By Richard H. Miller, Academic Outreach and Innovation
PULLMAN, Wash. – Motivating students to prepare for class requires faculty to also do some homework, said WSU music professor Sheila Kearney Converse.
At the next WSU faculty-led workshop, she will share what she’s learned about helping students keep up – “There aren’t easy answers,” she said, “and there’s no one answer.”
Converse will start the workshop with ideas for class design, such as going beyond the book and dividing long lectures into short segments.
“The goal,” she said, “is to be more interesting than social media.”
She also uses quick quizzes at the start of class – and peer pressure: Having students form small groups to discuss material means they hold one another accountable. In smaller classes, she tries to address students by name: “Let them know you have some idea of who they are.”
Converse is the winner of the 2014-15 Samuel H. Smith Leadership Award from the WSU Association for Faculty Women (see profile video), the WSU Distinguished Teaching Award, the Honors College Outstanding Teacher Award and the College of Arts and Sciences Award for Excellence in Teaching by a Clinical Faculty Member.
Her presentation will be 12:10-1 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 29, in CUE 518 on the Pullman campus; lunch will be provided. “Motivating Students to Come to Class Prepared” will also be live-streamed for those who can’t attend in person. Register here.
Other upcoming faculty-led workshops are:
• Nov. 18. Engaging Students in Active Learning
• Dec. 11. Improving Student Writing Without Grading Revisions
The workshops are sponsored by the Provost’s Office, Teaching Academy and Academic Outreach and Innovation.