Ask-Dr-Kirk

Website Generates Warning Signs

I found this site that allows you to generate and print your own warning signs. Now I'm trying to decide how I could use this in class. Any suggestions?

 

A Positive Attitude Affects Work Performance

Research by Professor Nancy Rothbard (Wharton) and Professor Steffanie Wilk (Ohio State) shows that, "the mood you bring with you to work has a stronger effect on work performance than mood changes caused by events in the workplace."  If you come to work in a good mood, "you are more likely to be productive, efficient and do better quality work." You can access more about their study here.

Being positive and enthusiastic in the classroom means your students are more likely to be excited about the class.  Even if you have had a bad day up until class time, being professional means not letting the students know this. You get to decide on your attitude each day when you walk into the classroom. 

 

Handling A Difficult Situation In Class

I’ve been teaching for 29 years now and have always enjoyed talking to colleagues about teaching. It's the reason why I started this blog about five years ago. It helps my reflective process to hear myself tell the story of something that happened and to get others’ opinions on what they would do in a similar situation.

One of my ways of “coping” with challenging incidents in the classroom is to say…well I could always get a publication out of this. 

The Journal of Management Education has recently published an article that discusses a difficult situation I had in a class on Managing Diversity. Here's the abstract for the article:

The assignment for the students was to write honestly about how they felt regarding specific current events dealing with diversity. However, what resulted was a kairos moment for the professor—an instance that called for her best response even when she did not know what that was—when a student crossed the line in terms of respectful communication. Our story picks up there and follows us through our own emotions and dialogues as we worked to make sense as to why the student responded as he did and how the emotionally charged issue could be turned into a teachable moment around language, boundaries, understanding, and acceptance.

The two things that I took from my experience and that I teach my students in approaching awkward diversity issues today are:

When you see differences, look for similarities. When you see sameness, look for differences. Thus, if the person you are talking to appears different from you (race, age, gender, social background, etc), look for things that you have in common. If the person seems the same (both of you are management majors), look for things that make each of you unique.

When topics get too emotional, look for theory to explain why this happens. As noted in the article, by stepping back to look at the theory behind what is happening, you can rationally defuse the situation.

I would like to thank my co-author, Dr. Rita Durant, for her wisdom and expertise in both addressing the situation in my class and in working with me to write up what happened in this article in order to help others cope with these moments.

The article is:  Kirk, D. J., & Durant, R. (December, 2010). Crossing the Line: Framing Appropriate Responses in the Diversity Classroom. Journal of Management Education, 34(6), 823-847. 

You can download the entire article here: Download Kirk & Durant Crossing the Line

 

What A Difference A Generation Makes

Marc Prensky coined the term, digital natives, in his article, “Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants, first published in 2001. His follow-up piece, “Do They Really Think Differently?” goes on to discuss how our students are different from most of us who teach them. As he notes,

Our students have changed radically. Today’s students are no longer the people our educational system was designed to teach.

If we have any doubt that we've come a long way in less than a generation, check out this two minute clip from the Today Show in 1994 as Katie Couric and Bryant Gumbel ask the question, "What is the Internet?"

 

 

Advice For New College Instructors

If you're new to teaching, Dr. Paul Hummel makes some insightful suggestions here.

 

Teaching is a performing art with content.

We can't ignore the content but at the same time we have to get the students' attention in order for them to learn.

 

Telling Your Students What You Expect From Them

Here's a great idea from Professor Barbara Nixon: Share your pet peeves with your students so hopefully they'll understand what not to do in class.

 

What Does It Mean To Be An Educated Person?

I'm reading this article by George C. Leef on "Becoming an Educated Person." As noted in the foreword by William J. Bennett,  

 "Education is not the same as training. Plato made the distinction between techne(skill) and episteme (knowledge). Becoming an educated person goes beyond the acquisition of a technical skill. It requires an understanding of one’s place in the world—cultural as well as natural—in pursuit of a productive and meaningful life. And it requires historical perspective so that one does not just live, as Edmund Burke said, like “the flies of a summer,” born one day and gone the next, but as part of that “social contract” that binds our generation to those who have come before and to those who are yet to be born."

I'm thinking about this as I put together my syllabi for the spring semester. I think there is a tendency in a business college to emphasize training rather than education, maybe because many of us as business faculty tend to be practical in our approach to teaching. I have been trying to tie in history, psychology, sociology, and economics in my lectures on management in the last few years but find the students struggle to see the connections.

You can access the article here:  Download Becoming an educated person

 

Handling Student Behavior Issues In The Classroom

Dr. Patrick J. King shares his powerpoint slide presentation on "Maladaptive Classroom Behaviors."

 

The More Evals, The Better?

I'm reading about Professor Robert Talbert's experience in giving four course evaluations during the semester. I've been giving midterm evals the last couple of years with positive results and am thinking about using his approach.

 

Hurtful Teaching Evals-How To Cope?

I had a friend call me a few weeks ago in tears. She had just gotten her teaching evaluations from spring semester and there were a number of nasty, hurtful comments made by the students. I did my best to reassure her that she is indeed a good teacher and has been for a number of years. I then went online to see if I could find any suggestions for her on dealing with negative, non-constructive evaluations.

 

I'm curious how others handle this hurt?  As for my friend, she found comfort in some of the comments and feedback on this Chronicle of Higher Education forum. 

 

Teaching Students How To Evaluate Your Teaching

I found this suggestion by Professor George Williams (University of South Carolina) on how to debrief a class before giving evaluations. As he notes:

 

I dedicate the entire final class period to a discussion about the course. We go through the syllabus, day by day, and they give me comments. I start them with readings and what we did in class, then move to supplementary media and activities, and then turn to assessments. I end with a discussion about classroom atmosphere, my pedagogical approach, and general comments about the course. Then I distribute the forms, and I ask them to summarize their thoughts in light of our conversation.

 

After an hour of discussion, during which I press them for details (e.g. why did you like that activity, in particular?), I get much more thorough, detailed, and reflective comments in the forms. I find this helpful for getting more thorough and thoughtful evaluations, and I also have all of their suggestions and ideas in hand early enough to implement them for the following semester.

 

Finding A Ted Talk For Your Classroom

Jeff Mummert has organized Ted Talks under various discipline categories to make it easier for teachers to find one on a specific topic. As there are 825+ of these, this shorter list is very useful.

Preventing Cheating

You've all probably heard about the recent cheating incident at the University of Central Florida. I can empathize with the pain experienced by Professor Richard Quinn as I too have had students cheat in the past.

Dr. Grace Ann Rosile (New Mexico State University) tells about her experience with having students cheat in the October 2007 issue of the Journal of Management Education.  She ended up flunking almost 25 percent of her class when they were caught cheating by having other students text message them the answers during the exam.  She tells a compelling story of how she felt and how she ended up making the experience a teaching moment. You can access her article here: Download Rosile

Here are some of my tips for being proactive and preventing cheating in the classroom.

 

Teaching Students How To Take Risks In The Classroom

I'm reading this article by Dr. E. Shelley Reid (George Mason University) on encouraging students to take more risks in the classroom. As Dr. Reid notes:

Many of my writing students are conservative learners: they worry about grades and want to “play it safe,” they don’t take time to imagine alternatives, or they have low skill or confidence levels that reduce their abilities to try new things.

Recently I took a pad of large sheets of white paper and a lot of colored markers to class and instructed my students to get into their teams and to draw a visual of how the various motivational theories we had been studying fit together. At first, they all said that they were not creative, that they couldn't draw but I told them that didn't matter. They were to come up with a way to visually illustrate the theories and then use their drawings to "teach" these to the rest of the class. After a lot of laughter, they came up with great models which they agreed helped in remembering the material we had been discussing.

I'm thinking about other classes where this might be a useful method. Any ideas?

Does Moving To An Online Evaluation Process Affect How Students Rate Their Professors?

Dear Dr. Kirk:

Our university is considering moving from in-class scantron evaluations to asking the students to complete teaching evaluations online.  The faculty are very upset by this move as they believe this change in process means fewer students will do the evals and this will result in lower overall ratings.  Can you give me any suggestions on this?

Dean at a University in the Midwest

Dear Dean of Midwest University:

Several years ago, Drake University also moved from in-class to online evaluations and the faculty had the same concerns as yours.  Several of my colleagues and I conducted a research study to see what impact the change in process made. The Journal of the Academy of Business Education recently published an article we wrote on our results titled, "Teaching Evaluations:  Does the Switch to an Online Process Make a Difference in how College Students Rate Their Professors?"

Some results of our study:

• Switching to an online process did result in a lower participation rate (we found this true at both Drake and other universities).
• When students were asked what incentives it would take to increase participation rates, they tended to say the same things as in previous research studies (extra credit, a drawing for a gift certificate, etc.).
• The process did not make a statistically significant difference in how students rated their professors; however, the online evaluation ratings did tend to be lower than the traditional evaluations overall.
• A major concern of the faculty was that students who were performing poorly in their classes would be more likely to take the time to do the online evaluation and to give their professors a bad evaluation rating.  This concern did not seem to be valid; In fact, students with higher grades in the class were more likely to take the time to go online and complete the evaluations than students with lower grades. 

One suggestion I would make for any university is to involve the faculty and students in any proposed changes of evaluation method.  The initial perception that scores will be negatively affected will engender ill feelings on the part of the faculty.  As teaching evaluations have an economic impact on promotion, tenure, and pay raises, schools going to an online process might want to treat the first semester online evaluations with caution and not necessarily compare these to previous scantron ratings.  In addition, students should be informed as to how evaluations are used and reassured that the process will be anonymous in order to raise participation rates.

You can access the entire article here:  Download Online teaching evals

 

Twitter Usage Increases Student Engagement AND Success In Classroom

 

Interesting video on Dr. Reynol Junco (Lock Haven University) and his research on how Twitter increases student engagement. In his study, he found that the group of students who used Twitter had a .5 point increase in overall GPA that semester over the control group that didn't. Wow.

 

Teaching Students To Pilot Their Own Helicopters

Have you experienced the helicopter parent yet? 

President Marvin Krislov of Oberlin College gives advice on how to encourage college students to 'pilot their own helicopters', in other words to take responsibility for their own success or failure.

As he notes:

Balance is the key. Parents should support their child, but not serve as their gofer or administrative assistant. They can do this by urging their son or daughter to learn how to navigate the college bureaucracy and campus life on their own. This is a vital part of the educational process. It includes allowing the student to handle issues relating to classes, housing, dining, roommates, and extracurricular activities such as athletics, clubs, and student organizations.

A good body of research indicates that college students have a better chance of succeeding academically and socially when they themselves discover and initiate contact with the campus offices and departments that offer services and resources for students.

We also know that the problem-solving skills students develop during the formative years at college are an important part of their education. Parents should encourage students to take responsibility for their own financial planning, for managing their time, and for setting limits on their personal behavior.

Good advice for parents sending their child off to college. You can read the entire article here.

The Social Media Revolution

 

Just watched this updated Youtube video on the Social Media Revolution posted May 2010. It really does make you think about the perspectives our students come in with and what we should be teaching in our classes.

 

Feedback From A Former Student

One of the problems with having teaching evaluations at the end of a semester is that you really don't get to see if what you're doing in the classroom will have a long-term impact on the students. Sometimes though you get feedback that makes you feel that you have been able to add value to a student's career. The following is an unsolicited recommendation from a former student of mine at Drake University that he posted on LinkedIn. Wow. This has made my day! 

 

"During the Fall of 1999, Professor Delaney Kirk taught Human Resource Management (MGT 282) at Drake University, and I was very fortunate to be a student in her classroom, pursuing a Master of Public Administration. Without question, Professor Kirk was a masterful professor with incredible subject matter expertise in her area; I suppose we demand this expertise as students. There were several things that separated Professor Kirk from many of the professors, and made her stand out as one of the best professors I have had.

First, Professor Kirk was exceptionally enthusiastic. She truly believed that the information that she was teaching would make a difference in the lives and professions of her students, and ultimately in the world itself. I suppose all professors feel this way to a degree, but there is no question that Professor Kirk carried herself in such a manner.

Second, Professor Kirk was an outstanding time-manager. You would not want to walk in late to her classroom, or you would definitely miss something – and that something would probably be important. While she ALWAYS kept the class the entire three hour period, I don’t recall any of that time being wasted, but rather I really saw it as time invested. Professor Kirk was incredibly well-organized; her skills in this area should be modeled by others.

Lastly, Professor Kirk was very demanding of TEAMWORK in her class. The team requirements were challenging. It was not feasible to split up the topic area for each team member to research and provide feedback to others. In order to be successful in her team projects, the team would need to work together to achieve a quality product. I found that this team effort resulted in one of my more favorable learning experiences at Drake University.

I was thinking of Professor Kirk the other day when attending a seminar recently, where the topic of “being organized” was discussed. Professor Kirk was among the people who came to my mind at that time – so much in fact that I decided to find out if I could find her on Linkedin. I am glad to re-connect with such an outstanding professional."

 

Why Learn When You Can Just Look It Up Online?

I get this question sometimes from my business students. For example, they don't understand why they need to learn the various laws pertaining to management when they can just look these up when needed.

I tell them yes, you can do that. Let's say you graduate and get that first job in management. Let's think about how that might go...

 

Employee: Can I take leave under FMLA to take care of my sick sister-in-law?

You as the new Manager: Let me look that up.

Employee: There is a holiday this week but I still worked 40 hours. Do I get overtime pay?

 You as the new Manager: Let me look that up.

 

How long before the new manager has absolutely no credibility with his or her employees?

When I explain this to the students, they are more willing to learn the knowledge, skills, and theories they will need to be successful.

Sidneyeve Matrix continues the discussion on “Why memorize when you can Googleize” here. 

 

Short Free Videos On Motivating Employees

 

Here are several short videos on motivation that I have found useful.

 

• This one is an interesting approach by Zappo's that I use in my Human Resource Management class when discussing recruiting and selection:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQLTQAv5JQA&feature=fvw

• I show this to give the students a glimpse of what a motivating workplace culture looks like:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFyW5s_7ZWc

• This is a very entertaining animated video of Daniel Pink discussing the surprising results of how motivation actually works.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc 

 

Dr. KirkCat Demonstrates Answer To "Why Do I Need To Learn This?"

Research On The Validity Of Learning Styles

In an earlier post I shared that I sometimes have my students do this questionnaire on learning styles and then write up a short paper discussing how they plan to take responsibility for their own learning.

I'm now reading this interesting research article on the validity of learning styles sent to me by Dr. Sherman Dorn, University of South Florida-St Petersburg).

You can read the article here: Download Research on learning styles.doc

 

Best Of Dr. Kirk Series: What If I Don't Know The Answer To A Student's Question?

Today's post: How To Handle Questions From Students.

 

 

Best Of Dr. Kirk Series: What If You Are (Or Look) Too Young To Be A Teacher?

Today's post: Getting respect from your students.

And me in my first teaching job. I look about 12.

 

 

Best Of Dr. Kirk Series: Dealing With Teacher Anxiety

Today's post: Tips for dealing with nervousness the first day of class.

 

Best of Dr. Kirk Series: On-time Attendance

 

Today's post: How to get your students to come to class on time.

 

Best of Dr. Kirk Series: Learning Names

 

Today's post: Tips for learning your students' names. More tips here.

 

 

Best of Dr. Kirk Series: Dress For Success

Today's post: Dress for classroom success. Here's more on this.

And just for fun: Dr. Kirkcat illustrates professional dress for faculty.

 

 

Road Trip (Again) To Nebraska

I'm big in Lincoln, Nebraska. Just saying :)  And I always enjoy going back to the midwest. I spent 18 years at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, so it seems like going home.

I'm leaving today to teach my third faculty development workshop in Lincoln, this time at Union College. In addition to topics of teaching effectiveness and classroom management, I'll discuss a number of creative educational technology tools that can be used in the classroom.

I'm looking forward to it.

Another Great First Day Of Class Activity

 

Professor Barbara Nixon (Georgia Southern University and Southeastern University) shares this Syllabus Scavenger Hunt as an activity the first day of class.

 

Download Syllabus-scavenger-hunt[1]

 

 

Best Of Dr. Kirk Series: Getting Hired Part-time As College Instructor

Today's post: Getting an an adjunct teaching job

 

Best Of Dr. Kirk Series: Students Texting In Class

Today's post: How To Handle Students Texting In Class

 

Best of Dr. Kirk Series: Quiz Your Students On Syllabus

Today's post: Give a quiz to see if your students have read and understand your syllabus

 

Best Of Dr. Kirk Series: Syllabi

Today's post: Tips and resources for putting together your syllabi

 

Best Of Dr. Kirk Series: Tips To Setting Expectations

Today's post: Ten Tips to Setting Expectations The First Day of Class

How To Get That Article Written And Published

 

Dr. Billie Hara (Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi) recently reviewed a book that would be useful for new faculty or graduate students on how to write an article for possible publication.

 

 

Road Trip To Boston

I'm off to Boston to teach a faculty development workshop for dental health educators. This Summer Boot Camp provides professional education emphasizing clinical competence as well as classroom management in order to help educators become more effective instructors. Here's more info in their April 2010 newsletter.

I'm looking forward to it.

How To Make Sure Your Teaching Sticks

The Curse of Knowledge is the fact that because we know something, it makes it difficult for us to teach it to someone else who doesn't know it.

Chip Heath and Dan Heath discuss this in their article, Teaching That Sticks.

As they note, "When you open your mouth and communicate, without thinking about what's coming out of your mouth, you're speaking your native language: Expertese. But students don't speak Expertese." 

In other words, being an expert in a discipline makes it hard for us to relate to others who are not experts.  Read their article below to better understand how we can teach our students what we know: 

Download TeachingthatSticks 

Tips On Designing Good Lectures (And Tips For Students On Learning From These)

I came across this resource from Harvard University on how to make lectures more interactive.

Also, here's some tips for your students on taking good lecture notes (I'm going to post these on my class website this fall).

 

Books By Writers For Writers

I came across this list of 75 books that writers should read. I've read the following three books (all were great!) and am looking forward to reading some of the others on the list.

On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King

Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within by Natalie Goldberg

Bird by Bird: Some instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott

Make Sure Feedback To Students Is Based On Actual Performance

 

I'm reading an article by Alfie Kohn that talks about the current trend towards praising children for everything they do. We even give awards (and trophies!) for last place so children will have "self esteem." However, this doesn't work and we see the results of this misplaced feedback now in colleges and universities.

As Kohn notes, "Does praise motivate kids? Sure. It motivates kids to get praise. Alas, that's often at the expense of commitment to whatever they were doing that prompted the praise."

You can read the rest of the article here.

How To Use Wikipedia As A Class Assignment?

If you've wondered how you might use Wikipedia as a resource in the classroom, here are two ways suggested by Dr. John Orlando (Norwich University). As he notes,"Wikipedia’s motto is 'no original thought,' meaning that everything must be cited, and uncited material is quickly removed. In fact, studies have shown the Wikipedia is about as accurate as Britannica."

One interesting idea is to have your students create their own articles for Wikipedia. Dr. Martha Groom (University of Washington) shares her tips on how to do this here.

Jon Udell walks us through how Wikipedia works by following a page and how it changes over time.

 

 

Should I Put MBA On My Business Cards?

Dear Dr. Kirk:

So what's the protocol with the initials? Do you put MBA after your name in your signature line?

Recent MBA graduate

---------------

Dear MBA grad:

Typically only Ph.D.s or M.D.s do this. Or someone might put an earned certification such as CPA or SPHR on their business card or signature line but putting MBA is considered inappropriate.

However, you can certainly mention your newly earned degree on your website or blog and on a cover letter in a job application. Here's an article that discusses this further.

Congratulations on your accomplishment!

Dr. Kirk

 

Advice For Students: Should You Call Your Professor By His/Her First Name?

Finally. A table to help your students understand whether or not to call you by your first name.

Source: www.phdcomics.com

Hello Delaney? It’s Stuart Weitzman.

  

I think we all know that the world of social media-Facebook, blogs, Twitter, Myspace, and others-has changed how we interact with each other and how companies interact with us. It allows us to reach out and virtually meet people we would never have had an opportunity to talk with before. It gives us “friends” to turn to when we need information or recommendations or just entertainment. We google to find restaurants or bookstores or venues in our cities-when was the last time you picked up the Yellow pages?

I’ve always loved shoes. My colleagues and students will tell you that my shoes are the first thing they check out after saying hello to me. So you can imagine how excited I was this week when I learned I was the winner of a contest on Twitter.  My prize? A personal phone call from THE shoe designer, Stuart Weitzman.

Stuart called at 4:20pm yesterday. We talked about Beth Levine, the first female shoe designer, who along with her husband Herbert changed the look of shoes for all time. Beth designed the white go-go boots worn by Nancy Sinatra to publicize her 1966 best selling hit song (quick-name that song!) In fact, Beth took boots from the purely practical function of rain and snow protection at that time to the fashion accessory they are today. She introduced stiletto heels and mules to American women, both designed to make our feet look as elegant as her own tiny size 4Bs. I asked Stuart if his family had known Beth and he said yes. His father, Seymour Weitzman, whose shoes were labeled “Mr. Seymour,” and the Levine’s were co-manufacturers in the late 1950s.

I asked him his opinion of the huge current popularity of flip flops for both men and women. He responded by asking me if I had any and when I said, yes, a couple pairs but mine have bling on them, he laughed and said, Me too!

We talked about all the choices in shoes now-pointed toe, round toe, the new style that covers the ankles-and I asked him how this affected his approach to designing new shoes. He said it really allowed him to be more creative as he does not have to be wed to any particular toe shape. Instead he can listen to his customers more whom he says let him know their favorites. He noted that the runway was just show biz. The best fashion trends are an extension of what we see on the street, what people are actually wearing. This connection to his fans and customers is also why he personally interacts on Twitter.

We talked about how the world of social media has changed his business. He shared with me his experience when he designed an espadrille wedge shoe that had modest sales.  Then Jennifer Aniston was photographed several times in public wearing the shoes, people started blogging about them and going on discussion boards asking where they could be bought, and the shoe became one of Weitzman’s biggest sellers of all time.

I bemoaned the fact that my favorite pair of Stuart Weitzman boots, bought in 2001 or so, were so worn that I had had to retire them. I asked him if he had ever considered bringing back some of the designs that customers liked so well in the past. He told me to send him a photo of the boots.

My last question was to ask Stuart what advice he would give my students. His first response was to say that if they liked fashion, then the world of fashion design is the most exciting place you could imagine. However, he went on to agree that it’s important to do something you love doing, something that makes you excited to get up in the morning and go to work. As Stuart creates some 300 styles per year, he obviously loves designing shoes.

Thanks, Stuart, for taking the time to call one of your biggest fans. As Cinderella said, "one shoe can change your life."

  

 

 

Educators As Hackers

Dr. Rey Junco (Lock Haven University of Pennsylvania) writes a very interesting blogpost on “Why Educators Must Become Hackers.” 

 

Measure Learning Rather Than Satisfaction

According to co-editors Ronald Flinn and Larry Crumbley, “professors are no longer in the learning/teaching business, but rather are in the satisfaction business. In an interview, Dr. Crumbley at Louisiana State University says the dysfunctional education system based upon the misguided concept that students are customers has allowed 'the inmates to be in charge of the prison.' Students are inventory, not customers. You would not allow the cars at the end of a General Motors assembly line to fire a worker. You would have someone check the automobiles to see if the worker is performing his or her task effectively. We need to determine if students are learning, not whether they are satisfied with their grades.”

 

You can read more here about this monograph recently published by the American Accounting Association.

 

Thanks to Dr. Maria Caban (University of South Florida Sarasota-Manatee) for bringing this interesting publication to my attention.  

How To Respond To Course Evaluations

Professor Kim Hannula gives some unsolicited but good advice on how to deal with course evaluations.

And just for fun, here's how to interpret those comments you get from your students.