Small teaching was the theme of the Warwick Education Conference 2023. Small teaching examines the modest but powerful changes we can all make that lead to big enhancements for our students’ learning. After the conference, an informal programme ran supporting colleagues to make a small-scale change in their teaching or supporting learning practice.

Below are short (10 mins) nano-presentations sharing the changes that they implemented. They are asynchronous for you to watch at a time and place that suits you and we hope you feel inspired to make a small change in your own practice!

Small Changes in Teaching: The Last 5 Minutes of Class

Abigail Ball and Miriam Averna-Joint (Centre for Teacher Education)

Abstract:

In the article of the same title, Lang (2016) argues that making small changes to teaching practice can have a significant impact on student learning. They cite the technique of using the minute paper (Angelo and Cross, 1993) to ask students two questions in the last five minutes of a teaching session (for example):

1. What is the most important thing you have learned today?

2. What question(s) do you still have?

Whilst Lang describes using hardcopy questionnaires to gather student responses, we wanted to see if we could provide online students with the same opportunity using an anonymous online polling tool (Vevox). In this presentation we reflect on our experiences of supporting staff to make small changes in their teaching practice rather than enacting the small changes ourselves.

References:

Angelo, T. A. and Cross, P.K. (1993) Classroom Assessment Techniques: A Handbook for College Teachers. 2^nd edn. Hoboken, NJ: Jossey-Bass.

Lang, J. M. (2016) Small Changes in Teaching: The Last 5 Minutes of Class. Available from: https://core.ac.uk/reader/233598350 (Accessed 02 April 2024).

 

Implementing mini-reflections in a language portfolio assessment

Tomoko Fujita (School of Modern Languages and Cultures)

Abstract:

This presentation introduces the implementation of mini reflections for students in a writing-focused portfolio assessment within a Japanese language module. These reflections were designed to scaffold students' reflective practices and enhance their self-assessment skills for writing a reflective commentary for the assessment. Active engagement in the reflections correlated with higher achievement levels in the assessment. Observations indicate that the mini reflections in this round facilitated continuous student engagement in tasks within the module and fostered a deeper understanding of their learning journey. For future rounds, further improvement in task design and feedback methods are planned to facilitate students’ learning and motivation, and the expansion of peer-learning opportunities and implementation of more tailored support are considered to address the diversity of students in the module.

One Minute Paper (OMP) as a small teaching intervention in an Economics module

Andreas Markoulakis, Department of Economics

Abstract:

In this presentation, I explain how I made use of the One Minute Paper (OMP) as teaching intervention during small teaching for an economics module. OMP is a formative assessment tool used to assess comprehension by the students, which is administered at the end of a class when the students are asked to answer 2 questions, typically on what they have learned and what questions they might still have.

My intention in doing this is to use OMP as an additional source of feedback from the students, in addition to module evaluation, and to check the level of understanding by students after each seminar.

The analysis in the presentation will focus on how often students had unanswered questions and how answers are affected when trying to control for students’ hesitation to ask questions.

Finally, I will briefly discuss a first attempt to unveil any patterns in their answers.

At a later stage, I intend to examine how the answers by students are correlated with their grades in the assessments and the final exams of the module.