Two Birds, One Stone

“With all the hemming and hawing and handwringing about whether and how to reintroduce student fees, something has been lost on almost everyone but working lecturers: the woeful rates of student attendance …” (more)

[Ernie Ball’s Blog, 14 March]

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The one hour lecture: How to captivate your audience in ten easy steps

“1. Don’t rehearse. 2. Have at least 100 slides. 3. Don’t use Powerpoint’s ‘hide’ function: just rapidly flick through the slides that you don’t have time for …” (more)

[BishopBlog, 11 March]

Using Pre-Lecture Resources in your Teaching

“Much of my study on educational research this year has focussed on Pre-Lecture Resources, working with Dr Roisin Donnelly at DIT’s Learning Teaching and Technology Centre …” (more)

[Is this going to be on the exam?, 10 January]

Take a note from me …

“… I won’t repeat the entire content of my earlier discussion, but one of the main points I made was about how inefficient many students are at taking notes during lectures, so much so that the effort of copying things onto paper must surely prevent them absorbing the intellectual content of the lecture …” (more)

[In the Dark, 14 December]

Behavioural Economics, Technology and Mandatory Attendance Policies for College Students

“Attendance is voluntary in many college classes, primarily because of the difficulty in taking attendance on a regular basis, but also because of the view that students should have some autonomy in determining the manner in which they engage with academic material …” (more)

[Martin Ryan, Geary Behavioural Economics Blog, 15 November]

Overcrowding in lecture theatres

“A very serious overcrowding problem has developed in several lecture theatres around campus over the past two weeks. Although the problems mainly affect students of Arts and Science, thousands of students have been affected by the problem, which is resulting in students sitting on both sides of the steps in theatres as well as on the ground at the podium level beside the lecturer …” (more)

[SIN, 15 November]

UCD Attendance Survey

“A short while ago I posted about lecture attendance at Irish universities. Recent research by myself and others from Geary has shown that approximately 12% of Irish university students claim to attend all of their lectures …” (more)

[Martin Ryan, Geary Behavioural Economics Blog, 15 November]

Reach of a Single Lecture

“Although we know there are issues with measuring online impact through the use of a single tool, I thought it might be worthwhile to show the reach of a single lecture at LIT-Clonmel. During Tom Murphy’s visit to the campus, several students tweeted his nic and several mentioned the creative multimedia lecture happening on campus. According to Tweetreach, nearly 10,000 people heard about Tom during the past week …” (more)

[Bernie Goldbach, Inside View, 29 September]

Attendance and Grades: Economics of Education Review

“Abstract: In this paper we estimate the effect of class attendance on exam performance by implementing a policy in three large economics classes that required students scoring below the median on the midterm exam to attend class …” (more)

[Geary Behavioural Economics Blog, 17 September]

Lecture Attendance at Irish Universities

“‘If I’m Not Learning, Why Go?’ This is the title of a blog-post from last year by Stephen Kinsella. Here’s an excerpt: ‘One answer MIT surveyors found was when students didn’t feel they were learning, they didn’t go. This is certainly because the penalty to not going to a lecture is reduced by the presence of online learning materials like power point slides and handouts …'” (more)

[Martin Ryan, Geary Behavioural Economics Blog, 1 September]

Note this!

“Exactly 35 years ago I started my second year as an undergraduate law student in a Dublin university. My workload for that year consisted of four ‘subjects’ (no modules in those days), three of which I had been very much looking forward to. But I dreaded the prospect of the fourth …” (more)

[Ferdinand von Prondzynski, University Blog, 27 August]

Why Lectures Should be Abolished

“With the advent of social media, online video, and pervasive mobile connectivity, nearly every industry has been experiencing massive transformations the last five years …” (more)

[Riley Strong, London Student, 14 March]

Nintendo generation ‘tunes out during lectures’

“Schools must make greater use of technology if they are to get through to the Nintendo generation, an education expert urged yesterday. Mary Mullarkey, president of the Association of Community and Comprehensive Schools, said: ‘Today’s students don’t willingly read text books and they are inclined to tune out when teachers deliver lectures or make speeches …'” (more)

[John Walshe, Independent, 12 March]

Taking notes

“Today I had reason to cast my mind back to October 14, 1974, the date on which I attended my first lecture as an undergraduate student. The place was the Old Chemistry Theatre in the then science building in Trinity College Dublin. No, I wasn’t a science student, I was reading law: but in those days Trinity had few adequate lecture theatres, and this was one we used quite a bit …” (more)

[Ferdinand von Prondzynski, University Blog, 16 December]

Why Are We Still Doing Lectures?

“Before I quit my faculty position to move into education management and consulting, I regularly lectured to classes with 200-250 students. I was nervous at first, and my delivery was stiff and overly formal. With practice, though, I got good at it. My lectures became almost theatrical, and I enjoyed great reviews from students and colleagues. I learned to love it …” (more)

[Keith Hampson, Higher Education Management Group, 25 November]

Kingsfield on Higher Options

“This time last year, I found myself explaining to concerned parents at the Higher Options Fair that law students’ small lecture load does not necessarily mean a small work load. Plus ça change. My colleagues have found themselves explaining much the same thing today at this year’s event. Briefly, law students should spend considerable amounts of time on independent reading, developing research skills (how to find what is relevant) and honing discernment and judgment (how to decide what to use of what is read) – these are all important practice skills which they learn in college …” (more)

[Eoin O’Dell, Cearta, 16 September]

Modules condensed to accommodate Swine Flu

“Lecturers have been asked to condense the 12-week lecture term into ten lectures, to allow for an average two-week absence due to Swine Flu. The proposal is one of several measures implemented by the newly appointed Swine Flu Committee. Students’ Union Education Officer, Donnacha Ó Súilleabháin, told The University Observer that although ‘the same amount of material will be in [each] module, and the structure will be altered to allow self-directed learnin’ …” (more)

[Bridget Fitzsimons, University Observer, 15 September]

If I’m not learning, why go?

“Why don’t students go to class anymore? This is a constant refrain in faculty lounges around the world. One answer MIT surveyors found was when students didn’t feel they were learning, they didn’t go. This is certainly because the penalty to not going to a lecture is reduced by the presence of online learning materials like power point slides and handouts. However, the old standards still apply – the researchers found students were less likely to go if they thought the lecturer wasn’t very good, and if they thought they wouldn’t learn much, which makes perfect sense, and, it should be noted, has nothing to do with technology …” (more)

[Stephen Kinsella, 1 September]

The problem with PowerPoint

“In the past 25 years, I’ve asked hundreds of people how many PowerPoint presentations they’ve seen that came across as really inspiring and enthusiastic. Most struggle to come up with a single example, and the most optimistic answer I’ve heard was ‘two’. So what are the main problems? …” (more)

[Max Atkinson, BBC News Magazine, 19 August]

Just being there

“When I started as a student in Trinity College Dublin 35 years ago, one of the endearing practices at our lectures (at least in the first year) was that the lecturer would do a roll call. As some of the names on the list were not easy (well, there was mine for a start…), this could take a little while. And when your name came up, you answered ‘yes’ or something similar (or in some cases, something actually rather dissimilar). In those days, attendance at both lectures and tutorials was compulsory, so if you missed a certain number (and I forget now what the number was) you became ineligible to sit the examinations …” (more)

[Ferdinand von Prondzynski, University Blog, 18 August]