== Quote from BCS (a...@pathlink.com)'s article > Reply to Sean, > > Some professors seem to think that lecturing about material that isn't > > presented anywhere else will force students to attend class. But in > > my experience it also creates a class that takes notes furiously > > rather than engaging the material and asking questions. Overall, I > > think it's a counterproductive strategy. > At the other end, if the professor *only* lectures on what's in the book, > what are they being paid for? Just talking? Better would be for the professor > to lecture on application, the what/why (and not the how), how ideas are > related, anecdotes and the like.
Exactly my feelings. Reading the book at one's own pace is a good way to get all the nitty-gritty technical details down. What lecture should be for is understanding the stuff at a higher level. This includes asking questions, discussions, broad overviews to help students see the forest instead of just the trees, etc. I tend to feel that huge lecture hall lectures, were any interactiveness is impractical, are largely a waste of time unless the lecturer is exceptionally engaging and/or you have enough background in the topic already that you're mostly interested in understanding another point of view on the subject rather than learning it for the first time.
