Practice makes progress
In this section, three assignments/activities and lesson plan are presented to demonstrate the teaching philosophy outlined on the homepage.
These assignments and activities are samples from different courses, including programming, data analytics in ecommerce and a career and project management activity that can be used across different kinds of business and programming courses.
Assignment & Syllabus Examples
Assignments
An Activity to connect student learning with the real world
The goal of this lesson activity is to engage students with an active learning activity that connects their learning to the real world beyond the classroom.
In my classroom, I would place this activity just after the midway point, after core concepts have been learned and students are able to have a more meaningful discussion about the workflow and roles involved in the process.
This reflects my teaching philosophy since students will have gained this knowledge from participating in many formative assessments and small group collaborative projects that are problem- or case-based. Therefore, students will have adopted approaches to problem-solving in a group before considering in this activity how that would look in an industry context.
Learning Objectives
Adult learners in a course to upskill in computer programming will be able to use effective communication skills to advocate for the resourcing needs of their assigned area of a project.
Activity Description
- Create small groups.
One technique I like to use is giving everyone a CTRL ALT or DELETE sticker on their nametag when they come in, and then later tell them they need to find their pair to make the triad. In this case, a similar approach can be used – perhaps hand each person a dice with only one number on it when they come in. Groups should be 4-5 people in size.
- Create role cards and have each student select a card.
Roles include project manager, technical journalist, QA, devops, programmer and agile coach. There should be more roles than people. This will force students to evaluate which roles they would like to have on their team to complete the scenario project and why.
- Hand out scenarios to each team, from the perspective of a "big tech" company problem to be solved.
Each scenario should include a variety of different tasks that are defined and must be completed in the project, a stated budget, the roles of leadership and the stakeholders on the project and a desired end goal and timeline for the project.
- Students will work together to decide how much time and budget each task will need and assess if they can complete the project with the roles they have chosen.
During this time, students cannot change roles. They can only advocate for why one area of work needs more or less time or budget to meet the desired goal. They can advocate for resources for themselves or for others to complete the project.
- Assessment 1: Formative, low-stakes group presentation of findings
- Assessment 2: Summative - A paper to be written by the group to present identified strengths and weaknesses of the group. They should also include a PESTEL or SWOT analysis for the project, company or team and should evaluate if they had the correct team for the project or if they would change the roles for the team in future.
· Assessment 3: Individual reflection – students should individually reflect on how well they advocated for their resource allocation and budget in the project scenario, and what they would do the same or differently in a similar scenario in future.
Alignment: Active Learning Technique & Desired Learning Objective
The desired learning objective involves Bloom (adapted) verbs like apply, execute and implement. Reading about aligning learning techniques and objectives, I discovered that activities like performances, prototyping, labs and simulations can be appropriate assessments for these verbs.
Justification (within disciplinary context)
My learning goal is to get students participating in the ways that projects, people and communication can happen in a workplace. For programmers, they are often prepared only to do work at their desk and it makes it difficult for them to integrate well into the broader company and move into leadership roles later. This scenario prepares them to contribute to the workplace in an appropriate way, developing necessary communication and negotiation skills to advocate for the needs of their projects.
In Business it is common to have cases for students to solve problems collaboratively for a complex topic and be able to explain their decisions and solutions. In computer programming itself it is perhaps more common to have labs for technical investigation or creation activities. I feel justified in bringing the Business approach over to soft skills training in technical subjects.
Assignment
aligned with learning goals, approached using backward design
The goal of this assignment is to provide the necessary grading criteria to ensure alignment with and measured achievement of the identified learning goals.
In my classroom, I would present this summative assessment and the components it involves at the beginning of the course, to allow students to understand the full arc of the course and the formative assessments of which the summative assessment will be composed. I would then return to this near the end of the course to prepare students to submit the final assignment.
This activity demonstrates the pragmatic approach I take in my classroom. Assignments and assessments are aligned not just with learning goals but with outcomes for career readiness in the technology industry. This summative assignment mimics industry project builds.
Learning Outcomes:
Understanding Ecommerce Concepts: Demonstrate comprehensive understanding of key concepts in ecommerce, including online sales channels, customer journey mapping, conversion optimization, and user experience design (UX).
Application of Analytics Tools: Apply various analytics tools and techniques to analyze and interpret data from ecommerce websites, (e.g. Google Analytics, heatmapping tools, and A/B testing).
Third-Party Applications: Successfully integrate third-party applications and tools into an ecommerce website to enhance functionality and improve UX.
Problem-Solving and Troubleshooting: Demonstrate the ability to identify and solve technical issues and challenges that arise during the development and integration process.
Effective Communication and Documentation: Effectively communicate design choices, integration strategies, and troubleshooting processes through written documentation.
Instructions:
Website Development: Develop a fully functional ecommerce website using a platform of your choice (e.g., WordPress, Shopify, Magento). The website should include essential features such as product catalog, shopping cart, user registration, and checkout process.
Select Third-Party Applications: Identify at least three third-party applications or integrations that can enhance the ecommerce website's functionality and UX. Justify your choices based on their relevance and potential benefits.
Implement Integrations: Integrate selected third-party applications into your ecommerce website, ensuring proper functionality and seamless UX. Document the integration process, including any challenges faced and solutions implemented.
Analyze and Optimize: Use analytics tools such as Google Analytics to track and analyze user behaviour on your ecommerce website. Apply data-driven insights to optimize website performance, UX and conversion rates. Provide a detailed analysis of your findings and optimizations.
Document: Create a comprehensive written report detailing design choices, integration strategies, troubleshooting processes, and optimization techniques employed. Include screenshots, diagrams, and relevant code snippets to support your explanations.
Grading Method and Criteria:
Website Functionality (25%): Website should include all essential features and demonstrate smooth functionality.
Third-Party Application Integration (25%): Integrations should be properly implemented and contribute to enhancing website functionality and UX.
Data Analysis and Optimization (25%): Analysis of user behaviour and optimization techniques should be comprehensive, insightful, and based on data-driven decisions.
Problem-Solving and Troubleshooting (15%): Reflect and describe how you solved any technical issues in the development process.
Documentation and Communication (10%): The written report should be well-structured, clear, and effectively communicate the design choices, strategies, and processes.
Justification for Assignment and Grading Method:
Students apply theoretical concepts from the course into a practical context. It requires understanding and navigating real-world challenges related to building an ecommerce site, ecommerce analytics and gaining hands-on experience with industry-standard tools.
The grading method aligns with the learning outcomes by assessing students on multiple dimensions of learning, including understanding of ecommerce concepts, ability to apply analytics tools, skills in integrating third-party applications, problem-solving abilities, and communication skills.
By combining practical implementation, data analysis, problem-solving, and documentation, this assignment provides a holistic evaluation of students' skills and knowledge, encouraging critical thinking, creativity, and collaboration while reinforcing the importance of effective communication in conveying technical concepts.
Overall, this assignment and grading
method promote active learning, practical application, and the development of
essential skills needed in the field of ecommerce analytics.
Lesson Plan
centred around an active learning technique
The goal of this learning activity is to create an activity prioritizing student engagement with a more inductive and active approach to a topic that is often presented deductively (for example, via a lecture).
In my classroom, this activity would happen in the earliest part of the instruction time, in the early weeks or the morning of a two-day workshop. This both introduces and models to students how the classroom will run and offers students a way to test their knowledge with each other about how to approach the process of scientific discovery and discover gaps in their own learning and understanding against peers' knowledge before coming to the larger group to further explore the topic and process.
This activity demonstrates my classroom approach both in offering multiple means of expression and engagement, but also in its focus on including adult learners who may be more used to discussions and meetings in the workplace than submitting essays to explore ideas.
Objective
By the end of this lesson, students should be able to:
- Identify the processes required to write a good hypothesis.
- Describe the essential components of a hypothesis: if, then, because.
- Apply the hypothesis method to a computer programming problem.
Lesson
In this computer programming lesson, students will create a STEM-style hypothesis about the next programmatic step that should be taken in a project already ongoing in the class (individual tutorial-style projects). Using think-pair-share as an active learning technique, students will be posed the question and then develop their own hypothesis before sharing with a classmate and comparing for gaps in their own thinking and strengths in their partner's thinking. Co-creating the hypothesis for the next step allows students to critically assess their project's current state and become engaged in the outcome.
Procedure
Preparation
Before beginning, the instructor explicitly describes what is expected during this exercise.
Discussion length and guidelines for conversation are given. Instructor tells students they will turn to their left for their pair.
Setting expectations allows students to effectively make use of the strategy.
Activity
- Instructor provides a specific question (e.g. Given x about the project, what is the next logical or necessary step for the program?).
- Think
(1-3 minutes)
Students will then stop and think to themselves what the answer is. Like in the Minute Papers, students should write down what they think, so that they cannot change their answer. - Pair
(5 minutes)
Students pair up.
Instructor asks students to share their answers with each other, and to discuss.
Students then discuss with each other. - Share
(15 minutes)
The class comes back together in their original seats and faces forward to the instructor.
One person from each pair should share what they discussed and explain if the answers they came up with were similar or different and how.
Classroom Design & Materials
One highlight for me with think-pair-share is it can be conducted in any classroom, including a lecture hall. Students need only listen to the instructor and face forward during the instruction and then turn in their seat to change focus to a peer on their left or right when they are in an auditorium.
However, in formulating a hypothesis, it may be helpful for students to have access to chart paper to stand in the aisle, or a classroom with whiteboards to use.
Reflection on Assignments: Grading
Reviewing my portfolio with peers and mentors for the final submission, I realized and it was reflected at me that the grading component of the assigned work does not reflect my standard grading practice. Instead, in the classroom, I usually have a pass/fail grading, which was originally demanded by the welfare institution NAV that provides programs for career transitioners to learn new skills like programming to re-enter the workforce. NAV mandates that courses only have a pass/not pass grading.
From this I worked together with industry partners providing project work with students to create feedback on the final project work instead, and then offer a graduation ceremony where students received a certificate and had a final social activity together.
I reflected on this during the portfolio creation and found research by Ruth Butler in an article called "Enhancing and undermining intrinsic motivation: The effects of task-inward and ego-involving evaluation on interest and performance" (1988) that says there is in fact no difference in student performance between classes where grades are given without feedback and those given feedback but no grades. The article calls out grades as ego-giving, and suggests instead to offer task-involved feedback, which had the added bonus of shifting focus from the person receiving a grade to the task that is being evaluated.
Future Direction
I found this article interesting in that it was able to articulate why the shift from grades to feedback can be effective. In future I aim to intentionally design course and task feedback in a way that serves students to iterate on their work in formative assessments and that then build to their success in summative assessments. Thinking back to my teaching philosophy and statement on feedback there, I hope to bring students to a place where they are able to evaluate the quality of both their own and their peers' work effectively and accurately by the end of the course or session.
During my reflection and colating of my portfolio, it was also recommended to me that I read Ungrading: Why Rating Students Undermines Learning (and What to Do Instead) (Teaching and Learning in Higher Education) by Alfie Kohn and Susan D. Blum. In this book, the recommender told me that it is found that self-assessments can be as good as teacher assessments, and I am interested in reading more about this and the research or evidence that may support this as a good practice in the classroom. In casual conversation, the lecturer recommending this book discussed with me that students are often well aware of their "level" in the course and the book supports the idea that students can therefore make this assessment well on their own.
Together, it would seem to me that Butler's article explores and describes why we should not use external motivators with students, as we also discussed in this course, and Ungrading may provide approaches to reduce those external motivators. Combined with Resnick's Play which I discussed in the main Teaching Philosophy and that drives forward the how of creating intrinsic motivation that drives deeper engagement and interest as well as better overall outcomes over time, I have a strong set of literature to guide me in developing the next iterations of my courses, syllabi and assignment design.