Freshmen : Fresh Meat?

1. Freshmen: Fresh Meat? Jennifer Beattie, Freshman Seminar Coordinator

2. Freshmen: What You Know • How would you describe your first-year students? • What has the greatest impact on their success?

3. Freshmen: What We Know • Today’s first-year students are… • Increasingly diverse (demographic characteristics). • More transient—moving from institution to institution, but often not “through” any institution. • At many levels of academic preparation or readiness. • Expectations don’t match ours • Study time, esp!!

4. To Succeed or Not to succeed • Profound changes • Inability to adapt = withdrawal • Best predictors for success/persistence Student input variables vs. Institutional variable vs. Environmental variables

5. Attrition Factors

6. Challenge & Support What’s that mean??

7. A Model for Ensuring Student Success

8. Small Group Discussion Techniques • Small Group Discussion • Opportunities: participate actively • Encourage deep processing of information and ideas • Small groups, constant membership • Assign at beginning of course, sit together during classes, may meet outside of class • Assign a variety of support tasks • Minimize isolation and anonymity • TCTC = Success Teams w/ Contracts

9. Small Group Discussion Techniques • Study Groups • Encourage and even help form • Suggest what groups should do • Design homework with study groups in mind • Meet with study groups during office hours

10. Small Group Discussion Techniques • Project Groups • Complete one or more outside-of-class projects • Most work done out of class, periodic meetings in class to monitor • Recommendations: • Carefully explain rationale for project groups • Describe how student work will be evaluated • Outline responsibilities of individuals to their groups • Alert students to potential problems and ask groups to define ground rules for themselves • Provide strategies for groups to deal with uncooperative members, and • Periodically invite students to evaluate the effectiveness of their own and others’ contributions to the group

11. Writing-to-learn activities • Different than traditional writing assignments: • Write to and for themselves • To collect thoughts and get them on paper for examination and revision • Short: a few sentences, maybe a paragraph or two • Not graded

12. Other Instructional Techniques • Variety is the Spice of Life! • learning styles—expand repertoire of instructional techniques • Effective instruction = both concrete and abstract • MBTI • research shows 2/3 to ¾ of population prefer inductive approaches that move from concrete to abstract • Most college instruction—abstract • Need different approaches • Case Studies/scenarios/problem-based learning provide grounding in a human context

13. Case Studies and Scenarios • Case studies tell stories • Scenarios present situations • characters, and actions • Tensions and conflicts • Problems and question • Promote empathy w/ central characters • Raise questions students care about, have no clear-cut answers • Start w/ shorter, focused case studies scenarios for freshmen! • There are websites for help in different disciplines!

14. Problem-Based Learning

15. Experiential Learning

16. Learning About Content?

17. Three things I learned today are… Gone in 60 Seconds

18. One way I can CHALLENGE 1st year students is… Gone in 60 Seconds

19. One way I can SUPPORT 1st-year students is… Gone in 60 Seconds

20. One question I still have about challenging & supporting Freshmen is… Gone in 60 Seconds

21. Questions