CELT | Good Practice Exchange
Transcript for Research Informed Teaching with Sam Illingworth
“My name is Sam Illingworth, Dr Illingworth, and I am a lecturer in Science Communication and what I have been doing recently is with my colleague Jenny Blake at the University of Manchester we've been investigating the role of the expert. So this based on some of Dweck’s work on mindset. So, particularly, if you have an expert at the front of the classroom verses a facilitator at the front of the classroom what effect does that have and what differences are there between the two of them.
We have done this in multiple of different ways and one of the ways that we have done it is by looking at soft skills workshops so things like time management, argument construction, critical thinking and presentational skills, that kind of stuff. So what we have done is we've run one workshop with a expert-led approach and one workshop with a facilitator-led approach and then we are gathering the feedback and we are doing that for a number of workshops so we can compare and contrast and see whether the students learn more, learn less, learn differently and really just trying to explore this different research area to see what the effect is.Then we are also working with academics at MMU and the University of Manchester effectively to parachute in a couple of these facilitator led approaches to their teaching and delivery so see what effect, if any, it has on their courses without changing too many of the variables to that we have a valid scientific experiment because at my heart I am still a scientist.
The reason why we wanted to explore this is that mainly I actually hate the sound of my own voice so when I am in the lecture I'd far rather in a lecture or a seminar or a tutorial or whatever, I would much rather the students work experimentally, work with each other to develop their own patterns to find out what they want to find out.and my role really is just a facilitator. I am not an expert. I don't have all the answers rally to anything. I've got a few answers to a couple of questions that are probably not that useful but what I am there for is to be able to help provide structure and to be able to ask the right questions. So, why I really wanted to this study is because I think it is important, certainly with soft skills, that students already know the answers, they already know how to manage time effectively, they know how to communicate, they know how to work as a team, but my role as a facilitator is to help put that out and to show them 'Look,you know how to do that, you have this required skill set, just demonstrate amongst one another and find out from one another your experiences on that particular issue'.
I think, hopefully, the research will show that the facilitator let approach leads to more interesting forms of learning and basically, I am hoping to reinforce what I already do and to effectively put some pedagogic theory behind and reasoning behind my personal choices in teaching. So when I am developing in a more facilitator-led approach there will be some literature now, I mean, obviously there is already literature on the subject but there is a specific study then that I had done and that I had been involved with as to why I'm teaching in this particular manner.
"I will give you three or four minutes to come up with an idea and to nominate someone in the group to them feedback that idea and there are prizes for the most original idea and the idea I like the most. So you have three minutes to come up with ... £5, five English pounds to spend on whatever you what that will bring you the most enjoyment, how would you spend that £5?"
The whole process is quite interesting and we don't really know what is going to happen. I have a suspicion that it may be that the expert-led approach is just as valid as the facilitator-led an approach but that in and off itself is a result because what we have been very careful to do not to have a expert-led with a very different teaching style to a facilitator-led.
And I think the most important thing with any of this is that is just going to enable me and my colleagues it is just going to enable me and my colleagues reflect on our own teaching practices. What we doing is ever so slowly moving forward, assessing ourselves, reflecting, how have we moved forward, why have we moved forward, how will that effect our student, why will it affect our students and looking at it in a personal level, an institutional level and beyond and I think it is a really great opportunity for me and my colleagues to look at our own practice and test out a few ideas and ultimately to benefit students and ourselves s and our future students as well.”