Resources for developing tutors
The PDF document (2.3mb) A tutor’s guide to teaching and learning at UQ covers a range of approaches to small group teaching and learning and also includes other UQ resources and policies related to tutoring.
Deep and surface learning
SOLO taxonomy of learning outcomes
Facilitation skills for tutors
Handling difficult tutorial situations
Small group teaching principles and methods
Deep and surface learning
A framework for teaching
(For a more extensive discussion of these and related issues see Ramsden, 1992.)
There are different ways in which we might conceive teaching:
- Telling or transmission, in which the teacher
is seen as the expert, the students as novices. In this model the
teacher gives students the
content and provides answers to their questions about the content.
Students are passive recipients of the content and the focus is on
the teacher,
the content and the methods by which the teacher delivers the content.
- Organising the students' activity, in which the teacher's expertise
is in the design and supervision of learning activities. The focus
here is on the student, their motivation to learn and techniques
that facilitate
learning, but the teacher is the expert in knowing what activities
'work'.
- A third conception of teaching is in terms of facilitating learning or making learning possible. Here the teacher designs activities based on continuous feedback from students and other teachers about how to overcome obstacles to learning particular things. The focus is on individual student needs, constant improvement, evaluation and self-reflection on the part of the teacher.
Types of approaches to learning
As well as differences in the conceptualisation of teaching, the approaches taken by students to their learning can be characterised. One useful way of doing this is the distinction between deep and surface approaches to learning.
Surface
The student focuses upon the details and parts of the information in
an atomistic way. There is an emphasis upon memorising individual details
in the form they were related or to list the features as they were presented.
Deep
The student looks for the overall meaning of the material and processes
information in a holistic way. The students construct their own meaningful
interpretation of the content by integrating it into pre-existing knowledge.
Learning outcomes
The learning outcomes that result from deep and surface approaches to learning can be characterised as follows.
A surface approach to learning results in:
- a limited understanding of concepts
- being less able to distinguish principles from examples
- difficulties in developing a logical argument
- difficulties in recognising which ideas are key ideas
- facts being forgotten very quickly (one week).
A deep approach to learning results in:
- the development of 'relational' responses to tasks
- long-term retention of understanding
- the ability to apply knowledge to novel situations
- the ability to generate new meaning, new paradigms
- fosters independence in relation to learning - self-directed learning.
How to engender a deep approach
Support independent learning:
- Learning needs to be self rewarding but can be ONLY IF the environment is set up in a safe, non-threatening way.
- Explicitly teach learning strategies so students can begin to develop self-directed learning, become more competent at learning and thereby reduce anxiety about failures and increase successes.
Organise appropriate learning activities:
- Students need to be active not passive in their learning experience. However, merely doing is not sufficient for learning; the learning activity must be planned, reflected upon, and processed and related to the learning outcomes.
Encourage interaction with others:
- It's often easier to learn with others than alone.
Use appropriate assessment practices that:
- reward deep learning
- inform students in advance of the marking criteria and standards required.
SOLO taxonomy: A framework for understanding learning outcomes
(based
on Biggs and Collis, 1984)
SOLO stands for:
- S tructure of the
- O bserved
- L earning
- O utcome
It is a taxonomy of learning outcome characteristics with 5 Levels in the taxonomy:
- pre-structural
- uni-structural
- multi-structural
- relational
- extended abstract
Pre-structural - use of irrelevant information; no meaningful response.
Uni-structural - answer focuses on one relevant aspect only.
Multi-structural - answer focuses on several relevant features, but they are not coordinated together.
Relational - the several parts are integrated into a coherent whole: details are linked to the conclusions; meaning is understood.
Extended
abstract - answer generalises the structure beyond the information given:
higher order principles are used to bring in a new and broader
set of issues.
Facilitation skills for tutors
As a tutor you can play an important role in developing your students' independent learning skills by devolving to them some of the responsibility for their learning. This is a matter of degree; however, most evidence suggests that better learning outcomes are derived from facilitated learning than from directive teaching.
Becoming a facilitative teacher requires a move away from directive, spoon-feeding approaches, towards facilitative approaches to teaching. But what does it mean to be facilitative? In the diagram below, a continuum of interactions is depicted, arrayed according to the level of intervention they embody.
| Doing
nothing Silence Support Questions to clarify |
Supportive |
| Questions to change Questions to move Suggesting choices Suggesting paths Sharing ideas Suggesting action |
Persuasive |
| Guidance Choosing for the group Directing the group |
Directive |
(Table taken from: Bently, T. (1993) Facilitation: Providing Opportunities for Learning. London: McGraw-Hill.)
Sometimes it is necessary to be very directive, even when espousing a facilitative style of teaching. So it is important that you recognise that you must use judgement and discretion when deciding whether to operate from the very facilitative or very directive ends of the continuum.
Notwithstanding, under ideal conditions it is better to facilitate than to direct, since directing takes away from the students both control over and responsibility for their learning.
Facilitation tips
Facilitators are skilled in asking appropriate questions. They do not give the answers and they manage groups so all students have the opportunity to become engaged in the learning activity.
The tutor can encourage group self-management by:
- observing and reporting on group processes and thereby opening them up as topics for group reflection
- encouraging all group members to become engaged in the learning activities
- developing 'self-directed learning' activities
- creating awareness of the group's time and project self-management.
Guidelines for non-directive or facilitative interactions:
- Ask open rather than closed questions.
- Pitch questions at an appropriate level for students' understanding, but vary the level to accommodate different individuals' levels of understanding.
- Rephrase your questions if they seem to be unintelligible or have not generated a response.
- Allow sufficient time to get a response (try counting to 10 or 15 before speaking again) and use eye contact to encourage any student 'thinking about' having a go at responding.
- Use probes to follow-up on students' contributions (e.g. "What do think will happen then?" "Tell me more about the viscosity of the emulsion at that stage.").
- Redirect questions to other students ("Mary has argued that..., what do you think Tim?")
Respond to every contribution appropriately:
- Reward the good (including that within a response that otherwise needs work).
- Correct the bad (avoiding ridicule). Try using these questioning techniques to draw out the problems or strengthen up the argument.
- Allow many students' contributions to contribute to a coherent whole answer to the initially posed problem - draw them out by redirecting questions to other students, rather than answering them yourself.
Handling
difficult tutorial situations
There are at lease three things you might consider doing in all your group work to help prevent difficult tutoring situations from arising.
- Communicating minimum standards that must apply
- Developing consensus on standards beyond the minimum
- Building trust, team building
Communicating minimum standards
- Use and refer to University policies and guidelines on standards of staff behaviour and professionalism. If you know your rights and responsibilities it is easier for you to deal with difficult student interactions.
- Expect that your School will support you in enforcing appropriate standards that students can be expected to uphold or conform to. Use School guidelines and communicate School expectations and disciplinary mechanisms to students.
- Provide students with examples of appropriate and inappropriate behaviour, showing how they will be handled. It is also useful to workshop these with students.
Developing consensus
- Use the group's own internal self-regulation abilities. If you can get a group to agree to adopt and accept behavioural guidelines, then you can get that same group to police adherence to those guidelines.
- If there are contentious, flexible or alternative standards that might be adopted, you might use design group exercises to generate a set of standards by consensus.
- Incorporate the ability to police, sanction, and report if necessary, into the administration of the group work.
Developing trust and team building
You might try and program time for various activities that are not related directly to the learning or content but help to develop the relationships between the students.
Games and icebreakers
- Games and icebreakers allow students to get to know each other in contexts and through activities that are purely fun. This reduces the tension some students associate with group work.
- Do the games and icebreakers early in the semester for best effect.
- Focus on getting social cooperative interactions that are not related to the course content.
Disclosure
- Appropriate levels of disclosure are important for building trust, both among students and between yourself and your students.
- Never try to bluff your students if you do not know the answer to a question; honesty is part of appropriate disclosure and shows respect for your students. Admit that you do not know and undertake to find out.
Tricky tutorial situations
If you are going to experience difficult tutorial interactions, are there ways of identifying them in advance and preparing for them? Yes there are. Here are some examples and some suggestions for dealing with them.
| What can you expect 'in the Classroom'? | What strategies can you use? |
|
Blocking
Typical student responses: |
|
|
Confusion (blocking variation)
Typical student responses: |
|
|
Miracle seeking
Typical student responses: |
|
|
Over enthusiasm (miracle-seeking variation)
Typical student responses: |
|
|
Resisting
Typical student responses: |
|
|
Passivity (often a variant of resisting)
Typical student responses: |
|
|
Fragmentation (another variant of resisting)
Typical student responses: |
|
(Adapted/expanded by Joan L. West (1990) from Difficult Tutoring Situations by UCL's Tutor Coordinator Mike Rose (1976))
Small group teaching principles
and methods
Smaller classes provide circumstances for the development of students, educationally, socially and personally:
Personal
- Building confidence (e.g. in giving seminars, working in pairs/trios/project groups, developing the ability to discuss and argue, to present and justify an opinion etc)
- Make studying at university more enjoyable (for some - introverts may never prefer smaller classes)
- Make studying at university more rewarding (by developing friendships, belonging to social networks, studying with others rather than alone, improving the quality of learning, increasing the scope of learning from high content to higher order reasoning and thinking skills, etc)
Social
- Making friends
- Finding allies
- Networking
Educational
- Problem solving skills
- Reasoning skills
- Development of relevant or appropriate attitudes (e.g. professionalism)
- Speaking skills
- Listening skills
- Leadership
- Cooperation
According to Newble and Cannon (1995) there are three elements necessary for successful small group teaching:
- Active participation
by all the students (requires keeping numbers as low as 5-8, but
you can break up groups of 20-30
into smaller
groups). Getting everyone involved in a way that is
productive and inclusive
is one of the major skill areas for you to develop
as a small class teacher.
You will find a lot of information about this skill
area dealing mainly with the issue of students' personal comfort
zones (use
of icebreakers
and games, getting to know names, making the context
non-threatening so students feel comfortable venturing their suggestions
and ideas).
- Face-to-face contact to capture para-linguistic
communication (gesture, facial expressions etc). This is of course
the area that is being practically
tested and challenged by the adoption of flexible
delivery methods (e.g. the use of computer mediated communication
technologies such as email
to mediate discussion groups asynchronously).
- Purposeful activity. Each session should have a purpose and develop in an orderly way. This is another major skill area for you, requiring you to plan tasks that are going to bring about the learning you want students to achieve. Remember all the while that there are many skills students may be learning (such as the social and personal skills) while they are working through tasks that seem on the face of it to be concerned with content. Staying mindful of what your students can and are learning because they are doing small class activities is very important because it allows you to self-consciously build into your planning both the specialist disciplinary content and the small group skills you want them to learn.
Reference
Newble D. and Cannon R. (1995) A Handbook for Teachers in Universities and Colleges: A Guide to Improving Teaching Methods (3rd ed.) London: Kogan Page.
