Objective: In recent years, the trend in medical education has been to utilize clerkship settings outside the medical school. Subsequently, students rotate at distant sites from the main campus and have lectures of varying quantity and quality. The objective of the present study was to standardize the core didactic experience for students in the…

In her Des English Memorial Lecture, the author provides some commentary on the changes that have occurred during her career in relation to the field of special education. In the 25 years that she has worked as an educator and been involved in special education in one way or another, there have been very significant and fundamental changes of…

Laboratory demonstration, as well as biochemistry lecture, has been used to complement explanation of biochemical processes. The laboratory demonstration is very useful in teaching biochemistry to students who lack background in biology. The experimental model of fibrinolysis described here presents a complex biological reaction in simplified…

In this article students' understanding of trigonometric functions in the context of two college trigonometry courses is investigated. The first course was taught by a professor unaffiliated with the study in a lecture-based course, while the second was taught using an experimental instruction paradigm based on Gray and Tall's (1994) notion of…

Introductory biology courses for pre-professional majors at large universities are usually high-enrollment lectures with associated labs that complement the lecture, but are independently taught and administered. Although web-based instructional formats have become popular alternatives to traditional lectures, it is unknown how these formats…

The following research is the result of frustrations involving teaching carpentry students who display little interest in learning within a classroom environment; however, often the same students excel in a laboratory (kinesthetic/hands-on) situation. Learning style surveys were given and nearly ninety percent of the students within this program…

This article explores the synergy that can be created when concept-mapping techniques are used in collaboration with the construction of PowerPoint presentations to increase the richness of the learning experience. Some weaknesses of the typical PowerPoint format are highlighted with a description of how they can be overcome through a more…

Biology students in their first year at university have difficulty understanding the abstract concepts of photosynthesis. The traditional didactic lecture followed by practical exercises that show various macroscopic aspects of photosynthesis often do not help the students visualise or understand the submicroscopic (molecular-level) reactions that…

Lecture is a common presentation style that gives instructors a lot of control over topics and time allocation, but can limit active student participation and learning. This article presents some ideas to increase the level of student involvement in lecture. The examples and suggestions are based on the author's experience as a senior lecturer for…

Classes of 100 students or more are not uncommon in higher education. With such large enrollments, it can be difficult for instructors to integrate active learning components to the traditional lecture format typically adopted in such large classes. To help address this problem, Johnny El-Rady discusses his use of an electronic classroom voting…

Variation in teaching techniques was examined among instructors based on their status (full-time vs. part-time) and educational level (doctorate vs. nondoctorate). To facilitate this study, a survey instrument was developed and distributed to 400 randomly selected faculty members employed at the two largest institutions, Community Colleges X and…

This paper discusses how the rise in numbers of non-native English speaking students in British universities has consequences for lecturers trying to be understood by heterogeneous audiences. Although listeners may be invited to ask questions, there are linguistic, psychological, and sociocultural pressures on non-native students that can deter…

Lectures have a place in educational history and even a place in today's classroom, but students must be exposed to more than one style of teaching. After 20 minutes of listening to a lecture, most students reach a saturation point. To realize their maximum potential, students must do more than just listen in the classroom. They must engage in…

Two studies compared strategies used to improve listening skills in business communication settings. The first study analyzed the effect of discussion length and incentive level on the ability of 347 business communication students placed in differing discussion and incentive groups to identify main points in 22 short, recorded dialogs. Results…

A study was conducted to compare the effectiveness of using the television lecture series "Introducing Biology" to traditional lecture techniques in a college-level Animal Biology course. The interest levels and subject course mastery of three groups of students were compared: (1) a control group who attended two 50-minute lectures per week; (2)…