Taking Stock: Research on Teaching and Learning in Higher Education (Queen's Policy Studies Series, 135)

by Julia Christensen Hughes, Joy Mighty

Drawing on contributions by renowned educational researchers, this book "takes stock" of teaching and learning research in higher education. Core findings -There is a relationship between how faculty teach and how students learn - when faculty teach in traditional teacher-centered ways, students tend to adopt surface learning strategies. -There is also a relationship between how students learn and the learning outcomes they achieve - surface learning strategies tend to result in a variety of learning deficits.-The majority of faculty continue to teach in traditional teacher-centered ways, resulting in system-wide learning deficits. -There is much faculty can do in support of student learning - from improving organization and communication in the traditional lecture to the adoption of non-traditional pedagogies and assessment techniques. Arguing for an enhanced commitment to evidence-based practice, Taking Stock offers concrete suggestions for changes on a systemic level in support of student learning and calls on all those working in higher education - faculty, educational developers, administrators, and government officials - to work together to bring about these changes.

350 pages, Paperback

First published February 5, 2010

Reviews

[David Mazella · Rating 4 out of 5]

From my perspective, one of the best volumes synthesizing higher ed research, with a welcome emphasis on the resistances to the pedagogical best practices that come from disciplinary practitioners; this is why their inclusion of Meyer's and Land's threshold concepts is so effective. The final summary chapters on the challenges facing contemporary universities are quite good, and free from the usual despairing or utopian tone of most commentators.