You tell me and I forget,
You teach me and I remember,
You involve me and I learn.,
Ben Franklin |
Before 1990, I usually taught 1 course a semester, after 1990, 2 courses a
semester except for the periods of faculty research fellowships and research
grant buyouts.
For the last seven years while at the University of Colorado at Denver (UCD)
students evaluated my courses at the level that varied from A to A+ with the
average 3.9 (out of 4.0). These grades reflect students appreciation of my highly
interactive teaching methodology when they do almost everything themselves. This
appreciation is even more valuable because it was shown despite heavy load that
students experience in my classes. In 1995, the College of Engineering and
Applied Science at UCD in recognition of my teaching awarded me title of
Outstanding Faculty. This award is given as a result of secret vote of all the
college students In 1996 students submitted my name for inclusion in the Who's
Who Among American Teachers, The Best Teachers in America selected by the Best
Students.
My classes are very dynamic in nature and can often take on an air of
entertainment with spirited interaction among the students, and myself. All the
students say it is a very enjoyable and learning experience. It should be taken
into account that the subject I teach can be difficult for students to comprehend
at times and not always entertaining.
I have been teaching since 1978 (beginning in Russia) and have always stressed
active student involvement. This high degree of involvement, the class
'entertainment', has been achieved only in the USA. The explanation is very
simple the shortage of technical means in Russia. There was a shortage of
overhead projectors, virtually total absence of transparency paper and
restrictive rules for using copying machines. It is very hard to achieve this
type of student involvement without total use of modern equipment, especially the
overhead projector. Obviously, preparation and permanent update of hundreds of
slides and handouts requires a very heavy use of a copying machine and publishing
quality printers.
My philosophy and method of teaching is that students should make 'discoveries'
for themselves while the teacher should only guide them in a right direction.
I ask students not to take notes during lectures in class and assure that they
will get a complete set of lecture notes of the covered material after each
class. (This set is a hard copy or just a file on the web page.) Then I show one
or two slides with theoretical ideas and initiate the discussion. Beginning as
questions between the students and myself, the discussion usually continues
between students themselves (of course, under my control) and results into the
development of numerous examples on the board. Students write on the board
themselves; sometimes two or three of them are at the board simultaneously. They
often compete for the privilege to go to the board and discuss their writing with
the entire class. I often assume the role of an ordinary student, though maybe a
little bit more knowledgeable than others. Students cannot get away even with a
little mistake the class carefully follows (or usually controls) their every
step.
My first role is that of a conductor of the discussion. Sometimes it is necessary
to intrude to restore order, but often the discussion is so intense that I have
to make efforts to do so. My second role is to follow every step of the
discussion (derivation, generation, and so on), and if the class or presenter
passed this step successfully to show the slide with the details of this step on
the screen (just for comparison). These slides keep students' thoughts in order
and create a framework for any subsequent discussions. Students often feel that
they have made significant discoveries, thus giving them the capacity to handle
this difficult material.
Very rarely it happens that after a long discussion the class failed to make the
right step but still does not believe it despite of my careful critical remarks.
In this case I usually postpone showing the right track on screen and give them a
chance to continue, meet the failure, and start from the very beginning.
Sometimes it is necessary to refer to the previous steps of derivation, previous
problems or definitions. In this case students often themselves pick the slide
needed from the pile of slides shown before and show on screen. Often they
project the statement of the problem or drawing directly on the board and develop
a solution by rewriting or correcting the projection. After every class my
transparencies prepared for this class are in total disorder because almost every
slide has been used (and reused) by me, and, most importantly, by the students.
This methodology generates a very creative research climate in class. Even during
the breaks students often cannot stop thinking, the discussion continues, and I
eagerly participate. Students feel that they discover everything themselves. Many
times students invite their friends and even relatives to attend (with my
permission, of course) one or two of my classes, and even participate in the
discussions.
At the end of each class I handout (or refer to the web file) copies of all the
slides shown during class and new homework assignment (once a week). After the
second class students usually themselves pick these handouts from my desk without
my announcement. Obviously, these handouts contain detailed solutions to all the
problems being solved in class. (That is why I do not give them available before
the class.)
I accept late submissions of the homework assignments with '10% discount', and
this discount does not grow while time goes. I even accept resubmissions. I
always require that students complete their homework, and accept it even with
one or two-month delay, because it is a very important part of the course. Some
of these assignments include very hard problems and even problems that have not
been solved yet, which is not stated in the assignment. I disclose this fact some
time later giving students a chance to apply their fresh unbounded talent to the
new problem domain. Of course, for solution of this type of problems I give them
an extra credit.
Usually, I give midterm and final exams that consist of 3-4 problems. All my
exams are open-book, and students can have textbooks and handouts available. I
always explain that they have to learn in class during our mutual daily
discoveries or directly at the board and deepen their knowledge doing the time
consuming homework assignments, and clarify all the uncertainties either in class
or in my office. Shuffling pages of textbooks on an exam is just wasting the
time, and never helps.
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