Quit Surfing and Start "Clicking": One Professor's Effort to Combat the Problems of Teaching the U.S. Survey in a Large Lecture Hall

Abstract

Teaching an introductory survey course in a typical lecture hall presents a series of related obstacles. The large number of students, the size of the room, and the fixed nature of the seating tend to maximize the distance between instructor and students. That distance then grants enrolled (usually firstor second-year) students enough anonymity to skip class too frequently and offer only limited attention when there. The advent of wireless Internet service has compounded the problem by bringing lecturers into competition with Facebook and other Web sites that have a high potential to absorb student-viewers, and thus seem to offer more significant distraction than texting, or its predecessor, note passing. Seating charts, mandatory attendance policies, banning laptops, even roving teaching assistants can force order and mannerly classroom behavior, but usually at the cost of a collegial atmosphere, and without ensuring that those with nothing left to do but pay attention will do so, let alone engage in the material. Long before the term active learning gained cache, I developed a teaching style that relied on discussion and occasional in-class exercises, as did many of my colleagues. For those of us who depend upon class participation, this lack of engagement lies at the center of our dissatisfaction with how the survey class is taught at most large public universities. Discussions and questions posed mid-lecture invariably engage only a handful of smart and/or confident students