Picture Essay

 

Lectures and Workshops

  




In focus groups, students enthusiastically endorsed the workshops. In contrast to lectures, anxiety is reduced, leaders are accessible, and peers supportive. They no longer feel isolated in the learning enterprise. Their incomplete knowledge is no longer felt as a liability, but permits them to join in group activities, helping and being helped. Workshops help students make connections with concepts presented in lecture.

Students and Workshop Leaders

  



 

Workshop leaders explain things differently. They supply more background information, break subject material down into smaller, more understandable chunks, and use examples to further illustrate their point.

Student and Students

  





The problem solving approach used in the workshops increases the confidence of the students. Each student is asked to explain problems and since no two students explain the same problem in the same manner, learning is enhanced.

Mistakes!

  



There are many theories and models of learning. One dichotomy contrasts the handing down of knowledge with growth from within. Clearly both approaches can make a claim on our experience. But most people have found that the exhilaration of discovery comes only after an investment of  time and energy, including mistakes and dead ends.
The importance of mistakes comes up repeatedly in focus groups. The workshops give students "the chance to make a lot of little mistakes." Students describe how leaders sometimes make mistakes, and generally, students are not afraid to challenge the leader, or to argue their point. They hold that if the professor makes a mistake, they would think that he was right!