Resources

Surveyed preservice teachers, following their final portfolio conference, to determine their views on the efficacy of using portfolio evaluation. The portfolio process helped students gain self-confidence, better relationships with instructors, organizational skills, professional attitudes, job interviewing skills, knowledge about teaching, and a knowledge base for teaching. Students expressed concerns about various aspects of portfolio evaluations.

Four theories of teaching are presented based on faculty definitions of teaching: knowledge transfer; shaping students to a predetermined mold; exploratory; and developmental. These theories are related to student attitudes about learning and are offered as a means of resolving misunderstandings among teachers and between teachers and students.

Personal reflection on the importance of informal moments in the education of students, and the implications for our metaphor of teaching.

A short article in which a teaching-scholar defines what she means by “active and meaningful learning,” discusses unstructured cooperative learning and critical thinking, and reflects on experience in using these concepts in the courses she teaches and the textbooks she writes. Idea Paper no. 34, from the series developed by the Center for Faculty Evaluation and Development, Kansas State University.