General Pedagogy

Bain, Ken. What the Best College Teachers Do. Harvard University Press, 2004.

In this text, Ken Bain studies the practices common to the most effective professors captured in his study. These instructors’ success was largely measured by how well students achieved meeting highly valuable learning objectives, including critical thinking, analysis, problem solving, and creativity. Key features of outstanding teachers include thorough knowledge of their subject, understanding how students learn, expecting more of students, confronting and solving important problems, stimulating students' interest through making topics relevant to students, developing positive interactive relationships with students based on trust and respect, and assessing one’s teaching efforts and making improvements. These components stem from the idea that “...the most effective teachers generally thought more carefully and extensively about their intentions with students and let those aspirations and attitudes guide them in their teaching,” (Bain 122). The features in his text reflect approaches to a good teacher’s intentions. Additionally, Bain argues that student learning should not be measured exclusively by students’ success on examinations; rather, good teachers have a larger impact on students, resulting in a “positive influence on how students think, act, and feel” (Bain 5). Bain organizes the text by examining the effective teachers’ content knowledge, pedagogical approach, and relationship with students before assessing the theory behind student and teacher evaluations.

A potential disadvantage of this text is that the arguments can be a little vague, which may make it difficult for readers to find practical applications from the text alone. Also, although the process of finding the subjects of the study is as thorough and acceptable as possible, there is always the potential for error in the subjective act of selecting “the best.” Still, the text makes strong arguments for certain attitudes toward teacher-student relations, the role of quantitative measurement in learning, and the nature of how students learn that are compelling and should encourage readers to try employing some of these ideas, which are still relatively on the periphery of standard academic practice.

This book presents a framework of essential shifts teachers must make to implement
learner-centered teaching. The text begins with an exploration of the theoretical
underpinnings of a learner-centered teaching approach, identifying many pedagogical
theories including constructivism, Self-efficacy, Attribution Theory, and critical
pedagogy. From these origins, the text makes the assertion that “the goal of
learner-centered teaching is the development of students as autonomous, self-directed,
and self-regulated learners”(9). As such, the role of the teacher and the “balance of
power” must change. The text further argues that teachers must release absolute control
of the learning experience and share the power with students. This sharing of power is not
a “wholesale” transfer of power but rather a collaborative and complimentary endeavor
between instructor and learner. The text then moves forward to outline five elements of
learner-centered classroom. These elements shift the management and regulation of
learning into the hands of students and foster a collaborative culture that empowers
students to learn from each other. The framework presented in this text provides teachers
with practical changes to work towards when designing a learning-centered classroom.
Furthermore, the theoretical origins shared at the beginning of the text provide teachers
with a solid foundation upon which they can begin building their own understanding of
this method.

Scott, Kathy Lynn and Wendy Murawski, editors. What Really Works With Universal Design for Learning. United States, SAGE Publications, 2019.

In the book What Really Works with Universal Design for Learning, nearly thirty different contributors write not only about the ideas behind UDL, but also the evidence that it works. Contributors discuss essential topics like integrating UDL into project-based learning assignments, how UDL can help with practical skills in the classroom, and how educators can use instructional supports like technology and consistent limits for students to build a better unit based on the principles of UDL. The text addresses basic concerns like the general definition of UDL and why it was initially created as well as more complex concerns like how to address social skills in the classroom while maintaining a focus on UDL. Early on, the editors suggest, “Our goal is that every student needs to experience achievement, growth, and success” (6), and they work to make sure teachers understand how to do that throughout the text. Each contributor works to help educators working with students look at the research behind UDL to better understand if it is right for their students then actually apply it in a working classroom. One particularly important section looked at the integration of project-based learning with UDL. The chapter successfully described project-based learning for those unfamiliar with the concept, then talked about why it works so well with UDL. The chapter then went on to discuss how to engage students with specific strategies any teacher could implement. “Have students set clear academic goals for their work as they begin to develop their project ideas. Help them identify what supports are necessary to ensure they can meet expectations. For example, what materials and resources will they need . . .” one section suggests helpfully (52). The section ends, as all of them do, with readings, references, websites that might be helpful in lesson design, and apps that work well in this setting. This work is important for any educator because it challenges them not just to think about yet another theory or educational acronym, but to understand how the research behind this might actually work well in a variety of different settings and to put it into practice.

Jung, Lee Ann. “Lesson Planning with Universal Design for Learning.” Educational Leadership. Summer 2021. Pp 38 – 43.

In the journal article “Lesson Planning with Universal Design for Learning,” Author Lee Ann Jung guides teachers through the ideas behind universal design for learning and offers instructional advice to improve student engagement and incorporate multiple means of action and expression throughout a given unit. She supports her advice with bulleted lists of specific ideas to incorporate into any lesson plan. For example, in one list of strategies teachers can use to allow students to express their learning, she suggests actions like, “Individual Conference with a Teacher” and “Diagram or Graph,” consistently offering options that would be accessible to all learners (Jung 43). Jung’s purpose is to not only help teachers understand more about the ideas behind UDL, but also to be able to quickly and easily implement the strategies behind UDL into their own classrooms. This article is aimed at K-12 teachers, which is clear from the K-12 specific examples she uses in the text. For example, in her opening paragraphs, she creates a fictionalized unit in a high school classroom. This work is significant for anyone who wants to build a K-12 unit around the theory of UDL because it offers a number of helpful ideas that could work with any type of lesson.