How Do I Improve My Lectures?

How Can I Best Organize My Lectures?

We discovered that the most highly-rated lecturers nearly always have five elements in their lectures:


1. Begin with a question.
       
   What question will the lecture help students to understand? How can you most effectively raise that question? Is there a story that will raise the question? ...(More)...

What's Wrong and (Right) with Lectures?

What can we hope to accomplish when we lecture to students? If we expect no more than to communicate information, then B. F. Skinner and others were right: the lecture method should have disappeared with the invention of the printing press. Students can read faster than we can talk. We can assure accuracy and thoroughness and save time by saying it once on paper. Students can review the printed page with considerable confidence that it will be more accurate than their notes. Word processors allow us to make constant changes, to keep "the lecture" on the "cutting edge" of advancing knowledge (once the standard defense for offering lectures). ...(More)...