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A Quarterly Publication of
The American Sociological Association
ABSTRACTS
Volume 36, Number 1, January 2008ARTICLES
- Inquiry-Guided Learning in Sociology ..... Maxine P. Atkinson and Andrea N. Hunt
- Information Literacy: The Partnership of Sociology Faculty and Social Science Librarians ..... Patti Caravello, Edward L. Kain, Triveni Kuchi, Susan Macicak, and Gregory Weiss
- Using ICPSR Resources to Teach Sociology ..... Lynette F. Hoelter, Felicia B. LeClere, Rachael E. Barlow, Amy M. Pienta, and James W. McNally
- Critical Pedagogy in the Sociology Classroom: Challenges and Concerns ..... Catherine Fobes and Peter Kaufman
- Learning by Exams: The Impact of Two-Stage Cooperative Tests ..... Marisol Clark-Ibáñez and Linda Scott
- Facilitating Active Student Engagement and Dynamic Learning in Theory, Research Methods, and Statistice ..... Ginger Macheski, Kathleen S. Lowney, Jan Buhrmann, and Melanie E. L. Bush
- Teaching Transgender ..... Tre Wentling, Kristen Schilt, Elroi Windsor, and Betsy Lucal
- Teaching Work and Family to Undergraduate Students: Catalyzing Pedagogical, Curricular, and Programmatic Innovations ..... Stephen Sweet, Joshua Mumm, Marcie Pitt-Catsouphes, and Judith Casey
- Teaching the Sociology of Gender and Work ..... Patti Giuffre, Cynthia Anderson, and Sharon Bird,
- Improving Pedagogy through Action Learning and Scholarship of Teaching and Learning ..... Cheryl Albers
- How to Do the Scholarhip of Teaching and Learning ..... Liz Grauerholz and John F. Zipp
Inquiry-Guided Learning in Sociology
This paper is based on a workshop of the same name presented at the 2007 American Sociological Association meetings. The purpose of the workshop and this article is to focus attention on teaching methods that require students to actively investigate sociological phenomena. During the workshop, participants practiced constructing inquiry-guided learning activities suitable for a range of different courses taught throughout the curriculum. These activities are described here. Inquiry-guided learning (IGL) includes a variety of teaching methods that assist students in their investigation of questions and problems. Fundamental to IGL in sociology is the notion that students should think and act like sociologists. IGL activities provide a means whereby the instructor models and the student practices the same disciplinary activities. Students “do” sociology rather than just learning about the results of others.
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Information Literacy: The Partnership of Sociology Faculty and Social Science Librarians
This paper discusses a joint project of the American Library Association and the American Sociological Association. The goal of this collaboration is to guarantee that students of sociology, particularly sociology majors, develop strong information literacy skills during their undergraduate experience. The article talks about national standards for information literacy and how they relate to the sociology major. It presents examples for applying the sociology information literacy standards to course assignments and the sociology curriculum. We also provide suggestions for building linkages between sociology faculty members and social science librarians, as well as ways in which information literacy outcomes might be assessed in the sociology curriculum.
Using ICPSR Resources to Teach Sociology
The focus on quantitative literacy has been increasingly outside the realm of mathematics. The social sciences are well suited to including quantitative elements throughout the curriculum but doing so can mean challenges in preparation and presentation of material for instructors and increased anxiety for students. This paper describes tools and resources available through the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) that will aid students and instructors engaging in quantitative literacy across the curriculum. The Online Learning Center is a source of empirical activities aimed at undergraduates in lower-division substantive courses and Exploring Data through Research Literature presents an alternative to traditional research methods assignments. Searching and browsing tools, archive structures, and extended online-analysis tools make it easier for students in upper-division undergraduate and graduate courses to engage in exercises that increase quantitative literacy, and paper competitions reward them for doing so.
Critical Pedagogy in the Sociology Classroom: Challenges and Concerns
Although critical pedagogy has been discussed in the Teaching Sociology literature for nearly twenty years, dialogues about the difficulties in practicing and implementing critical pedagogical strategies in everyday classroom life are less common. In this note, we discuss a predominant theme of our workshop: challenges and concerns that may arise when one attempts to do critical pedagogy. We focus on both challenges and potential solutions for learners, instructors, and institutions of higher education. Understanding what some of these obstacles are and how they manifest in institutions of higher learning goes a long way in devising strategies to assuage their deleterious effects.
Learning to Teach Online
The demand for online courses is growing. This paper offers suggestions on how to teach online courses that promote student engagement and learning. We discuss the benefits and challenges of teaching online. We share research-based strategies for designing an online course and draw upon our experience of developing fully online sociology courses. Practical suggestions include preparing students, promoting learning through the discussion board, managing communication, incorporating multimedia, and evaluating the course. Recommendations for modifying teaching strategies for the online environment are also included. Student comments from anonymous surveys convey the student perspective about taking online courses. Developing an online class is possible with early planning and an awareness of how to engage students.
Facilitating Active Student Engagement and Dynamic Learning in Theory, Research Methods, and Statistics
Participants in the 2007 American Sociological Association teaching workshop, “Innovative Teaching Practices for Difficult Subjects,” shared concerns about teaching statistics, research methods, and theory. Strategies for addressing these concerns center on building a community of learners by creating three processes throughout the course: 1) an ongoing active role for students; 2) mechanisms to establish a common language of discourse; and 3) a means of monitoring students’ feelings. Examples are provided which introduce readers to ideas which can help in the creation and maintenance of a successful community of learners when teaching these difficult subjects. These processes can build student engagement and help to reduce student anxieties. More detailed information about specific exercises, examples, and bibliographic resources which were distributed at the workshop, can be found on the Teaching Sociology website. rules.
The recent visibility of transgender lives demonstrates the dawning of a new period in the potential to include transgender topics in sociology courses. The focus on transgender individuals, communities, and inclusive initiatives are gaining momentum on many public and private college and university campuses, awakening old and new curiosities, igniting student activists and advocates everywhere. Such developments provide an important opportunity for instructors who are motivated to create trans-friendly syllabi, courses, and classrooms. In this article, we briefly explore how transgender people have been used to teach sociological concepts and provide strategies to positively integrate transgender communities into the classroom. Ultimately, we intend this article to show new and more sensitive ways to include transgender experiences into a wide range of sociological courses.
Teaching Work and Family to Undergraduate Students: Catalyzing Pedagogical, Curricular, and Programmatic Innovations
In 2006 and 2007, two workshops on teaching work-family courses were held at the annual meetings of the American Sociological Association. This article examines the current challenges and strategies of teaching work-family, as identified by workshop participants, and the resources that are available through the Sloan Work and Family Research Network. Three concerns are considered: pedagogy, curriculum and programming. Analysis of syllabi, course catalogues, and teaching activities reveal that work-family scholars are making innovative contributions to teaching, but work-family has yet to have a firm position in the undergraduate curriculum. We argue that increasing undergraduate’s exposure to work-family concerns is one of the most significant challenges—and potential contributions—for work-family scholars to address.
This paper describes two teaching strategies from our workshop, “Teaching the Sociology of Gender and Work,” that can help students understand the mechanisms and consequences of workplace gender inequality at the macro- and micro-levels. Cynthia Anderson’s class project uses wage and sex composition data that allows students to learn actively how data are used to study general trends and changes over time. It encourages students to explore the reality of their possible careers and fields in terms of wages, proportion of women and men, and other factors. Sharon Bird’s class exercise requires students to consider the interactional dynamics of everyday work life and encourages them to see the subtle processes of marginalization and exclusion while also thinking about how to overcome gender biases. Some of this information will contribute to student angst about inequality in the workplace; thus, we conclude with suggestions for decreasing potential student distress and increasing student empowerment.
Improving Pedagogy through Action Learing and Scholarship of Teaching and Learning
This ASA Teaching Workshop explored the potential of Action Learning to use teachers’ tacit knowledge to collaboratively confront pedagogical issues. The Action Learning model grows out of industrial management and is based on the notion that peers are a valuable resource for learning about how to solve the problems encountered in the workplace. Action Learning groups (called sets) engage in reflection and collaboration with the goal of identifying and implementing strategies that address specific teaching problems. Scholarship of Teaching and Learning provides guidance for systematically documenting and disseminating the impact on student learning that results from changed classroom practice. Together Action Learning and SoTL promote the improvement of teaching through collaborative reflection on tacit knowledge, paired with formal knowledge as documented in the literature.
At the 2007 annual meetings of the American Sociological Association, we presented a workshop entitled “How to do the Scholarship of Teaching.” The workshop had three main goals: to introduce participants to the literature on the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) and to various SoTL outlets, to guide participants in the process of doing their own SoTL research, and to enhance participants’ chances of getting their SoTL work published, especially in the discipline’s teaching journal, Teaching Sociology. The overarching purpose of the workshop and this paper is to help participants and readers think about how their own experiences in the classroom could be transformed into research.
The Editor of Teaching Sociology is Liz Grauerholz.
For articles, notes, and conversations, send manuscripts to: Liz Grauerholz, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Purdue University Stone Hall, 700 West State Street, West Lafayette, IN 47907-2059. Phone: 765-494-5874, Fax: 765-496-1476.
For book, video, and software reviews, send manuscripts to: Jay Howard, Department of Sociology, Indiana University Columbus, 4601 Central Avenue, Columbus, IN 47203-1769.
For questions about manuscript processing, contact Monica Mendez, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, University of Central Florida, Howard Phillips Hall 403, Orlando, FL 32816-1360. Phone: 407-823-2227, Fax: 407-823-3026.
The Webmaster is Pauline H. Pavlakos. Observations on form and egregious spelling may be directed to Ms. Pavlakos.
The Teaching Sociology Web Page is located at the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Le Moyne College, the Jesuit College of Central New York.
Page last updated: December 15, 2007
