Spring 2000
Vol 8 Issue 2
IN THIS ISSUE...
Metaphors, Mathematics, and Myers-Briggs
The MIL: Developing a Public Conversation about Teaching Learning
Integrating Humanities Classes with Historical Storytelling
Re-framing and Renewing a Learning Project
Inquiry-Oriented Physics Instruction
Self-Directed Learning in the Chemistry Lab
Center for Native and Urban Wildlife at SCC
ASSIDERE
"Just Tell Me What I Have to Do to Get an 'A' in Your Class!"
MCLI Assessment and Evaluation Resources
SEE ALSO...
The Labyrinth
Maricopa Center for Learning and Instruction
The Maricopa Institute for Learning: Developing a Public Conversation about Teaching and Learning
Holly McKinzie Beene, MIL Faculty Chair, GCC
At Maricopa we are frequently reminded that a great number of conversations are conducted about teaching and learning. These include both informal and formal exchanges that focus on the nature of our work: how we can not only keep doing what we already do - but do it more effectively. Sometimes we focus on method and sometimes, every now and then, we find ourselves in a moment that births deeper reflection about the essence of what we do as teachers - and what we expect our students to do as learners.
In informal conversations, we often engage in dynamic exchanges that occur in what Nancy Dixon (1997) calls "The Hallways of Learning." The power of the metaphor is that the building hallway invites multiple perspectives; just think about how colleagues wander by, join in if the topic strikes their fancy, and feel free to wander away. The limitations of hallway learning are that these gem-like moments of our professional lives are essentially time-constrained and more or less private... rarely does the impact of such conversation extend beyond the hallway. All of which brings me to the importance of formal conversations that make public our thinking and insight.
Lee Shulman, president of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, recently stressed in his keynote address at the 8th annual AAHE conference on faculty roles and rewards that there is a powerful difference between scholarly teaching and the scholarship of teaching. Scholarly teaching is what each of us does every day and what we aspire to in every aspect of our professional lives. The scholarship of teaching is a thoughtful and public examination of the nature of teaching itself; this engagement requires that we understand more about both teaching and the other side of the coin - learning.
The Maricopa Institute for Learning (MIL), now in its pilot year, is a fellowship program modeled on the PEW National Fellowship for Carnegie Scholars. MIL grew out of the efforts of the ACE Learning Team (an intercollegiate Maricopa group sponsored by the American Council on Education). The fellowship is designed to provide faculty time to investigate, research, and develop teaching and learning scholarship in ways that promote deeper understanding of student learning - and to do so in a public manner.
MIL is not an award for teaching excellence, nor is it a teaching improvement workshop. The Institute's primary purpose is to create a community of scholars who will contribute to the scholarship of teaching and, like the national Carnegie/Pew scholars (who come primarily from 4-year institutions), will "explore not only the teacher's practice but also the character and depth of student learning that results from that practice."
References
"Our Work." Carnegie Academy for the Scholarship of Teaching and
Learning (CASTL)/Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of
Teaching. Available: http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/OurWork/OurWork.htm (15 February 2000).
Dixon, Nancy M. "The Hallways of Learning." Organizational Dynamics 25 (Spring 1997): 22-33. (Available electronically through Wilson Select database at Maricopa Community College library web sites; access protocol varies.)
