** Low Priority ** Also, "instructional methods" don't mean so much at higher levels. At the graduate level especially, students are adults and should be able to develop the necessary understanding in any environment. We are all going to approach each discipline differently. While I can see, and I do, sticking to the textbook more with freshman undergraduate students, and have used textbooks as principle sources in graduate courses, if all a student comes back at me with in a graduate course is what is in some textbook, I would not consider that effort a passing effort at the graduate level. I make it a point to give graduate students questions of a sort they have not seen in class, but require the use of the principles learned during the course when creating tests. A student who cannot handle this is not adequately prepared for graduate level education, and is most certainly not qualified to be awarded a graduate degree. Real science doesn't come with a textbook!
"So easy it seemed once found, which yet unfound most would have thought impossible" John Milton ________________________________________ Robert G. Hamilton Department of Biological Sciences Mississippi College P.O. Box 4045 200 South Capitol Street Clinton, MS 39058 Phone: (601) 925-3872 FAX (601) 925-3978 >>> Jeff Jewett <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 11/20/07 4:11 PM >>> Speaking as a former high school teacher and current environmental science graduate student, I'd like to comment on instructors tossing the textbook from their courses. I appreciate _supplements_ to the textbook, such as selected websites, journal articles, etc. I have always had a problem, however, with instructors whose only "reading material" is something that they wrote themselves (whether it was a coursepack or something more formal). Every student learns differently, and not all students will relate well to any particular instructor's teaching style. If the course follows a decent textbook (even if assigned readings are not required), then a motivated student has a fall-back instructional method if lectures are not working (read the book!). If the only reading available is something that the instructor wrote, it is usually "more of the same" that the student heard in lecture. An instructor-written textbook rarely sheds new light on the subject or teaches with a different explanation of the concept. So...course readers and other supplemental materials are good, but be very careful that students have the opportunity to hear from a variety of instructional voices, not just one. Thanks for listening, Jeff Jewett Montana State University
