active learning

If ‘Writing about Music is Like Dancing about Architecture,’ Maybe it is Time to Draw: Using Visual Aids to Introduce Musical and Stylistic Analysis

by Francesca Rivera, Music Without the terminology or solid knowledge of the historical context in which the composers worked, students can't move beyond simplistic taste statements...or value-laden judgments. My problem, then, was to help them quickly memorize key musical concepts with sufficient depth of understanding to recall the term and apply it effectively, and, to help them connect the works of individual composers with the larger time period in which they lived.

Revitalizing and Contemporizing Ancient Literature

by Heidi Saleh, Near Eastern Studies After a couple of weeks into the class, I found that coming up with fresh ways to discuss and interpret texts that have been studied for hundreds of years such as The Odyssey was becoming a problem. The students were getting tired of straight literary analysis, and quite frankly, so was I.

Slimemolds vs. the MCATs

by J. Peter Coppinger, Plant and Microbial Biology As a GSI for Biology 1B, my goal seemed simple in principle: get students to enjoy biology because biology is fascinating in and of itself. I wanted my students to appreciate biology simply because biology is worth marveling at — barnacles, slimemolds, and all. Unfortunately, many students often brush aside an interesting topic if it is not explicitly intended for an exam.

Teaching an Uncommon Sense

by Sarah Cunningham, Integrative Biology The basic evolutionary and ecological concepts and principles are not difficult to understand...However, in order to tie them together and apply them in the solution of novel problems, students must learn to think scientifically and within an evolutionary framework. It is another kind of common sense that the students must develop, and it often runs contrary to the assumptions they are used to making.

Teaching History Students to Read Between the Lines

by Lisa Kaborycha, History The challenge, as I saw it, was to inspire the students through the readings of great historians of the past, while keeping them from being overwhelmed with the task before them. How to demonstrate that history is a lively endeavor, and the day-to-day study of history is being practiced all around them?

Think Out of the Box

by Gaurav Punj, IEOR Students usually think of discussion sessions as just problem-solving sessions where the GSI will work on some numerical problems that are relevant for their midterms and finals. I realized that they were more interested in the final answers rather than Physics.

Charting the plot of ‘La noche boca arriba’

by Mary Becker Quinn, Spanish and Portuguese "Reading and Literary Analysis" (Spanish 25) is the first literature class required in the Spanish department. Because it is a course organized by genre, the students' command of literary form is essential. Equally essential, therefore, is the instructor's ability to demonstrate why such knowledge is vital to the study of literature.

Creating Coherence with Conceptual Maps

by Edith Replogle Sheffer, History I distributed piles of arrows, blank paper, and colored markers, and announced we would construct our diagram of the Revolution on the table. Following a rough chronological order, we built the map one index card at a time. A student would read their card aloud; the group then discussed its significance and debated where to place it.

Demystifying the Thought Process

by Viswanath Sankaran, Mathematics Integral Calculus poses a new challenge. Here, most problems involve a crucial "guessing" step (called the substitution) that transform them into more amenable problems. An "insightful" guess leads to the solution, a "wrong" guess can get one stuck. So the question is: How can a teacher communicate this insight?

Monstrous Texts: Overcoming Resistance to Literature

by Mai-Lin Cheng, English By juxtaposing classic literature with contemporary literature, film, and television, I hoped to help students connect with the literature in specific, personal ways that would help them become rigorous readers. Rigorous readers, in turn, develop into strong writers.