Improving Students' Learning Outcomes is a book for educators and administrators in higher education who have a genuine interest in developing an inspired curriculum centered on student learning. Integrating theoretical perspectives with empirical practice, researchers and practitioners from four continents discuss why and how students' learning outcomes can be improved. The book offers new theoretical approaches to the understanding of students' learning outcomes, as well as normative implications and inspiring examples from people professionally engaged in teaching, learning, and assessment-practices. Editors Claus Nygaard and Clive Holtham are the founders of the international academic association LIHE (Learning in Higher Education). The book came out of an international symposium held on Aegina Island, Greece, arranged by LIHE.
An ambitious, comprehensive reimagining of 21st century higher education Improving Quality in American Higher Education outlines the fundamental concepts and competencies society demands from today's college graduates, and provides a vision of the future for students, faculty, and administrators. Based on a national, multidisciplinary effort to define and measure learning outcomes—the Measuring College Learning project—this book identifies 'essential concepts and competencies' for six disciplines. These essential concepts and competencies represent efforts towards articulating a consensus among faculty in biology, business, communication, economics, history, and sociology—disciplines that account for nearly 40 percent of undergraduate majors in the United States. Contributions from thought leaders in higher education, including Ira Katznelson, George Kuh, and Carol Geary Schneider, offer expert perspectives and persuasive arguments for the need for greater clarity, intentionality, and quality in U.S. higher education. College faculty are our best resource for improving the quality of undergraduate education. This book offers a path forward based on faculty perspectives nationwide: Clarify program structure and aims Articulate high-quality learning goals Rigorously measure student progress Prioritize higher order competencies and disciplinarily grounded conceptual understandings A culmination of over two years of efforts by faculty and association leaders from six disciplines, this book distills the national conversation into a delineated set of fundamental ideas and practices, and advocates for the development and use of rigorous assessment tools that are valued by faculty, students, and society. Improving Quality in American Higher Education brings faculty voices to the fore of the conversation and offers an insightful look at the state of higher education, and a realistic strategy for better serving our students.
American higher education needs a major reframing of student learning outcomes assessment Dynamic changes are underway in American higher education. New providers, emerging technologies, cost concerns, student debt, and nagging doubts about quality all call out the need for institutions to show evidence of student learning. From scholars at the National Institute for Learning Outcomes Assessment (NILOA), Using Evidence of Student Learning to Improve Higher Education presents a reframed conception and approach to student learning outcomes assessment. The authors explain why it is counterproductive to view collecting and using evidence of student accomplishment as primarily a compliance activity. Today's circumstances demand a fresh and more strategic approach to the processes by which evidence about student learning is obtained and used to inform efforts to improve teaching, learning, and decision-making. Whether you're in the classroom, an administrative office, or on an assessment committee, data about what students know and are able to do are critical for guiding changes that are needed in institutional policies and practices to improve student learning and success. Use this book to: Understand how and why student learning outcomes assessment can enhance student accomplishment and increase institutional effectiveness Shift the view of assessment from being externally driven to internally motivated Learn how assessment results can help inform decision-making Use assessment data to manage change and improve student success Gauging student learning is necessary if institutions are to prepare students to meet the 21st century needs of employers and live an economically independent, civically responsible life. For assessment professionals and educational leaders, Using Evidence of Student Learning to Improve Higher Education offers both a compelling rationale and practical advice for making student learning outcomes assessment more effective and efficient.
How do disabled students feel about their time at university? What practices and policies work and what challenges do they encounter? How do they view staff and those providing learning support? This book sets out to show how disabled students experience university life today. The current generation of students is the first to move through university after the enactment of the Disability Discrimination Act, which placed responsibility on universities to create an inclusive environment for disabled students. The research on which the book is based focuses on a selected group of students with a variety of impairments, as they progress through their degree courses. On the way they encounter different styles of teaching and approaches to learning and assessment. The diversity of their views is reflected in the issues they raise: negotiating identities, dealing with transitions, encountering divergent and sometimes confusing teaching and assessment. Improving Disabled Students’ Learning goes on to ask university staff how they experience these new demands to widen participation and create more inclusive learning climates. It explores their perspectives on their roles in a changing university sector. Offering insights into the workings of universities, as seen by their central participants, its findings will be of great interest to all practitioners who teach and support disabled students, as well as campaigners for an end to discrimination. Crucially, it foregrounds the views of disabled students themselves, giving rise to a complex, contradictory and always fascinating picture of university life from students whose voices are not always heard.
The change in paradigm in our field is away from the great man or woman theory of leadership and the teacher in his or her own classroom to the development of learning communities which value differences and support critical reflection and encourage members to question, challenge, and debate teaching and learning issues. How to achieve such learning communities is far from clear, but we believe the areas of problem-based learning (PBL) and organizational learning (OL) offer valuable clues. The indications are that the successful educational restructuring agenda depends on teams of leaders, whole staffs and school personnel, working together (i.e., OL) linking evidence and practice in genuine collaboration (i.e., PBL). The book is unique in that it is both about and uses these two concepts. The book is made up of four sections: 1.An introductory rational in which the case for using only quality evidence in school reform efforts is argued. Results from a quality research project are then presented. These results are organised around six questions: how is the concept of OL defined in schools ('teacher voice')? what leadership practices promote OL in schools ('teacher voice')? what are some outcomes of schooling other than academic achievement ('pupil voice')? what are the relationships between the non-academic and academic outcomes of schooling? does school leadership and/or organisational learning contribute to student outcomes? And, what other factors contribute to student outcomes? The section concludes with a plea that given the accumulation and consistent quality of the evidence from across systems and countries, we no longer need to involve ourselves with just impressions of effective leadership. We have a way forward that links leadership to organisational learning and improved student outcomes. 2.Advice for using the book. The reasons for the choice of problem-based learning as the vehicle for the professional development materials that form the major part of this book are detailed. Suggestions are then made for use of the book, including a one-day and two- day workshop, and advice on group development and warm-up activities for such group development before moving to the problem-based learning package in Section 3; 3.A problem based-learning, evidence informed, professional development package for aspiring and actual school leaders based on real schools and their leaders. 4.A challenge. The final section provides refined versions of the diagnostic instruments used in the research and challenges readers to use them in their own schools. The book concludes with the references used and a list of other readings.
This book summarizes the major research findings that show how to substantially increase student achievement. This book draws on a number of investigators who have statistically synthesized many studies. A new education method showing superior results in 90% of the studies concerning it has more credibility than a method that shows results in only 60% of the cases. Research synthesis of many studies can also test the possibility that the new method works with a variety of students and circumstances. A robust method shown to work well at many grade levels with boys and girls in cities and suburbs is more desirable than one that only works well in special cases. Subsequent chapters weigh these considerations. Obviously policymakers and educators must also consider the costs and difficulties of implementing new policies and practices. Some innovations, however, are not only more effective but less costly. Teachers well prepared in their subject matter are usually a better investment than small classes, and, despite conventional beliefs, the Internet and other distance instruction delivery can be both more effective and cheaper than traditional classroom teaching. Thus, both old and new methods should be viewed in terms of efficacy, frugality, ethics, and other considerations. The remaining chapters begin with the most fundamental, well-established principles of academic learning within and outside schools. Because children spend approximately 92% of the total hours in the first 18 years of life outside school and under the responsibility of parents, the features of home conditions and parents' behaviors that foster learning before and during the school years are described. In successive chapters, the book describes the most effective classroom practices and school, district, and state policies.
As academic service-learning continues to grow rapidly, practitioners are discovering a pressing need for solid empirical research about learning outcomes. Where's the Learning in Service-Learning? helps define learning expectations, presents data about learning, and links program characteristics with learning outcomes. It is the first book to explore the experience of service-learning as a valid learning activity.
Participants in this workshop were asked to explore three related questions: (1) how to create measures of undergraduate learning in STEM courses; (2) how such measures might be organized into a framework of criteria and benchmarks to assess instruction; and (3) how such a framework might be used at the institutional level to assess STEM courses and curricula to promote ongoing improvements. The following issues were highlighted: Effective science instruction identifies explicit, measurable learning objectives. Effective teaching assists students in reconciling their incomplete or erroneous preconceptions with new knowledge. Instruction that is limited to passive delivery of information requiring memorization of lecture and text contents is likely to be unsuccessful in eliciting desired learning outcomes. Models of effective instruction that promote conceptual understanding in students and the ability of the learner to apply knowledge in new situations are available. Institutions need better assessment tools for evaluating course design and effective instruction. Deans and department chairs often fail to recognize measures they have at their disposal to enhance incentives for improving education. Much is still to be learned from research into how to improve instruction in ways that enhance student learning.
This essential guide helps teachers refine their approach to fundamental challenges in the classroom. Based on research from cognitive science and formative assessment, it ensures teachers can offer all students the support and challenge they need – and can do so sustainably. Written by an experienced teacher and teacher educator, the book balances evidence-informed principles and practical suggestions. It contains: A detailed exploration of six core problems that all teachers face in planning lessons, assessing learning and responding to students Effective practical strategies to address each of these problems across a range of subjects Useful examples of each strategy in practice and accounts from teachers already using these approaches Checklists to apply each principle successfully and advice tailored to teachers with specific responsibilities. This innovative book is a valuable resource for new and experienced teachers alike who wish to become more responsive teachers. It offers the evidence, practical strategies and supportive advice needed to make sustainable, worthwhile changes.
