The imperative “Help Students Get the Dictionary Habit” is one of the headings in the 2001 edition of John C. Bean’s book Engaging Ideas, specifically in a chapter called “Helping Students Read Difficult Texts.” Bean goes on to describe the importance of annotating unfamiliar words.
Many students do not arrive in our courses with college-level reading skills. That usually ends up meaning a couple of things. First off, they don’t like
Here’s one of those articles that really shouldn’t be missed, particularly for those with interest in making teaching and learning more evidence-based. Current thinking about evidence-based teaching and learning tends to be more generic than specific. Use any active learning strategy intermittently or even regularly,
New Approaches, Instruments and Emphases
Eddy, S. L., Converse, M., and Wenderoth, M. P., (2015). PORTAAL: A classroom observation tool assessing evidence-base teaching practice for active learning in large science, technology, engineering and mathematics classes. Cell Biology Education, 14 (Summer), 1-16.
Many years ago, a higher-education publication ran a commentary from a faculty member who complained that students were bored by her lectures because she was not entertaining them enough, but that she should not have to entertain them; however, she was wrong.
Positive classroom climate can encourage students to participate, think deeply about content, and engage peers in intellectual debate. Creating a classroom climate conducive to that type of expression can be difficult. Classrooms are filled with a diverse cross-section of our society representing multiple learning preferences
And there seems to be lots of them: required general education courses in content areas the student deems completely uninteresting, those with a reputation for being hard, and others that require skills students know they don’t have and feel they cannot acquire. With all that
Students aren’t all that excited about most of their assignments. Given the chance not to write papers, not to take exams, or not to complete group projects, most students would happily take advantage of the opportunity. But those are all assignments they’re used to, ones
When it comes to class notes, we all know that students would much rather get the teacher’s notes or PowerPoints than write their own for lots of reasons. They’re getting the content straight from the expert. It makes note-taking less work, and they don’t have
Abrami, P. C., Bernard, R. M., Borokhovski, E., Wade, A., Surkes, M. A., Tamim, R., & Zhang, D. (2008). Instructional interventions affecting critical thinking skills and dispositions: A stage 1 meta-analysis. Review of Educational Research, 78(4), 1102-1134.
To develop critical skills in students in a course,
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The imperative “Help Students Get the Dictionary Habit” is one of the headings in the 2001 edition of John C. Bean's book Engaging Ideas, specifically in a chapter called “Helping Students Read Difficult Texts.” Bean goes on to describe the importance of annotating unfamiliar words. Students, he says, should keep a dictionary nearby as they read. Today, of course, students have ready access to dictionaries through their electronic devices. My own institution (and many others, I imagine) offers students and faculty free access to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED). Access to a first-class dictionary, in short, is not a problem for today's budding critical readers.
What is more, I have always enjoyed having students look up words to flesh out usage as we critique texts. After all, “Helping Students Read Difficult Texts” is essentially a mandate in Temple University's Intellectual Heritage Program, where I teach. To this end, I have always thought that I teach the “Dictionary Habit” pretty well. In fact, as a dictionary enthusiast who occasionally peruses the OED for fun, I have taken special pleasure in emphasizing the fundamental importance of the dictionary to critical reading.
A recent student email, however, got me thinking. The email was in regard to Jane Jacobs's The Death and Life of Great American Cities, which was to be included on a final exam the following day. In part, the student wanted to know about Jacobs's use of the phrase “dwelling density.” “What are dwellings?” asked the student. Why had the student not used the OED or another dictionary to answer that question? I speculated that because the email had come the night before an exam, the student may have wanted to know my thoughts, especially in light of having to potentially answer a question on dwelling density that I had composed. A practical surmise. Still, the student's question served as a catalyst, and I began to wonder about my approach to teaching the Dictionary Habit. Had I made it too much about me?
As I reflected on how I encourage students to use the dictionary, I realized that I was often the driving force. In certain instances, direct instructor guidance makes sense, such as when the class is on the verge of a key critical reading lesson involving the historical contextual importance of a single word. For instance, Mary Wollstonecraft's use of the verb “sophisticate” in a passage of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman may well puzzle a reader who assumes he or she knows what the word means. Only after the reader has perused the OED's entry for “sophisticate, v.” and read the third definition does the gist of Wollstonecraft's sentence become clear.
I have begun to think, however, that apart from specific instances, I should have my students take more initiative in regard to lexical inquiries. Not infrequently I already have my students use their electronic devices to look up words, but also not infrequently I am the one who chooses the words that need clarification. If I want classroom dictionary use to be more organic, it would behoove me to design a short form that students would fill out, at least from time to time, before coming to class. The form would ask students to identify two or three words from the day's reading that they annotated and looked up because the denotations were not wholly clear from the context. The students would write down the definitions they had decided were most applicable, noting the dictionary from which the definitions had come. I could bring several examples from the students' forms into class discussion. In this way, the students themselves would be providing the impetus for our lexical inquiries, at least much of the time.
