FACULTY TEACHING EXCELLENCE PROGRAM GUIDE

Written by

Ms. Amita Marwha

Faculty Department of Economics

Isabella Thoburn College

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

Changes curently witnessed across the entire field of education are impacting a far

reaching population at both institutional and individual practitioner levels. The

relentless evolution of new information and communication technologies and the

emergence of freely accessible social software on the Web have been instrumental

in repurposing the manner in which pedagogy is conceived and delivered in

schools, colleges, and universities.

Change is therefore an important process to manage effectively for the future

success of education.Higher education is going through a reinventing phase a kind

of transformation in which effectiveness, relevance and very exisistence of

graduadtion and post graduation courses are being questioned. These courses are

struglling and falling short in filling the gap between higher education and

employbility. This gap seems to be widening day by day as a result at the tactical

level the quality of higher eduction is suffering in India.if indian education system

will not redifine itself it will be reduced to a monotonous exercise which wil result

in empty classes.

Student’s who have most of the access to the so called knoweledge at the click of

the button. Now the question is why student should come to the class? For that

there has to be some innovative out of box pedagogy adopted by the faculty in its

day to day routine apart from just imaprting routine lecturers. Every faculty should

strive for excellence. It will not be able to contribute to the young minds if it will

not invent and reinvent itself, continuously, persistently to achieve excellence.

This guide for teachers will help them in their self assessment and will guide them

how to communicate with their student effectively, figuring out there own

limitations while reaching out to the students, and in the process overcoming those

limitations.

Example: Getting Feedback on Your Teaching:

The One-Minute Paper

Q. What is the One-Minute Paper?

A. The One-Minute Paper is a brief, anonymous feedback instrument given

randomly during the semester. It can be administered several times during the

semester at the end of any class. It supplies you with a local response to that day's

course material.

For the One-Minute Paper, simply dictate these two questions to your

students:

1. What is the most important information that you have learned in today's class

period?

2. What question about the material in today's class is uppermost in your mind?

Q. When should I administer the One-Minute Paper?

A. Use of the One-Minute Paper is appropriate whenever your goal is to check

comprehension and effectiveness of your presentation of material. Responses

might point to terminology that wasn't understood, or a comment might suggest a

more complex concern.

Q. What benefits derive from giving the One-Minute Paper?

A. Normally, you receive student feedback on their instructional methods and

choices only well after the end of a semester .By that time, of course, it is too late

to apply anything learned from student ratings to the teaching of the particular

course from which they originated.

The One-Minute Paper, on the other hand, provides reactions to the class and your

teaching that can be applied during the same semester. In addition, it is a very

time-efficient method. Even in the largest classes it takes just a few minutes to scan

through the papers looking for patterns of responses. Students perceive that you

care about teaching and care about their opinions.

Purpose of this guide is not to teach a teacher how to teach but laying down a

ground work on which teacher can create his or her own building through their

own knowledge, creativity, personality and perseverance.

Chapter 2

CHALLENGES BEFORE HIGHER EDUCATION

EXCELLENCE

Accredited institutions -As of March 2010, NAAC had rated 62% of the universities and 90% of the colleges as average (B) or below average (C) on specified quality parameters.

Faculty shortage — 40% and 35% shortage of faculty in state and central universities, respectively

Low citation impact — India’s relative citation impact being half the world average

EQUITY

There is wide disparity in the GER of higher education across states and the GAR* in urban and rural areas, and gender-and community-wise.

Inter-state disparity — 47.9% in Delhi vs 9% in Assam

Urban-rural divide — 30% in urban areas vs 11.1% in rural areas

Differences across communities —14.8% for OBCs, 11.6% for SCs, 7.7% for STs and 9.6% for Muslims expansion

Gender disparity —15.2% for females vs19% for males

EXPANSION

India’s GER of16% was much below the world average of 27%, as well as that of other emerging countries such as China (26%) and Brazil (36%) in 2010.

EMPLOYBALITY

Only 13% of Indian educated class is employable.most of the students lack soft skills, or do not have access to quality educaton.

CHAPTER 3

PEDAGOGY

Competency-Based EducationCompetency Based Education

What is it?

Competency-based learning refers to systems of instruction, assessment, grading,

and academic reporting that are based on students demonstrating that they have

learned the knowledge and skills that they are expected to learn as they progress

through their education.

At the college level, competency based education may entail prospective adult

students receiving academic credit for knowledge and skills they acquired in their

former careers-an approach that can reduce tuition costs and accelerate their

progress towards earning a degree.

Why is it needed?

Competency based education is required for effective learning and development

by identifying the behaviors, knowledge, skills and abilities that are necessary for

successful performance in a career/job. Teachers can assess student’s competencies

and develop strategies accordingly.

Competencies support learning by:

Focusing learning on the critical competencies needed for success in the

career chosen.

Providing standards for measuring student’s performance and capabilities.

Providing the framework for identifying learning

options/curriculum/programs to meet student and institutional needs.

Supporting effective forecasting of institution, as well as project-related

learning requirements.

Providing standards for determining how well learning has occurred, both at

the individual and institutional level.

What will it lead to?

Competency-based learning ensures that more students learn what they are

expected to learn.

The approach can also provide educators with more detailed or fine-grained

information about student learning progress, which can help them more

precisely identify academic strengths and weakness, as well as the specific

concepts and skills students have not yet mastered.

Academic progress is often tracked and reported by learning standard in

competency-based courses and schools, educators and parents often know

more precisely what specific knowledge and skills students have acquired or

may be struggling with. For example, instead of receiving a letter grade on

an assignment or test, each of which may address a variety of standards,

students are graded on specific learning standards, each of which describes

the knowledge and skills students are expected to acquire

How to conduct Competency based education?

Some basic characteristics of CBE are:

Different type of teaching methods and aids are used

Adequate material ,space and equipment are available

Each student’s programme is individualized and self placed

Learning activity is repeated/reinforced until competence is achieved

Individual student records are maintained and should reflect his/her progress

Continuous and detailed feedback is given to students on their progress

Students ‘rating will reflect the level of competence achieved

Some of the common benchmark competency-based practices in learning and

development are:

1. Identify and/or develop competencies that define the broader outcomes for young

people in college community. This might include grouping Common Core State

Standards into “habits of mind” or 21st century skills. No matter which

competencies you use, make sure that educators and learners are familiar with the

rubrics that are being used to assess them.

2. Foster active and engaged inquiry through a project-based approach to the

competencies. Here, the key is to design a project that scaffolds learning for

students but also embeds authentic assessments that allow them to demonstrate

their growing knowledge and skills.

3. The  four common concepts can help structure this type of inquiry- and project-

based learning: Investigate the World, Recognize Perspectives, Communicate

Ideas, and Take Action Collaboratively and regularly look at student work for

evidence of proficiency in the competencies. This requires continuous evaluation

which focuses on what competencies students are demonstrating and how, by

focusing on observation of evidence rather than interpretation into a grade. The

process creates a shared understanding of what proficiency looks like when

students demonstrate it, and more relevant feedback on what the student needs to

do to progress towards it

Calibrated Peer Review

What?

Calibrated Peer Review (CPR) is a web-based, instructional tool that enables

frequent writing assignments in any discipline, with any class size, even in large

classes with limited instructional resources.

CPR offers instructors the choice of creating their own writing assignments or

using the existing assignments in the rapidly-expanding central assignment library.

Although CPR stems from a science-based model, it has the exciting feature that it

is discipline independent and level independent. CPR has been adopted in

undergraduate and graduate institutions, in professional medical and business

schools, and even in secondary schools.

Calibrated Peer Review (CPR) melds the pedagogy of ‘writing-across-the-

curriculum’ with the process of academic peer review. This web-based,

instructional tool can be used in any discipline with any class size. The 10-year

track record of the first version shows CPR adopted in over a thousand institutions,

in undergraduate and graduate programs, in professional medical and business

schools, and even in secondary schools. Faculty in small private schools through

large state universities have integrated CPR assignments in over 5000 courses.

Why?

Faculty recognizes that CPR provides an opportunity to teach students using the

higher-order thinking skills required in writing and reviewing processes. In a

Calibrated Peer Review assignment, students not only learn their discipline by

writing, they also learn and practice critical thinking by evaluating calibration

submissions and authentic submissions from their peers. Throughout each part of

an assignment they gain a deeper understanding of the topic.

What does CPR entail?

A student encounters three components in each CPR assignment: Writing,

Calibration Training, and Peer Review

1. Students first write and submit an essay on a topic and in a format specified by the

instructor.

2. Training to evaluate comes next. Students assess three 'calibration' submissions

against a detailed set of questions that address the criteria on which the assignment

is based. Students individually evaluate each of these calibration submissions

according to the questions specified by the rubric and then assign a holistic rating

out of 10. Feedback at this stage is vital. If the evaluations are poorly done and

don’t yet meet the instructor’s expectations, the students get a second try. The

quality of the evaluations is taken into account in the next step evaluation of real

submissions from other students.

3. Once the deadline for calibration evaluations is passed, each student is given

anonymous submissions by three other students. They use the same rubric to

evaluate their peers’ work, this time providing comments to justify their evaluation

and rating. Poor calibration performance decreases the impact of the grades they

give to their peers’ work. After they’ve done all three they evaluate their own

submission.

Once all the reviews are done, each student gets their grade, which includes the

peer reviewers’ evaluation and comments, their own performance on the

calibration training, and the quality of the reviews of their peers’ work and their

own submission. Students also get to see the reviews submitted by the two other

reviews of the submissions they reviewed, giving them a better sense of how good

their evaluations were.

What does the instructor need to do? Basically, design the assignment and create

the calibration submissions and the grading rubric. A number of premade

assignments are available to be used or modified, or just used as guides for creation

of a new one. These models are really helpful, because the 'calibration submissions'

need to be carefully designed to allow students to learn to identify the errors. An

instructor also needs to set up the grading criteria for the assignment, weighting the

various components in a way that is consistent with the goals of the course. And

finally, the instructor needs to handle problems that may arise if there are

defaulting students or inconsistent grading.

CPR allows instructors to spend their time effectively on teaching and adjudicating

the few student submissions that require the more advanced expertise that only

they bring to the classroom. It is a much more rewarding and effective use of time.

The minimum system requirements for CPR, as well as additional

recommendations for running our software.

Hardware

Dual Intel Xeon 3.2 GHz processors

4 GB of RAM or more (16 GB recommended)

136 GB or larger hard drive (we use SCSI RAID with a hot spare for peace of

mind)

CD-ROM drive

Ethernet adapter (1000 Mbits/sec Intel)

SuperVGA (1024x768) or higher resolution video adapter

Keyboard and mouse

Software

Microsoft Windows 2003 Server (Standard or Enterprise Edition) with Service

Pack 1 installed

Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Standard or Enterprise Edition

Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 SP1 or later

Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) 5.0 or later and ASP.NET 2.0 or later

To insure reliability you may want to consider things like:

RAID storage for hard drive fault tolerance and hot spare setup

dual power supplies

anti-virus software

uninterruptible power supply (UPS) plugged into an emergency power source

Games and Learning

 Games which are explicitly designed with  educational purposes, or which have

incidental or secondary educational value. All types of games may be used in an

educational environment. Educational games are games that are designed to help

people to learn about certain subjects, expand concepts, reinforce development,

understand an historical event or culture, or assist them in learning a skill as they

play.

Game types include board, card and video games An educational game is a game

designed to teach humans about a specific subject and to teach them a skill. As

educators, governments, and parents realize the psychological need and benefits of

gaming have on learning, this educational tool has become mainstream. Games are

interactive play that teaches us goals, rules, adaptation, problem solving,

interaction, all represented as a story. They give us the fundamental needs of

learning by providing - enjoyment, passionate involvement, structure, motivation,

ego gratification, adrenaline, creativity, social interaction and emotion.

Games have five major characteristics: conflict, control, closure, contrivance, and

competency. Games encourage active learning, interaction between multiple

people, encourage team work, and also provide a free environment that allows for

skill enhancement. Games based learning provides versatility for more than one

learning style, and also can affect cognitive and psychomotor skills. While learning

through games can be very effective, they can become a distraction, causing them

to become too focused on the game and not on learning. It describes an approach to

teaching, where students explore relevant aspect of games in a learning context

designed by teachers. Teachers and students collaborate in order to add depth and

perspective to the experience of playing the game.

Good game-based learning applications can draw us into virtual environments that

look and feel familiar and relevant. 

Within an effective game-based learning environment, we work toward a goal,

choosing actions and experiencing the consequences of those actions along the

way. We make mistakes in a risk-free setting, and through experimentation, we

actively learn and practice the right way to do things. This keeps us highly engaged

in practicing behaviors and thought processes that we can easily transfer from the

simulated environment to real life. 

While similar, gamification   is a different breed of learning experience. It takes

game elements (such as points, badges, leader boards, competition, achievements)

and applies them to a non-game setting. It has the potential to turn routine,

mundane tasks into refreshing, motivating experiences.

Some benefits of using Game-Based Learning

Get students attention. Students easily engaged to game activities due to

their willingness in playing.

Students get a positive experience about learning. The use of games

encourages students to keep learning and to erase the idea that learning is

boring.

Rememorize concepts or facts. Activities such as solving a crossword or

alphabet soup are activities more engaging than a regular test. Prepare some

contests such as “Who wants to be a millionaire” or “The wheel of fortune”.

Encourage students to work in teams to achieve the goal where

their knowledge is the clue to succeed.

Reinforce and consolidate knowledge in a friendly environment. The

most effective way to turn content in something meaningful is to find out

where and when to use it. With games students can reinforce and consolidate

their knowledge through practicing and getting reward for their

achievements.

Understand the consequences of our choices. Using games enables users

to understand the consequences of their choices. In other words, the

students learn through experiences, through trial and error. Games offer a

safety environment to test and learn through mistakes so the information

becomes meaningful when students understand its use.

Conclusion

Games can be your best ally to turn the information in meaningful content. You do

not have to throw away your traditional methods and use only game-based

learning. Instead try to merge traditional methods with the new ones to make your

classes more engaging so students get a positive experience of the learning process.

Pedagogy adopted with the post Graduate students of economics was the mixture

of the above given techniques and the results were astoundingly positive and got

whole hearted support of the students.

1. Number of group discussion was conducted by me as an incharge of

activities in the P.G department of Economics.detailed case study is given

below.

Moderator guide

1. Call the group to order and welcome participants.

2. No of participants - nine to twelve.

3. Time limit- The entire session will be of one hour. Group will be given 45

minute to discuss the topic.

4. RULES

one person speaks at a time rather than talking over one another;

the moderator will actively look for everyone to participate, with no one person

dominating the conversation;

No one person’s comments will be singled out or tied back to that person at the

end of the discussion.

5. Ask for each person to briefly introduce themselves,

6. Topic of the Group Discussion -Is Lap top distribution and unemployment allowances a short sighted political gimmick to cover up the glaring unemployment problem in Uttar Pradesh?Today’s topic of discussion is very relevant to all of us present here. As I see in front of me young people sitting who will be going out very soon and look for jobs. Now I will ask the group to begain the discussion. In Uttar Pradesh, the jobless get money. Not jobs

7. Open with a general topic question as a warm-up, sometimes a "what if" question

Cabinet meeting on 15 March to obtain its approval for giving an allowance of Rs

1,000 per month to every jobless youth in the state.

Government will add an additional recurring burden of Rs 2,000 crore on the

state, even as Uttar Pradesh reels under an accumulated debt burden of close to Rs

2 lakh crore as on 31 March.

Instead of adding to a burden of over Rs 16,000 crore in annual debt servicing

obligations, the government could have done well to fill over 5 lakh sanctioned

government posts lying vacant in various departments. This includes 2.18 lakh

posts of police personnel, 2.78 lakh teachers’ posts in government- run primary,

upper primary and secondary schools, besides 6,000 sanctioned posts of doctors

and over 1,000 para-medical staff, including nurses.

“Recruitment against vacant posts will not be an unforeseen burden as the

appointed persons will draw salary and allowances from the treasury,” says a

senior official of the finance department on condition of anonymity

Against the sanctioned strength of 191 police personnel per lakh people, as many

as 116 posts are lying vacant. of the total 58,794 sanctioned posts of head

constables, 44,177 are vacant. of 2.5 lakh posts for constables, as many as 1.62

lakh remain unfilled. Important wings like the Special Task Force and anti-

terrorist squad are also crippled by a paucity of staff.

The health department too fares no better. Against the total sanctioned 14,103

posts for doctors, as many as 5,621 are vacant. Close to 7,000 posts for medical

staff such as pharmacists, lab technicians, x-ray technicians, auxiliary nurse

midwives and basic health workers are also waiting to be filled.

“The tentative cap on age is 35 years but it could also be higher and the age limit

will ultimately decide the number of beneficiaries, which is expected to be around

10 lakh,” says Shailesh Krishna, principal secretary of the labour department.

Uttar Pradesh’s employment exchanges, which come under the labour

department, register every person above age 14 in a job queue, who become

eligible only at 18. The list includes the illiterate as well as those with degrees in

technical education.

8. Thank respondents for participating and now I would like to call Dr A. srivasrtava to

share some words.

Topic of the Group Discussion

Is Lap top distribution and unemployment allowances a short sighted political gimmick to cover up the glaring unemployment problem in Uttar Pradesh?

The parameters on the basis of which the candidates will be judged by the evaluators are

Name of

the

candidate

Content

The moderator would like

to understand how well-

versed you are with the

knowledge relevant to the

topic.

Communication

1. Correctly conveying

what you want to say

2. Listening

3. Language

Group behaviour

Deals with style, manners

and body language of the

aspirants. It is evaluated

to what extent the

aspirant is a team player

Leadership skills

giving vision to the

group and aligning

group members to this

vision through positive

motivation.

Many other activities like desert survivial was conducted by me.purpose was

to bring out team work and weather students can work to strenthen team or

to weaken team amd weather they have good communicative skills and

analytical power.

Conlusion:

Holistic development of students is the need of the hour.along with syllabus

studies students should be engaged in field work as well as in the activities

which bring out their hidden talents.students profile in which each and every

students progress report along with their internal assesment test marks

should be made for individual students and record have to be updated with

one on one conversation with the students sharing with them their progress.