COURSES
For each course taught in 1998-99 I include a cover page that reviews:
the original objectives for the course (which should be read together with the description and goals stated in the syllabi);
challenges encountered and my responses;
and future plans.
This is preceded by a link to the syllabus. Not included in the webversion are the summaries of the GCOE evaluations, and originals of written course evaluations I designed.*
For future new courses, there is a statement of objectives and a draft syllabus.

* I ask students to compose short summary statements, and when they have done so these are included. I have not summarized the written evaluations for this portfolio, but have instead incorporated many of their comments into the review of challenges and responses and future plans.
1. Thinking, Learning and Computers (CCT670)
(syllabus)

Initial Goals

My goal was to create a course about computers and education for both CCT and M.Ed. students. (I thought, mistakenly, that this would be the only computers and education course.) For the first six classes I designed activities to acquaint students with a number of specific computer-based tools, and at the same time to lead into critical thinking about these tools. On that basis, the second half of the course would examine interpretations of and debates about social and educational transformations that involve computers. The different class activities were intended to provide models for adaptation to classes and other settings. In addition to their projects, students also prepared briefings on selected topics for each other, which is one way they can address the explosion of information made possible by computers (see syllabus from Fall 1998).
This course was established by a former CCT director who believed that research on computers and artificial intelligence provided insight about processes of human cognition, thinking and intelligence, and thus about learning. I do not share that belief, and attempted to provide the conceptual and socio-historical background to support a critical position on computers as models for thinking and learning.

Challenges and Responses
I learned quickly that the M.Ed. students thought the course would provide direct instruction about use of computers and software in their classrooms. Some withdrew; those who stayed still wanted more hands on time on computer-based tools than I had planned. Most students needed more warm-up than I gave them to appreciate "critical and creative thinking," the expectations of reflection pieces, the rationale for the unconventional assessment system, and the value of revising and resubmitting in repsonse to my comments. Nevertheless, M.Ed. students proved able to choose a classroom oriented project or a more critical paper as it suited their interests.

A turning point in the course was a mid-semester class in which I was away at a conference. The students brought in movies cued to a scene highlighting changing social attitudes about computers and had to interpret their scenes to the other students, something I had modeled the previous week. Having to take full responsibility for their own learning had a positive impact on students' engagement in the remaining classes, something they acknowledged in the historical scan during the final class (see exhibit 3.D.iii). Unfortunately, activities during the final class to take stock of the course left insufficient time for most students to complete either the GCOE evaluation or the one I had prepared. Follow-up requests yielded more returns, but the number of evaluations received was too low to be representative.

Future Plans
My plans for future offerings of this course are to:
--maintain the hybrid CCT-education nature of the course, and to direct the more pragmatic or anxious M.Ed. students to the other courses;
--rearrange and adjust the early classes so the course begins with the students experiencing computer use from the position of students, not teachers. The aim here would be to make non-CCT students comfortable by establishing a basis in the concrete before moving on to critical thinking about computer-based tools and, later, to interpretations and wider debates about computers in society;
--address the emerging challenge of using the World Wide Web well, in particular for distance education, by starting with a hands-on class related to this topic;
--maintain the CCT emphasis on critical reflection, but with streamlined requirements, instructions, and assessment system;
--require conferences with me early in the course for students to express their concerns and for me to establish dialogue needed to support students' development as critical thinkers;
--encourage M.Ed. students to undertake course projects on their specific educational interests;
--continue to collect clippings on developments in computers and organize them in a binder to stimulate students thinking about their projects and my own thinking about possible changes in the course;
--provide handouts on class activities to facilitate their adaptation into students' lesson plans (a practice already begun by the end of the fall 1998 semester);
--rework the two most difficult classes (on dynamical systems and heterogeneous construction); and
--time the final class so evaluations are submitted before students leave on the last day.
2. Practicum [Processes of Research and Engagement] (CCT698)
(syllabus)

Initial Goals
This course is based on a research course I taught several times in which undergraduate students investigated issues that concerned them about the social impact of science or about the environment--issues they wanted to know more about, or advocate a change. CCT students would instead focus on current social or educational issues, but, as in the previous course, they would be guided through different stages of research and action--from defining a manageable project to communicating their findings and plans for further work. The classes would run as workshops, in which students are introduced to and then practice using tools for research, writing, communicating, and supporting the work of others. To keep students moving along in their research, there would be many small writing assignments on their projects, with requests to revise and resubmit in response to my comments.
The emphasis on process, not simply the production of the final paper/report, makes room for confronting personal, psychological issues that usually arise around defining one's own work and convincing others of its significance. The course description, overview, assessment system, and expectations listed in the Fall 1998 syllabus spell out my teaching/learning approach in this course.
On a practical level I had to condense the two 2 hour sessions from the earlier course into one 2.5 hour session.

Challenges and Responses
This has been my most challenging course to date at U. Mass. Five of the eleven students were very product-oriented, some of them because they were simultaneously completing their capstone projects on the same topic under a timetable that allowed little room for new exploration. Four of the five viewed the assignments, tasks, and requests for revision as getting in the way of doing what they knew how to do, completing a research paper. My use of illustrations from previous classes did not help them see the value of new steps along the way--these classes consisted of young undergraduates from elite colleges, not adult learners like themselves. The four did not engage productively in the workshop activities, assignments, or revision. Most seriously, they avoided talking to me about the approach they were taking to the assignments and the course in general.

Although the full picture became clear mostly only in retrospect, I did realize during the semester that I needed to talk more with these students. However, I found it difficult, given the busy-ness of their lives and mine starting a new job, to make times when this could happen, or to follow up when appointments were missed. I now include a requirement of at least two conferences in all my courses, one of these early on before misunderstandings of course goals become fixed in a student's head.
During the semester, I also responded to expressions of "confusion" about what was expected in two ways:
i) producing a summary of the iterative, overlapping phases of "research and engagement." (This has since evolved into a structure reflected explicitly in the Fall 1999 syllabus and is reflected in the subtitle I have added to the course.); and
ii) by structuring my weekly handouts so they began with a summary of "Assignments due," "Tasks in preparation for class," "Other tasks," and "Follow-up and feedback," and followed this by details about item. After the semester, I digested my experiences and feedback and produced detailed "Notes on Teaching/Learning Interactions," which I now include in the course packet for all my courses. Including such material in the course packet also accommodates to students who want details in advance of future assignments and allows weekly handouts to be much simpler. I still need, of course, to draw students attention in class to the numerous tasks and assignments ahead, and to convey their rationale.
I do not, however, believe that the added written material would have "won over" the four students who resisted or rejected what the course offered. In addition to making more time to talk with students, I decided this fall to:
i) focus on producing the "dialogue around written work," as articulated in the Notes. (My efforts to achieve this will be illuminated by peer observation and reflection during this fall's faculty seminar on "Becoming a teacher-researcher.");
ii) include in the course packet examples from the previous CCT course (not the pre-UMass courses); and
iii) invite to the first class an alum from the previous course to be interviewed by the new students. This appears to have been an effective "innoculation" against students proceeding as they always have and focusing on the end of semester deadline for submitting a report/paper. (I think I can always expect product-orientation to be a default option for some CCT students, many of whom have busy work lives and would not have chosen the CCT Program if they were not so headstrong.) There are again two Practicum students undertaking their capstone projects, but I worked with them through much of the Practicum process during the summer. Their role in the Practicum classes, when they can attend, will be to coach the others.

Fortunately, a number of students in the Fall of 1998 appreciated the course process, experimented with the tools I was introducing, and made significant progress. Even so, it was difficult to lead students beyond library research and to pilot implementations of the classes or workshops many envisaged. In the third class this fall, in order to model what is possible, I have scheduled a demonstration by an alum of her curricular innovation.

Future Plans
In addition to the changes above already being implemented, I am working (via advising, the CCT handbook, and notes to other advisers) to ensure that CCT students take the Practicum before they undertake their capstone projects. I am also exploring the range of other research courses in the GCOE with a view to allowing students to cross programs if another course matches their needs better.
3. Critical Thinking (with A. Millman) (CCT601)
(syllabus)

Initial Goals
This is a required CCT course and is also taken by many M.Ed. and doctoral students as an elective in critical and creative thinking. I had not taught a course like this and expected this would be an opportunity for me to learn from my co-teacher approaches to critical thinking established in philosophy and, to a lesser extent, in psychology. I expected to insert only one or two new classes based on my personal approach to critical thinking, which is to place established facts, theories, and practices in tension with alternatives so one can see how things could be otherwise. However, my interest in students learning through activities, not only through discussion, led me to invent activities for many of the classes, especially when I discovered I was familiar from other contexts with the author or their themes. Arthur Millman was willing to try out other changes I suggested for the course, such the "revise and resubmit" assessment system, the manifesto assignment, the critical incident questionnaires, thought-pieces extracted from students's journal, and the "Notes on teaching/learning interactions" I had prepared after teaching the fall courses.

As a result of our pre-semester discussions, we defined the following overall goals, which had not been expressed in quite this way before. We wanted course participants to:
1. appreciate and reflect on the range of views on critical thinking, contrasts and tensions among those views, and the evolution of the field toward increasing attention to the social context in which thinking takes place;
2. work new views, skills, and model lessons/group activities into practices of thinking, learning, teaching critical thinking to others, and finding support for change (see 3);
3. develop support to understand 1 and sustain 2 beyond this course, especially the support that derives from having active conversants, appreciative listeners, and dialoguing around written work.

Challenges and Responses
Early on some students raised their misgivings about working in small groups--could they trust others; was this an exercise in "mutually shared ignorance? Some students wanted the class to be smaller so they could have more direct interaction with the professors and whole class discussions. Cutting the class size was not an option and in "whole class discussions," of which we had some, fewer voices are heard. Instead, I reviewed other people's guidelines for small group discussions and developed ones for the course based around four roles (facilitator, initiator, timer, and reporter). These roles were not always well followed. In the future, we should model and give explicit training at the start of the semester.

As the course developed, however, listening became a significant theme. Classes 7, 8, 9 and 11, which introduced various approaches to listening, were very popular. During this phase of the course students who had been quiet or lacked confidence in their ability to think critically started to articulate connections between critical thinking and their work as teachers and professionals. On an intellectual level, it appeared that listening well allows one better to tease out alternative views. Without alternatives in mind there is little motivation to question the support for one own view, and to follow critical thinking dictates to examine evidence, hidden assumptions and logic.

Dialogue also became a recurrent theme of the course. Several times Arthur Millman and I exposed and explored different perespectives through dialogue in front of the class. Some students were disconcerted by our apparent differences; others valued them. More generally, we noticed that some students wanted us to provide clear definitions of and procedures for critical thinking and for particular assignments and activities, while others were more comfortable grappling with the tensions among different approaches. We responded at times to anxieties by preparing mini-lectures and handouts, but we also persisted in conducting activities and promoting journaling through which students might develop their own working approaches to critical thinking. This tension was most evident around the manifesto assignment, which asked for a "synthesis of elements from the course selected and organized so as to inspire and inform your efforts in extending critical thinking beyond the course." This was a new assignment so we could not provide examples from previous classes. I responded to students queries about the assignment by distributing my draft manifesto (exhibit 2.C.i). Eventually, however, almost all the students had become confident enough to compose their own, often quite personal, syntheses. In future years, we will be able both to provide examples and to convince students that they'll see how they want to compose their manifesto by the time it is due at the end of the semester.

In the class on remodeling lesson plans, we reviewed the first class of the course. This helped me to articulate the primary message of a story and demonstration I had presented, namely, that the development of critical thinking is like a journey. I went on to use this metaphor in a faculty development workshop last June (exhibit 3.E.i), and would do so in future offerings of this course. It corresponds well to the three goals we defined for the course (see above) and would allow us to further develop the intra- and inter-personal dimensions that have been insufficiently explored in critical thinking texts and courses.

Several other items to address emerged during the course and from the course evaluations. These are summarized in my "to do" list (exhibit 3.C.i).

Future Plans
Unfortunately, scheduling considerations may mean that I will not teach this course again in the next few years. In the meantime, however, I am collecting material material on current controversies to develop into critical thinking activities and am looking for opportunities to synthesize and publish something about the role of listening, dialogue, intra-personal reflection, and the journey metaphor in fostering critical thinking.
4. Science-in-society [Seminar in Critical Thinking] (CCT611)
(syllabus)

Initial Goals
This seminar was based on case studies and activities from an undergraduate "Biology and Society" course I had taught several times. My goals were to adapt it to the CCT/GCOE setting, by leading students to
address the course material on a number of levels: as an opportunity to learn the science and interpretive approaches; as models for your own teaching; and as a basis for discussions about practices and philosophies of education, construed broadly as a project of stimulating greater citizen involvement in scientific debates.
To this end I was more explicit than I had been before about my conceptual and pedagogical themes (see "Overview of course themes").

Challenges and Responses
The students' prior training in biology was varied and, with one exception, not recent. As a consequence the class meetings operated mostly on the first level. In any case, more than 2.5 hours per week would have been needed and/or fewer topics, in order to make room for serious discussion of teaching and educational philosophy.

Future Plans
Over the next few years I plan to prepare the cases for a book and website. While doing so I expect to see ways to fashion classes that would fit in the time available and to prepare reading material that brings students up to steam in the relevant biology. As I develop new cases, e.g., one on gestational programming (see exhibit 1.D), I will have to drop others. I intend, however, the mix of cases to cover the four broad angles of interpretation, namely, "scientists' historical location, economic and political interests, use of language, and ideas about causality and responsibility."
I also plan to emphasize the lesson plan option for students' projects, which will, I expect, stimulate more discussion of teaching and educational philosophy.
5. Issues in Educational Evaluation (CCT685)
(syllabus)

Initial Goals
Although I had experience in social research and statistics, evaluation of educational change was a new area for me as a teacher. I designed the course so that I learn as much as possible by leading students to digest the texts for themselves and for each other, coaching the students in mini-projects, and facilitating participatory planning and other group processes. This last aspect would serve two functions: the syllabus could be adjusted according to students' background and interests, and students would be introduced to the larger endeavor of working with other people in implementing and improving educational changes. In this spirit, I chose texts that emphasized the relationship between evaluator and sponsor from the formulation of questions onwards needed if outcomes are to be taken up in changes in practice and policy.
The mini-projects were based on clippings and short articles I had collected concerning evaluations undertaken or needed.
I decided not to schedule a sequence of classes on quantitative methods but to encourage students to formulate questions based on the articles they were reading and to coach them in securing statistical advice from skilled practitioners.

Challenges and Responses
The first challenge was that many students thought the course would focus on assessment of students and some of them took several weeks to appreciate the actual topic--evaluation of educational changes. In response, I have arranged for the course name to be changed to Evaluation of Educational Change. I also had to help several students sort out what is going on in the name of testing and standards. Different kinds of evaluation are routinely conflated by teachers, administrators, and policy makers, namely, evaluation of: students' knowledge; the new curricular frameworks as a means to improve students' knowledge; the performance of teachers; the performance of schools; and the performance of school districts. Students also needed to more time than I had expected to get the hang of the "evaluation clock," which divides evaluation into 12 questions (from "Why is evaluation needed?" to "What do sponsors do differently as a result?") and emphasizes re-visiting earlier questions in light of later ones. I modeled this to students, but have identified a simpler case to use for future introductions.

Time spent early on orienting students to the endeavor of evaluation led me to eliminate the second mini-project on the politics of evaluation (what things are subject to evaluations and what not, which evaluations are paid attention to, etc.) and truncate this topic. The politics of evaluation is an important issue, but CCT students, I have learned, are less interested in general obstacles to innovation than they are in creating new educational approaches and finding situations in which to try them out. At the same time, the practitioners I invited to class emphasized the importance of collaboration and patience in getting one's plans implemented, and students were very impressed by these presentations. Indeed, it seems to me that the topic of evaluation is best presented in terms of students becoming teacher-researchers or practitioner-researchers. I began to consult with GCOE colleagues teaching evaluation and action research to clarify whether to push this theme further in CCT685, or whether to direct receptive students to action research courses taught by other faculty. I plan to continue this consultation.

Some students were disconcerted for a while by the diversity of mini-project topics and by the changes made to the syllabus as we went along, but from my experience with this first class I believe I can in the future minimize syllabus changes and anticipate potential sources of confusion. Some students commented on the number of evaluation and group process tools I introduced and suggested working with fewer in greater depth. At the same time, the final projects indicated that students were trying out many of the tools in their work even without extended training. I hope I can continue to introduce a range of tools, because in the future at least some students will have done other courses with me and so fewer of the tools will be new.

The method I used to acquaint students with the texts, namely, not lecturing but having students prepare briefings for each other on the different chapters, worked quite well. I realized, however, that it would be better to use a more recent text and one with a focus on evaluation in educational contexts. I have identified a strong candidate, Evaluation by Carol Weiss, but am still reviewing possibilities.

Students raised fewer questions about quantitative methods than I had expected, even when I assigned a quantitatively-oriented manuscript of a colleague and had him come to class to discuss his work with the students. I have identified among the clippings some cases that will allow me to convey when students need to secure statistical advice from skilled practitioners.

Some students in this course (and also in CCT698 and CCT601) wanted a rubric for A vs. A- vs. B+ grades and one student prepared an elaborate model. This motivated me to prepare my own streamlined version and implement it my Fall 1999 courses.
Future Plans
I have mentioned some of my future plans in the preceding section. I have a larger "to do" list stimulated by the formative and summative evaluations of students in the course, and their participation in revising the course as we went. My other major goals for the future are to:
--expand some of the clippings into well developed cases, especially in the areas of science education;
--consult with other GCOE faculty with a view to differentiating the evaluation and research courses we offer; and
--build on the mini-project of one student last spring to push for more productive forms of course evaluation in GCOE.
6. CCT695, Synthesis seminar
(syllabus)

Initial Goals
The Synthesis seminar provides a structure within which students get faculty and peer assistance and support in completing the written product of the synthesis project or thesis by the deadline. Because of the small class size and the progress students have already made over the summer, I am making time during class for them to step back and review their work in light of the "phases of research and engagement" that I introduce in the Practicum course (CCT698; see 2. above). My goal is to show that reflection and dialogue is valuable for clarification and more efficient writing, even when the product deadline looms.
I also want to wean students from relying on their faculty readers to do detailed copy-editing, a relationship between student and reader usually gets in the way of dialogue around the content and overall organization of the synthesis. I will provide encourage them to pay for assistance from some outside party, skilled in manuscript-editing.
I am teaching this course this semester as an overload, and hope that my experience will stand me in good stead in the spring when more students are enrolled.

Challenges and Responses
The tension between product and process is evident at the outset. I want the students to revise what they have written during the summer and strengthen their exposition, but how far can I push this without their feeling I do not support their work? My initial response is to avoid detailed comments on the text, but to talk with them about what is distinctive in their projects and reflect back to them in an organized form what they say and what I discern. Eventually, however, I expect that their space for significant revision will disappear and I will work more on their terms.
7. CCT645, Environment, Science, and Society [Seminar in Scientific Thinking]
Initial Goals
This course has similar goals to CCT611 (see 4 above), but the emphasis is on environmental rather than life sciences. I prepared a first draft of this course before learning that I would be participating in a faculty seminar instead of teaching the course. I realize that the syllabus needs to be pared down and streamlined, in order to make room for serious discussion of teaching and educational philosophy (see discussion in 4 above). In addition, the base groups and problem-based learning aspects of the course require more planning and preparation.