ON PEDAGOGY
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I hope it's not too pretentious to suggest that Socrates is one of my models of an effective teacher. |
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Pedagogy is a fancy word that describes a theory or method of education. Everyone who teaches has a theory and method, even if they aren't conscious of it. I want to briefly describe my own educational philosophy so that you can better benefit from taking my classes by knowing how I approach teaching.
Every class I teach includes a substantial amount of primary reading material. Primary, in this sense, refers to the original works in a field and is different from secondary works, which are typically written by scholars (often text book authors) and intended to interpret, explain, and sometimes simplify the more demanding original texts. For example, in my World Religion classes, the Huston Smith book, The World's Religions, is a secondary text. Its purpose is to provide an accessible introduction to the different religions we study. Primary texts for the course include the Bible, the Tao Te Ching, and the Bhagavad Gita. Many primary texts, especially those which have stood the test of time, are now classics. Such works include the writings of Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Machiavelli, Shakespeare, Rousseau, Marx, Tocqueville, and the scriptures of the world's religions. The works that do or don't belong on this list of the western or world canon is constantly subject to debate. I am less interested in debating what should be on the list than I am in reading some of the works that most people agree are on the list to stay.
Works become canonical in part by eluding simple or single interpretations. Many people read and respect the Bible, but they don't all agree about what it teaches. Some people believe that it teaches that God created the world in six twenty-four hour days, while others believe that it emphasizes that God created the world without seeking to stipulate his timing or method.
For me, a good class is one in which students have become aware of some of the interpretive questions that arise in connection with the texts they're reading, and become thoughtful about the range of ways those questions might be answered. As a result, I don't lecture very much in class, since at best, lecturing can tell you how other people interpret the texts we're reading. Through a mixture of question and answer and discussion, I hope that students become thoughtful about the works we read.
Now, to become thoughtful about a text, it is necessary to actually read it. Procrastination is the age-old student vice, and to give students an incentive not to put off the reading for my classes, each section includes weekly quizzes. This is even true in my telecourse sections, where the quiz questions are printed in the syllabus and can only be answered by viewing the week's telecast. Students always have an opportunity to ask questions before quizzes--even in online sections, where students can ask question on the bulletin board before they attempt a quiz, and in telecourse sections, where students can email me questions on any thing they don't quite understand. The questions I ask in quizzes are not usually interpretive, but factual, and cover the concepts one must understand before one begins to interpret the texts we study.
Finally, I rely entirely on essays for students to convey what they have learned in a class. Sometimes the essays are formal essays written outside of class, and sometimes they are in-class blue book essay exams. They always provide students with a choice of topics to explore to reflect what they have learned from the readings and topics covered by the essay.
In summary: the reading for
my courses is primary-text centered.
Classes begin with quizzes whose purpose is to "encourage" students
to keep up with the reading.
Class time is spent substantially on question and answer and discussion.
Students are graded through essays which presume that they understand
the "facts" behind their reading and ask them to interpret
what they've read in essay form.
There are certainly other ways to teach the humanities, but these are the methods I rely on.