Peer Review

Interdisciplinary Approaches to Teaching

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Overview:: The site gives a comprehensive overview of interdisciplinary teaching including 1)What is Interdisciplinary Teaching?, 2) Why Teach In an Interdisciplinary Fashion? and How to Teach in an Interdisciplinary Manner. Included are 6 specific examples of interdisciplinary teaching and a comprehensive lists of references and resources. The resources is part of Pedagogy in Action Portal of the Science Education Resource Center at Carleton College.
Type of Material:: Website
Recommended Uses:: For professional development of instructors
Technical Requirements:: None
Identify Major Learning Goals:: The learning goal is to introduce interdisciplinary teaching and equip instructors with the knowledge and tools to teach in the manner
Target Student Population:: Faculty development rofessionals and iinstructors
Prerequisite Knowledge or Skills:: none

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Strengths:: Interdisciplinary instruction entails the use and integration of methods and analytical frameworks from more than one academic discipline to examine a theme, issue, question or topic. The hallmark of interdisciplinary education is integration of notions and guiding principles from multiple disciplines to systematically form a more complete, and hopefully coherent, framework of analysis that offers a richer understanding of the issue under examination.
This resource is very comprehensive and should help any instructor who is interested in interdisciplinary teaching get started. The How to Teach section and the examples are particularly useful.
Concerns:: None

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Strengths:: The site is well constructed and the principles are easily understood.
Concerns:: none

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Strengths:: It's easly to navigate the site. The extensive list of references is useful.
Concerns:: none

Other Issues and Comments:: The most challenging part of interdisciplinary instruction is moving beyond examination of an issue from the lens of multiple disciplines, to the synthesis and integration of insights into a more inclusive framework of analysis. A six step procedure for how to effectively integrate idea from multiple disciplines is provided in the section of the module dedicated to How to engage in interdisciplinary Teaching along with teaching tips, insights on how to reduce the costs of becoming an interdisciplinary teacher, and ideas on what types of classes are best suited for interdisciplinary instruction.
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