Spotlight on Teaching: Hasse Structures Classroom For Effective Teaching

Janis Leibold
July 1, 2000


Posted in LQP OnLine Spring 1997

For many faculty, finding effective ways to teach critical thinking in a large class is a real challenge. Joan Haase has discovered one way to tackle the problem successfully - the structured classroom.

Haase, an assistant professor of nursing, teaches undergraduate and master's level courses That include qualitative research at the College of Nursing and has classes numbering 50 to 60 students.

Although lecturing might seem to be the strategy of choice in a class that size, Haase has found a way to engage her students more actively in learning.

While an Arizona Health Science Center Dean's Teaching Scholar, Dean's Teaching Scholar, Hasse developed a new way to approach teaching that is having some very exciting outcomes. Instead of lectures - and there are none - Haase has students work together in small groups to develop, carry out, and report on qualitative research studies. Faculty in the course provide resources, for example, suggestions for reading, clear guidelines for the project, and instructions in the use of appropriate technology, communications and data management.

Faculty help students learn to work independently in their groups and use each other as resources. Only when all other resources have been explored do students call on the instructor for assistance. As an extra tool, students use the computer to communicate with each other and with faculty via the internet. Clearly, this new kind of learning environment is a surprise for students used to lectures and individual note taking. For these students, group learning requires that they master not only the course content, but also new collaborative group skills.

To bridge the gap, Haase and her colleagues help prepare the students for working in groups by teaching them about various group roles and communication.

Weekly progress reports by students describe both the status of their research project and how well the group is functioning as a team. In addition, there is in-class discussion of group processes and group roles with ongoing feedback from faculty to the groups, both verbal and written. When groups encounter major problems with members that can't be resolved by the group, faculty will intervene. Haase is the first to admit that it takes time and energy to implement the structured classroom.

Not only is there a lot of up-front preparation, but also conducting and evaluating the research projects in addition to evaluating the group process takes a lot of time.

However, Haase is convinced the payoff is worth the added effort. As Haase puts
it, "When students really get involved in learning, as they do in this classroom, what they learn is likely to stick." Not only do students learn new ways to conduct qualitative research, but they learn a whole new set of collaboration and problem-solving skills to carry with them for a lifetime - skills that are in increasing demand.

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