Related Programs

More and more graduate departments are incorporating some instruction in teaching into their core curricula.  Many of us have taken at least one teaching course while pursuing our doctorates.  However, these courses tend to focus on techniques for facilitating undergraduate courses, leaving the challenges of teaching graduate seminars overlooked.  Here, we will address the differences between these two kinds of learners and offer some insights into how to structure successful learning environments for graduate students.  Issues covered will include:

• How to lead a discussio nin a graduate seminar
• How to model the research tasks of your discipine in a seminar
• How to assess graduate student interest and performance

For more information contact Tessa Bishop.

4/7/08 - Science Education in the 21st Century: Using the tools of physics to teach physics - Guy and Rebecca Forman Lecture
Presenter: Carl E. Wieman, 2001 Nobel Prize Winner in Physics, University of Bristish Columbia and University of Colorado - Boulder
3:00PM - 4:00PM, STEVENSON CENTER 4327
Sponsored by Vanderbilt Department of Physics

Guided by experimental tests of theory and practice, science has advanced rapidly in the past 500 years.  Guided primarily by tradition and dogma, science education meanwhile has remained largely medieval.  Research on how people learn is now revealing how many teachers badly misinterpret what students are thinking and learning from traditional physics classes and exams.  However, research is also providing insights on how to do much better.  The combination of this research with modern information technology is setting the stage for a new approach that can provide the relevant and effective physics education for all students that is needed for the 21st century.  The presenter will discuss the failures of traditional educational practices, even as used by “very good” teachers, and the successes of some new practices and technology that characterize this more effective approach, and how these results are highly consistent with findings from cognitive science.

4/10/08 - Does the Purpose Change the Pedagogy? Theoretical and Pedagogical
Perspectives on Language Learning in the Liberal Arts Tradition and in
"The Real World"
Presenter: Dr. Nina Garrett, former director of Yale's Center for Language Study
12:00PM - 1:00PM, FURMAN 217
Sponsored by Vanderbilt Applied Linguistics Association
Co-sponsors: ACFEE, College of Arts and Sciences, English Language Center, Center for Teaching, Department of Teaching and Learning, The Writing Studio

The report of the MLA Ad Hoc Committee on Foreign Language Education has
provoked some controversy about the appropriate purposes for language
learning in the liberal arts tradition as contrasted with those espoused
by government and business. Academics who see the study of literature
as the primary reason for language study often see trends in Second
Language Acquisition theory as well as in language pedagogy as catering to intellectually less valid pressures.

This workshop will sketch out some of the history of both these trends, focusing particularly on concepts of "culture" and on debates over "grammar" as emblematic of the controversy about purpose and curriculum design, and will suggest that a broader and deeper understanding of both liberal-arts and practical goals for language
learning can provide the basis for a much more effective integration -- badly needed -- of language learning in post-secondary education.

Boxed lunches will be provided to the first 40 attendees.