Classroom interaction styles: is egalitarian irreverence the most effective approach?
Ok, so I’ve seen a lot of lectures in my days here, and a lot of them have had very little if any room for interaction with the lecturer. I’ve gotten used to having a prof ask a rhetorical question, sort of muttering the answer under my breath knowing where he’s going, and before I’m done saying the magic words that’ll move the lecture onward, he’s already said them himself.
Worse, I’ve seen profs who simply won’t interact with students voluntarily… especially from Math and Physics, in the classes they grind freshman engineers through (like, the prof I had for Phys 241, who actively refused to call on people in class, going so far one day as to say “there’s no time for questions, put your hand down” after someone yelled out “there’s a question over here!” … or the Math 261 lecturer who simply didn’t turn away from the board more than 4 times in a 50 minute lecture).
Even in CS classes, where I usually know what’s going on, I’ve encountered a lot of classes where the profs try to make the lecture interactive by asking questions so predictable and basic that they’re practically rhetorical. As a student who knows approximately what’s going on, when that happens I’m always faced with a conundrum: do I brownnose the prof by raising my hand and hoping he’ll call on me 6 times a lecture to answer these stupid snag-points that keep the pace just a little too slow to keep me entertained? Do I play it cool and just ignore it, mutter the answer under my breath, and find another “6″ on today’s sudoku? Or do I circumvent the brownnosing game and the “wait for a classmate to brownnose” game by just blurting out the answer loud enough for everyone to hear.
I really don’t like doing the first. I guess maybe it’s a deeply-ingrained psychological problem with raising my hand … fear of rejection, or desire for control maybe? I don’t like turning over the power for me to answer to someone else, even the person I’m answering to… it’s probably the same reason I have trouble meeting women or just making friends in general …
And the second doesn’t get anything anywhere. The class stalls out for a minute or two, I get more interested in the sudoku or crossword or whatever than the lecture, and sort of tune it out and get nothing from it — in which case what would the point of showing up be?
This semester, I’m in one large lecture (~80 students) and one small one (10 students, including one grad student who’s just auditing the class, but plays along and asks quite a few so-so quality questions that indicate he should attend more lectures, but isn’t really any more advanced in the subject matter than the rest of us). The large lecture, I bring the sudoku. I sit in the back, I usually show up 3 or 4 minutes late, but it’s pretty good and I usually end up taking 3 or 4 pages of notes. Neuroanatomy is surprisingly interesting, once you get over the initial hump of memorizing brain structures with no good framework to put them in. The lecture goes just fast enough not to bore me, but just slow enough that despite taking complete notes I still have time to do the sudoku during class…
The other class, though, Theory of Computation, is definitely more interesting. Since it’s small, the “blurt the answer out” approach, basically without any regard for the classroom order or anything like that, has really enhanced my experience in the class. I’m generally interacting with the prof and the other two or three “lead” students on a day-to-day basis (as are two or three others), and I like the setting it gives. Which makes me wonder how effective it would be in a larger setting…
Really, my approach here smacks of complete disregard for the professor’s position. I don’t care that he’s a prof. If there’s something to be said, I’m just saying it. It’s very … equalizing. Puts the professor back in reach, where a lot of profs don’t seem to be, I guess.
I think CS448 was a good turning point for class interactivity though. I did a lot of that, with Aref’s half-point system and the small classroom, he really encouraged participation. I guess Frederickson’s the same way, he’s not really aiming to shoot me down or assert his authority, and really letting the atmosphere be casual and open. Maybe it’s just an “older profs teaching their favorite subjects are better teachers” sort of deal… I dunno.
But all of this makes me wonder whether I’ve stumbled onto the best possible approach for me to take in class. Being assertive and insisting on taking what I can get from the course is looking pretty appealing, I guess.
But really, is it? How does it compare to the respectful hand-raise? I know the “ignore it” falls way short as far as what I get from the course goes… but could it be the case that simple respect can get in the way of learning?
I wonder …
October 11th, 2006 at 5:46 pm
I would simply say that asking questions is the cornerstone of learning. It’s a basic feedback problem – the more information you receive from the source of knowledge in the form of comparisons between his input and your understanding of the subject matter, the better you are at obtaining a more precise understanding of the subject matter. In the large lecture halls the professor does not have the time to teach everything the university tells him he must teach and answer questions in a back-and-forth fashion. That’s what I call open-loop learning. Closing the loop in such a setting requires TA’s/RA’s, self-study, etc., and can lead to learning, but is not as gratifying as real-time closed loop learning, the second scenario you present.
Therefore, I think it’s not a matter of respect or whatnot … it’s just your personal preference. And it’s cool you found it.