ASSESSING AND IMPROVING YOUR TEACHING

ASSESSING AND IMPROVING YOUR TEACHING

THE JOSSEY-BASS HIGHER AND ADULT EDUCATION SERIES

ASSESSING AND IMPROVING YOUR TEACHING Strategies and Rubrics for Faculty Growth and Student Learning Phyllis Blumberg Maryellen Weimer Consulting Editor

Cover design by Michael Cook Cover image: li jingwang/istockphoto Copyright 2014 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved. Published by Jossey-Bass A Wiley Brand One Montgomery Street, Suite 1200, San Francisco, CA 94104-4594 www.josseybass.com No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc., 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, 978-750-8400, fax 978-646-8600, or on the web at www.copyright.com. Requests to the publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, 201-748-6011, fax 201-748-6008, or online at www.wiley.com/go/permissions. Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: While the publisher and author have used their best efforts in preparing this book, they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaim any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. No warranty may be created or extended by sales representatives or written sales materials. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for your situation. You should consult with a professional where appropriate. Neither the publisher nor author shall be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages. Readers should be aware that Internet websites offered as citations and/or sources for further information may have changed or disappeared between the time this was written and when it is read. Permission is given for individual classroom teachers to reproduce the pages and illustrations for classroom use. Reproduction of these materials for an entire school system is strictly forbidden. Jossey-Bass books and products are available through most bookstores. To contact Jossey-Bass directly call our Customer Care Department within the U.S. at 800-956-7739, outside the U.S. at 317-572-3986, or fax 317-572-4002. Wiley publishes in a variety of print and electronic formats and by print-on-demand. Some material included with standard print versions of this book may not be included in e-books or in print-ondemand. If this book refers to media such as a CD or DVD that is not included in the version you purchased, you may download this material at http://booksupport.wiley.com. For more information about Wiley products, visit www.wiley.com. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Blumberg, Phyllis, date Assessing and improving your teaching : strategies and rubrics for faculty growth and student learning / Phyllis Blumberg. First edition. pages cm. (Jossey-Bass higher and adult education series) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-118-27548-1 (pbk.) ISBN 978-1-118-41953-3 (ebk.) ISBN 978-1-118-42134-5 (ebk.) 1. Reflective teaching. 2. College teaching. I. Title. LB1025.3.B595 2013 371.102 dc23 2013013534 Printed in the United States of America first edition PB Printing 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Contents Preface The Author ix xiii 1 Growing Your Teaching Effectiveness: An Overview 1 PART 1 A TEACHING MODEL THAT PROMOTES BETTER LEARNING 15 2 Beliefs Leading to Better Teaching 15 3 Essential Aspects of Effective Teaching 29 4 Documenting Critical Self-Reflection of Teaching 49 5 Evidence-Based Approaches to Enhance Teaching 65 6 Finding and Using Literature to Promote Better Teaching 83 PART 2 A MODEL TO ASSESS TEACHING TO PROMOTE BETTER LEARNING 97 7 Principles of Assessing Teaching 97 8 Model for Assessing Teaching 115 PART 3 SELF-ASSESSMENT RUBRICS 129 9 How to Assess Teaching Using Rubrics Based on the Assessment Model 129 10 What These Rubrics Assess, and How That Improves Teaching 153 v

vi Contents CASES SHOWING EFFECTIVE USES FOR THE RUBRICS 171 Introduction 171 1 How a Beginning Assistant Professor Used Rubrics to Plan and Track Her Personal Faculty Development 175 2 How a Faculty Developer Used the Rubrics with a Pretenure Instructor to Facilitate Improvement 187 3 How an Experienced Professor Used the Rubrics to Document Her Scholarship of Teaching and Learning 197 4 How a Pretenured Professor Used the Rubrics to Assess His Mentoring Undergraduate and Graduate Students in Research 207 5 How an Experienced Clinical Professor Used the Rubrics to Assess His Changed Roles While Precepting or Supervising Students in Hospital Settings 217 Comparisons among the Cases 229 References 233 Appendix: Rubrics for Self-Assessment of Teaching: Tools for Improving Different Types of Teaching 241 Index 323

Dedicated with love to my sons, Adam, Barry, and Noah Kosherick

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Preface THE ORIGIN FOR THIS BOOK came from a department chair s request. He asked me for a comprehensive teaching assessment instrument that could objectively measure teaching effectiveness that he could also use to help his faculty to improve. His professors were largely summarizing student course evaluations, and that did not give enough information. I checked the literature and was not able to find one that fit his needs. Thus began my quest for a better model to assess teaching. Since I see myself as a faculty coach and not a judge, I wanted the model to focus on improvement, not high-stakes decisions. Current methods of evaluating teaching do not generate the data needed to make good choices about how to teach more effectively. This book addresses that need. It emerged from my faculty development experiences and my convictions about what is good teaching. This book is intended for all teachers in higher education, including those who teach in experiential settings. It offers suggestions for teachers at all stages of their careers. The overarching purpose of this book is to promote teaching excellence. Effective teaching promotes both deep and intentional learning. This book describes a comprehensive plan for teacher development. It s not something that should be done all at once, and it is not a quick fix for struggling instructors. This is a systematic process for career-long development of teaching effectiveness. I propose a hierarchical development and self-assessment model, but it is not necessary to do all of the steps; doing even one step helps instructors teach more effectively. In fact, making ongoing improvement may ix

x Preface be more important than achieving excellence. The hierarchical model is based on essential principles in the literature on faculty development and cognitive sciences. The strength of this model places the locus of control with readers who want to improve rather than with external audiences who want to judge. Thus, this book deals with formative self-assessment rather than summative assessment. The book begins by building the rationale for the assessment model and methods. It offers broad improvement strategies for career-long growth, describes a formative assessment model, and finally introduces self-assessment rubrics (see figure P1). Throughout, I offer many suggestions to increase student deep and intentional learning through better teaching. The cases describe how five professors improved their teaching. The appendix contains self-assessment rubrics. Part 1 describes a hierarchical approach to teaching better that integrates four well-supported, but previously separate, effective teaching strategies. An introduction and orientation to this approach is in chapter 1. Chapter 2 discusses misconceptions about teaching and recommends alternative ideas about teaching. Chapter 3 defines the essential aspects of teaching. Studying each of these aspects is the first effective teaching strategy. Chapter 4 discusses the role of critical self-reflection and the need for documentation of this reflection, the second effective teaching strategy. The third strategy for more effective teaching involves evidence-based decision making to guide practice and is the topic of chapter 5. Since many professors may not know the appropriate literature to support teaching, I devote chapter 6 to how to find such literature in your discipline and in general. The last strategy is using self-assessment as a continuous improvement process. To assist in this process, I describe a constructive, self- assessment model in part 2 that assesses all of the essential aspects of teaching discussed in chapter 3. Chapter 7 describes principles of assessment to foster learning. Desire to teach better Use effective teaching strategies Self-assessment tactics Model for selfassessment to promote better teaching Rubrics for assessing different contexts of teaching FIGURE P.1 The Model of Better Teaching to Increase Learning Used throughout This Book

Preface xi Chapter 8 applies these principles to a new assessment model that fosters better teaching. Through critical self-assessment, evidence-based decision making, and rigorous data collection, instructors employ a broad-based and layered support for their teaching effectiveness. This self-assessment model leads to a catalogue of critical reflection, selfassessment rubrics as I discuss in part 3. Chapters 9 and 10 describe how to understand and use the self-assessment rubrics, which assess many types of teaching and identify specific components of these types of teaching. The discussion shows the types of data that can be used to support claims of teaching quality and how the assessment standards provide suggestions for enhancement. This model and the resulting rubrics will change how you assess your teaching while raising the standard for what is effective teaching. The five cases, which focus on faculty who have used the rubrics to assess their teaching, show the richness and variety of ways that teaching can promote better student learning. Reading these cases can show you how to improve your teaching and assess your effectiveness largely on your own, as these professors have done. Acknowledgments This book was possible only through the collaborative efforts of many people who helped me develop and refine my ideas, validated the rubrics, edited drafts, and offered suggestions for improvement. I offer them my sincere gratitude. Maryellen Weimer, my trusted friend and mentor, read many drafts of this book and offered insightful criticisms in the spirit of improvement. People who collaborated on the development of the rubrics include faculty at the University of the Sciences, especially the Department of Mathematics, Physics, and Statistics: Linda Robinson, Annemarie Flanagan, Thomas O Connor, Amy Jessop, Paula Kramer, Carlos Moreno, Thomas O Connor, Steven Sheaffer, Elisabetta Fasella, Preston Moore, Cathy Poon, Fred Schaefer, Ruy Tchao, and Shanaz Tejani-Butt. Linda Nilson of Clemson University and Shirley Mier of Century College were especially helpful in formulating the rubrics. I also acknowledge the assistance of art faculty from other institutions who assisted in the development of the rubrics for the performing and visual arts, including Nicholas Morrison of Utah State University, Monica Ines Huerta of University of Michigan, Gail Rathbun of Indiana Purdue University at Fort Wayne, and Martin Springborg of Academy of Art University. James Yarrish crafted the rubrics template. Paul Halpern, Lia Vas, Susan Wainwright, Kay Scanlon, Gregory Theilman, Madhu Mahalingam, Roger Ideishi, Therese Johnston, Elizabeth Amy Janke, Bo Sun, Lindsay Curtin, Carol Maritz, Amy Jessop,

xii Preface Ruth Schemm, Shanaz Tejani-Butt, Pamalyn Kearney, Laura Pontiggia, Salar Alsardary, Alice Levy, and Maria Brown participated in the rubrics validation study. Linda Robison, a psychometrician who worked with me consistently throughout the development of the rubrics, also took the data submitted by these professors and completed rubrics on them for the validity study. Many people offered wonderful advice on the wording and organization of the book, especially Maryellen Weimer, David Brightman, and Halley Sutton of Jossey-Bass, the two external reviewers, and the production staff at Jossey-Bass, Susan Geraghty and copyeditor Bev Miller. My sister, Ella Singer, proofread the final drafts and corrected the smallest mistakes that I overlooked. I also want to acknowledge the many instructors who are named throughout the book who willingly shared examples of their teaching reflections and self-assessments. August 2013 Phyllis Blumberg Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania

The Author PHYLLIS BLUMBERG has dedicated her career to improving teaching in higher education and to increased learning. She has taught first-year college through graduate and medical students. She has been working with instructors in the health sciences and the sciences as a faculty developer for thirty years. Blumberg has worked with faculty at five universities in the United States and Canada on a one-to-one basis to help them change their teaching so that their students will learn more. She is currently the director of the Teaching and Learning Center and professor of social sciences and education at the University of the Sciences. Faculty value teaching at this university and want to teach better. More than 80 percent of the instructors at her university voluntarily participate in at least one faculty development event or consult with Blumberg individually every year. Blumberg is the author of more than fifty articles on active learning, learning-centered teaching, problem-based learning, and program evaluation, including a guidebook on how to implement learner-centered teaching, Developing Learner-Centered Teaching: A Practical Guide for Faculty (2009, Jossey-Bass). She is a frequent presenter at POD, the Teaching Professor, Lilly-East, and other higher education conferences. She has given workshops at numerous colleges and universities across around the world. Blumberg earned her doctorate in educational and developmental psychology from the University of Pittsburgh, Learning Research and Development Center, in 1976. xiii