CRI - Teaching Through Research Workshop - Alan Jenkins - linking Teaching to Research

Task! Introducing the session … Sit in groups of 2-3

Ensure you have session handout

Private discussion

What do you understand by ‘Research

based learning’?

What do you think research reveals about

teaching/research relations in universities?

Implementing Research Based Learning in your Teaching

Alan Jenkins

Emeritus Professor Oxford Brookes University : advisor to HEA on teaching /research links and QAA Scotland on

the Teaching Research Nexus Enhancement Theme

http://www.enhancementthemes.ac.uk/themes/ResearchTeaching/

Aims

• Clarified your view on the current relationship between (staff/faculty

) research and student learning in your current and future role(s),

courses, discipline and in your department /institution

• Considered a range of discipline based and department

wide case studies

• Considered how you could develop ‘research based learning

in your courses –at undergraduate level/or at postgraduate

level

• Explored how those relationships could be more ‘effectively’

constructed and/ or ‘managed’.

Alan Jenkins

Geography undergraduate at London UK and post grad Madison USA

Schoolteacher Canada and UK

Long taught geography /contemporary China studies mainly UK at

undergraduate level outside the research elite institutions

Moved into educational /faculty development and worked on

teaching /research relations . http://www.alanjenkins.info

Available from the HE Academy http://www.heacademy.ac.uk/rtnexus.htm

Mick Healey, Alan Jenkins and John LeaMarch 2014

Developing research-based curricula in college-based higher education

http://www.heacademy.ac.uk/college-based-he/research-based-curricula

Teaching and Research :An Ideal view

 “Universities should treat learning as

not yet wholly solved problems and

hence always in research mode.”

Wilhelm von Humboldt on the then

future University of Berlin (1810)

Teaching and Research : Two contemporary views

"The research universities have often failed, and continue to fail

their undergraduate populations, thousands of students

graduate without seeing the world - famous professors or

tasting genuine research." University of Stony Brook (1998, 3)

Reinventing Undergraduate Education: Boyer Commission on

Educating Undergraduates in the Research University.

In Scholarship Reconsidered Ernest Boyer (1990, X11)

challenged US higher education to “break away out of the tired

old teaching versus research debate.”

Research evidence : ONE summary

Faculty find it hard to balance teaching and research roles

Undergraduate students often unaware of staff /faculty

research or its relevance to their concerns

At individual level limited ‘correlation’ staff research and

teaching effectiveness

At departmental and institutional levels little effective strategic

links between teaching and research

Students learning in active inquiry mode can have significant

positive impacts on understandings of knowledge complexity

Acting on the Research Evidence

“The aim is to increase the circumstances in which teaching and

research have occasion to meet….

Increase the skills of staff to teach emphasizing the

construction of knowledge by students rather than the

imparting of knowledge by instructors......

Ensure that students experience the process of artistic and

scientific productivity."

(Hattie and Marsh, 1996)

A ‘Language’ to Help Us Examine What We Do-see handout p 1-2

• Research-led: where students learn about research findings, the

curriculum content is strongly shaped by faculty research

interests/current research in the discipline.

• Research-oriented: where students learn about research

processes, the curriculum emphasises as much the processes by

which knowledge is produced as learning knowledge that has been

achieved, and faculty try to engender a research ethos through

their teaching; or

• Research-based: where students learn as researchers, the

curriculum is largely designed around inquiry-based activities, and

the division of roles between teacher and student is minimised.

• Research tutored ; where students supported by staff in small

group discuss current research ( papers) in their discipline.

Research-tutoredEngaging in research discussions

Research-basedStudents undertaking research and inquiry

Research-ledLearning about current research in the discipline

Research-orientedDeveloping research inquiry and techniques

STUDENT-FOCUSED

STUDENTS AS PARTICIPANTS

EMPHASIS ON RESEARCH CONTENT

EMPHASIS ON RESEARCH PROCESSES AND PROBLEMS

TEACHER-FOCUSED

STUDENTS AS AUDIENCE

Tasks :Using that typology/language

Consider the case study of geography at University College London , page 4-5

Don’t get lost in is this ‘good’ or ‘bad’ practice ? Let’s see it as ‘interesting practice’

Using the language of the handout page 1- 2 ; what forms of teaching /research links do you see there ? Research led ,research orientated , research based, and/or research tutored.

Small Group Task : Consider the case studies at course team level on the handout p2-4 (Ignore departmental case studies 4-5)

QUICKLY each of you choose a case study that

you think may be suitable for ADAPTING to your

practice /perhaps as developing in your project

Individually read your case study

Then share your views on adapting these case

studies to your future practice

You have till …..

: Course Design-see Section 4 pp 5-6

Which of these approaches might be relevant to your

future practice /developing through your project?

Strategy 1: Develop students’ understanding of the

role of research in their discipline

Strategy 2: Develop students’ abilities to carry out

research

Strategy 3: Progressively develop students’

understanding

Strategy 4: Manage students’ experience of research

Considering two Departmental case studies :UCL and Imperial pp 4-5

Just from the case studies :

Discuss what you see are the similarities and

the differences in the ways these two

departments handle the roles /relationships

between teaching and research ?

Your conclusions/forward planning

In your groups each of you state

ONE thing I am taking forward ( in my

project ) from this session

….

My conclusions

• Understanding the complexity of knowledge lies at

the centre of what makes HIGHER education distinctive

• That requires purposeful action at a variety of levels

• In one’s own teaching and to an extent at course team and

departmental level one does have some freedom of action to

ensure that your research in parts supports your teaching

• As you progress in your career then departmental and institutional

leaders can do much to ensure some synergies between teaching

and research

• Bringing your teaching and research more effectively together can

help you balance what can be competing demands on your time and

attention.

How your teaching can support your role as  a researcher.

• Research led teaching can make the two activities explicitly

linked in content .

• Research orientated teaching can help you reflect

/experiment in research methodologies

• Research based teaching can help you see these activities as

explicitly linked

• Making explicit to students the importance /value of

research to them –can help them better appreciate the

importance of faculty involvement in research