * Tullis, J
EM: Jan_Tullis@brown.edu
AF: Dept. Geol. Sci., Brown Univ., Providence, RI 02912
AB: The link between research and teaching at all levels is increasingly recognized, and can be an attractive as well as an effective part of a graduate program in geoscience. At Brown we have a strong partnership between our department and the university's teaching center. The Sheridan Center for the Advancement of College Teaching provides resources and programs to help grad students improve their effectiveness as TAs and their qualifications for obtaining a teaching-related job, as well as to promote and facilitate improved teaching by faculty. Departments are encouraged to designate faculty and grad student liaisons to the Center and to take advantage of Center programs (including seminars on topics such as Persuasive Communication, Cognitive Diversity, Developing a Syllabus, Assessment, and Teaching Portfolios) and resources (such as books, tapes and videos and Individual Teaching Consultations), as well as to develop their own discipline-specific programs. The Geol. Sci. Dept. has been an active participant in Center activities from the start, but we have also developed our own activities and programs. Each year two geo faculty and two grad students serve as official liaisons to the Center, in addition to organizing and running a variety of programs within the department, including: orientation sessions for new graduate students and first-time TAs, `micro-teaching' practise sessions with constructive feedback for new TAs, mid-semester discussion and feedback sessions for current and more experienced TAs, as well as lunch meetings for all interested faculty and grad students to discuss aspects of teaching. These activities have increased the awareness and effectiveness of teaching and learning in our department, for example promoting faculty and TAs to implement syllabi with stated goals, in-class active learning exercises, small group projects, a greater number and variety of writing assignments, and greater diversity in assessment. The effectiveness of our program depends in part on the University-backed Center to provide certain resources and general programs, but also on having a core of several faculty and grad students within the department who are strongly committed to the program. Another key element is the dedicated involvement of undergraduate TAs and Writing Fellows who are an invaluable part of our teaching teams. Overall we have found that the emphasis on teaching improvement is a strong recruiting tool in our graduate program, as well as significantly strengthening the credentials of our MS and PhDs.
DE: 6605 Education
SC: Education and Human Resources [ED]
MN: 2003 Fall Meeting