I came across this today – it’s not new – but if you’ve ever questioned the efficacy of the Lecture as instructional technology, have a look:
Twenty terrible reasons for lecturing.
Worth remembering: “A heavy workload and a lack of freedom in learning is associated with students taking a surface as opposed to a deep approach.”
1. If students didn’t have as many lectures they’d learn less.
1.1 “Lectures should last an hour. If I can stay awake for an hour, so can they”.
1.2 “Its the only way to make sure the ground is covered”.
1.3 “Lectures are the best way to get facts across”.
1.4 “Lectures are the best way to get students to think”.
1.5 “Lectures are inspirational: they improve students’ attitudes towards the subject, and students like them”.
1.6 “Lecturers make sure that students have a proper set of notes”.
1.7 “Students are incapable of, or unwilling to, work alone, so its good for them to have full timetables”.
1.8 “The criticisms one can make of lecturing only apply to bad lecturing”.
1.9 “The value of lectures can only be judged in the context of other teaching and learning activities which make up the course”.
2. Why is there so much lecturing going on?
2.1 We are ignorant
2.1.1 We are ignorant of the evidence about the effectiveness of lectures
2.1.2 We are ignorant of alternatives to lectures.
2.2 We are overworked
2.2.1 Alternatives to lectures may appear to involve more work
2.2.2 Changes take time to introduce
2.3 There is a shortage of resources
2.3.1 There is a shortage of books
2.3.2 There is a shortage of other learning resources
2.4 Our attitudes obstruct change – we use lectures as a coping strategy
2.5 There are institutional constraints which support lecturing:
2.5.1 in the way teaching hours are counted;
2.5.2 in the relationship between individual courses
2.6 Course validation and other external forces often support lecturing
2.7 We don’t know how to design courses
