Teachers helping teachers teach

Faculty and professors are seeking to improve their skills to better cater to the different audiences they’re teaching. 

Last Thursday, the College of Liberal Arts began a series of discussions that allow teachers in the department to have conversations with each other about teaching.

“This is not a program to ‘instruct’ teachers in how to teach, but a set of conversations among teachers about how they approach their work and what strategies they have found effective or what challenges they have run into,” dean of the College of Liberal Arts Terry Cooney said. 

Cooney said at the first session, faculty participated in an exercise designed for students which concentrates on the reading of texts.

They developed assertions about the text and the ways those assertions are supported with evidence.

Each session will have a different central topic, according to Cooney. 

At the first session, one of the faculty participants suggested that another session might concentrate on ways of using art in teaching in different disciplines.

“Is there one kind of student? Do all students learn in the same ways?”Cooney asked.

 “Have [students] ever found something difficult to grasp when [they] eventually realized that another way of coming at it made things much clearer? There are many reasons for faculty to be constantly thinking about new ways of engaging students or helping students learn.”

Cooney said he led the last session.

However, he does not expect to take the lead in future sessions. 

The first session lasted a little more than an hour. 

Apart from the exercise, the group interacted through various comments and questions to reflect upon different experiences.

“The goal should be to graduate independent thinkers and learners, not human repositories of inert information,” Cooney said. 

“Teaching is the most important part of every faculty member’s job at Towson.”