IDEA Objective 7: Gaining a broader understanding and appreciation of intellectual/cultural activity
What is this objective?
- This objective aims at broadening student understanding and appreciation of the diverse disciplines through properly designed survey/ non-major/ general education classes. These classes must be designed and taught in a way that the students will appreciate new and unfamiliar ideas, and develop curiosity for further study.
How can one teach this objective?
- Include cultivating student motivation as an intentional learning task.
- Clearly communicate how learning in your course is relevant to learning other courses, their understanding of the world and potential careers.
- Provide frequent feedback and opportunities for self-assessment. This would help the students build students’ confidence in their ability to learn in a new discipline.
- Give them opportunities to learn deeply by manipulation, application and analyses of the course material, both in class and in assignments.
How can one assess this objective?
- Classroom Assessment Techniques like “minute-paper” in which you ask the students to write in one minute the most important concept you learned in a class, would give you an idea of their understanding of the subject. Another relevant CAT can be, drawing of “concept maps”.
- Hands-on experiments can also be used to assess their understanding of the concepts.
Reference and resource:
https://www.ideaedu.org/Portals/0/Uploads/Documents/IDEA%20Papers/IDEA%20Papers/Idea_Paper_42.pdf
https://www.ideaedu.org/Portals/0/Uploads/Documents/IDEA%20Papers/IDEA%20Papers/Idea_Paper_41.pdf
Author:
Praveena Kanchupati, PhD. Candidate & GTA Consultant
Center for Enhancement of Teaching and Learning
Praveena.Kanchupati@sdstate.edu
Contributions:
Shelly Bayer, Ed.D., Assistant Director
Center for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning
Shelly.Bayer@sdstate.edu
Kevin Sackreiter, Ed.D., Director
Center for the Enhancement of Teaching & Learning
Kevin.Sackreiter@sdstate.edu