Paper Authors

Abstract

NOTE: The first page of text has been automatically extracted and included below in lieu of an abstract

Session Number 1321

Enhancing Student Learning -- Students $Teaching# Students

Charles McIntyre North Dakota State University

Abstract

The scope of this paper deals with promoting effective student learning through the use of Cooperative Teaching. The basic principle of the Theory of Cooperative Teaching states that teaching others is the most effective method to learn subject material. Based on this premise, students should take an active role in $teaching# course material, including: 1) the preparation and presentation of lecture material, 2) the development and grading of homework assignments, and 3) course assessment and evaluation. It is anticipated that this interactive and innovative style of teaching should allow students to gain valuable experience in: teamwork, organizing and delivering presentations, critical peer evaluation, and a better overall understanding the academic process. The contents of this paper document the procedures used to incorporate and integrate this approach into the instructional sequence of an existing course in construction management. Conclusions are formulated as a result of this $experiment in education.#

I. Introduction

$CME 425 - Risk Management and Decision Support# is a senior level course offered by the Division of Construction Management within the Department of Civil Engineering and Construction at North Dakota State University. During the 1998 spring semester, twenty-nine (29) students enrolled in the course. The majority of the students were construction management majors, however, there were some construction engineers and architecture students. As part of the course deliverables, students are required to perform a group assignment. The group assignment consisted of forming student teams and having the student teams present material related to risk management from the course textbook. The students were unaware of the nature and scope of the group assignment at the beginning of the semester. This was done so that the instructor wouldn t $scare off# the students. Gradually, throughout the first third of the semester, the instructor

presented material related to effective student learning, teamwork, and teaching styles. Eventually, the audience was in a frame of mind to accept and actually look forward to doing some of their own $teaching.# The basic objective of this experiment was to promote effective student learning by using innovative instructional methods.

II. The Theory of Cooperative Teaching

There exist several suggested methods and $theories# that describe how to approach the subject of involving students in the delivery mechanisms related to presenting course material1,2. During in class discussions concerning the group project, it was decided that we (the students and the instructor) should develop our own system for CME 425 - Risk Management and Decision Support. We were aware that we may be reinventing the wheel, but we felt that this would give us the opportunity to $learn by doing# and to use the $classroom as a laboratory# approach to improving student learning, thus we developed the $Theory of Cooperative Teaching.#

• Citation

• Format
  • APA
  • APA - LaTeX bibitem
  • MLA
  • MLA - LaTeX bibitem
  • Bibtex
  • EndNote - RIS

McIntryre, C. (1999, June), Enhancing Student Learning Students " Teaching " Students Paper presented at 1999 Annual Conference, Charlotte, North Carolina. 10.18260/1-2--7643