Teaching With Style

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//-->Teaching With StyleiTeaching With StyleA Practical Guide toEnhancing Learning by UnderstandingTeaching and Learning StylesAnthony F. Grasha, Ph.D.University of CincinnatiAlliance PublishersiiTeaching With StyleTo everyone over the years who took the time to listen to my ideas about teachingand learning, who sometimes took exception, suggested alternatives, and in theprocess helped me to sharpen my thinking as I probed the underlying componentsof the teaching-learning process.Teaching With StyleCopyright © 1996, 2002 by Alliance PublishersAll rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be usedor reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case ofbrief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information address AlliancePublishers 2086 South “E” Street, Suite 205, San Bernadino, CA 92408Telephone: (909.777.0033 FAX 909.777.0034ISBN: 0-6745071-1-0Teaching With StyleiiiPrefaceAbout 25 years ago I wrote a twelve page essay describing the learning styles ofstudents as part of a proposal for a paper session for the American PsychologicalAssociation’s annual meetings. At the time I was not engaged in a research programon learning styles, but I was fascinated with the different ways students appeared tolearn in classes. The essay was an analysis of critical incidents in my interactionswith students. It was the first thing I had ever written about college teaching andthus I had no way to gauge whether others would find my observations intriguing.To my surprise, the proposal was accepted and I suddenly began to worry about thepresentation. I questioned whether I could go to a professional meeting in a fewmonths armed only with a twelve page essay. “I’ll get killed by all of the empiricaltypes,” I told myself. Thus, toprotect myself,I developed a questionnaire and surveyedstudents about how they learned. Their responses were then used to supplement myinformal observations. In retrospect, I am not convinced the paper was better but Ifelt less anxious knowing I had a few numbers to support my conclusions.The essay was well received and the editor of the prestigiousAmerican Psychologistasked me to submit it for publication. The subsequent article generated a considerableamount of interest in my views on learning styles and dramatically changed mycareer. I then began to seriously study a variety of teaching-learning issues includingthe role of student learning styles and teaching styles in the college classroom.Teaching With Stylerepresents an extension of that twelve page essay twenty-fiveyears later. While informal observations of classroom dynamics continue to play arole in my writing, they are supplemented with information from other sources.This book also includes concepts from research using theGrasha-Riechmann StudentLearning Style Scales,theTeaching Styles Inventory,extensive interviews withcollege faculty across disciplines, outcomes of my work consulting with instructorson problems they faced in the classroom, ideas generated from several hundredinterdisciplinary workshops and seminars I have conducted with faculty and graduatestudents, concepts and practices described in the literature on college teaching, andmy personal experiences as a teacher and as a learner.Teaching With Stylewas written to enable readers to learn more about themselves asteachers, the factors that facilitate and hinder attempts to modify instructionalpractices, and how to use an integrated model of teaching and learning style toteachfor learningby enhancing the nature and quality of what occurs in the classroom. Toaccomplish these goals, this book is organized into eight chapters.Chapter 1argues that teaching style is more than a set of interesting personal qualities.Rather, such qualities are related to our preferences for particular instructionalprocesses and are often markers that students, administrators, peers, and others employwhen judging our effectiveness as teachers. This chapter also notes that without afocus on the qualities that learners possess, and how they interact with our styles asteachers, changes in instructional processes will be difficult to develop and maintain. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]