Linking research and teaching

Associate Professor Angela BrewThe University of Sydney

Plan

Defining the agenda

Institutional strategies

What gets in the way?

Where is this going?

Teaching

Knowledge Transmission

Knowledge generation

Disciplinary Research culture

Departmental Learning milieu

Students

Research

Academics

Academics’ understandings of 'research-led teaching'

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Presentingresearch to

students

Researchingteaching

Reflections onthe task

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Research-Enhanced Learning & Teaching key areas:

1.Research-enhanced teaching

2.Research-based learning

3.Scholarship of learning and teaching

1. Research-enhanced teaching

Teaching is informed by staff research. This includes the integration of disciplinary research findings into courses and curricula at all levels such that students are both an audience for research and engaged in research activity.

2. Research-based learning

Opportunities are provided for students at all levels to experience and conduct research, learn about research throughout their courses, develop the skills of research and inquiry and contribute to the University’s research effort.

A student prepares his skating robot for a test run at the Olympic Ice Skating Rink (University of Calgary, Canada)

Research-Enhanced Learning & Teaching key areas:

1.Research-enhanced teaching

2.Research-based learning

3.Scholarship of learning and teaching

3. Scholarship of learning & teaching

Staff and students engage in scholarship and/or research in relation to understanding learning and teaching. Evidence-based approaches are used to establish the effects and effectiveness of student learning, teaching effectiveness and academic practice.

the scholarship of teaching as a kind of ‘going meta’ in

which academics frame and systematically

investigate questions in relation to teaching and

learning

(Hutchings & Shulman 1999)

Key elements of the scholarship of teaching and learning

Knowledge of teaching and learning and the literature that informs it

Commitment to reflection on teaching practice in order to improve it

Communicating and disseminating knowledge about teaching and learning in a variety of ways

Taking account of students’ perspectives

Following: Trigwell, K., Martin, E., Benjamin J. & Prosser, M. (2000)

Plan

Defining the agenda

Institutional strategies

What gets in the way?

Where is this going?

Plan

Defining the agenda

Institutional strategies

What gets in the way?

Where is this going?

University of Sydney Context

University Plan, Faculty Teaching and

Learning Plans

Performance-based funding for teaching

including a “Scholarship Index”

Scholarship of Teaching Index Criteria

Qualification in university teaching (10)

National teaching award (winner) (10)

National teaching award (finalist only) (5)

University teaching award (including awards for Excellence in Research Higher Degree Supervision) (5)

Faculty teaching award (2)

Publication on university teaching – book (10)

Publication on university teaching – refereed chapter (2)

Publication on university teaching – refereed article (2)

Presented conference paper or poster on university teaching (1)

University of Sydney Context

University Plan, Faculty Teaching and Learning Plans

Performance-based funding for teaching including a “Scholarship Index”

Vice Chancellor’s Awards for Outstanding Teaching and for Research Higher Degree Supervision

Criteria for promotion

Use of problem-based or issues-based curricula

Project Aims

Increasingly employ undergraduate teaching and learning strategies which enhance the links between research and teaching

and utilise scholarly inquiry as an organising

principle in departmental organisation, and curriculum development

and Encourage and reward the scholarship of

teaching

Strategies to develop research-led teaching

A Working Group

Strategies to develop research-led teaching

A Working GroupA web-site for staff development

Strategies to develop research-led teaching

A Working GroupA web-site for staff developmentWorkshops to faculties & departmentsLarge events to raise issuesFaculty reviews A Graduate Certificate in higher education unit

to teach academics to research their teaching

Faculty Initiatives

Grad cert in higher education mandatory for all new staff

Faculty research on teaching & learning website /in-house publication

Teaching & learning support unit within the facultyFaculty Teaching & Learning Committee

subcommittee on Scholarship of teachingFaculty staff seminar series on teaching & learning

issuesStaff publish in journals and/or attend teaching &

learning conferences

Plan

Defining the agenda

Institutional strategies

What gets in the way?

Where is this going?

Plan

Defining the agenda

Institutional strategies

What gets in the way?

Where is this going?

Issues

Tendency to redefine existing practice

Ethics in teaching

Campus planning

Involving the research community

How to move on

What gets in the way?

Economies of funding regimes

Separate evaluation of teaching and research

Research

Teaching

What gets in the way?

Economies of funding regimes

Separate evaluation of teaching and research

Hierarchical levels

Academic mindsets

Student mindsets

Modular course structures

Clearly prescribed course outcomes

Plan

Defining the agenda

Institutional strategies

What gets in the way?

Where is this going?

Plan

Defining the agenda

Institutional strategies

What gets in the way?

Where is this going?

“What is required is not that students become masters of bodies of thought, but that

they are enabled to begin to experience the space and challenge of open, critical

inquiry (in all its personal and interpersonal aspects)”

(Barnett 1997: 110)

Inclusivity

Academics, undergraduates,

postgraduates and others in the university involved together

Relationships characterised by ‘democratic discussion’

Awareness of power issues

Scholarship

Scholarship as a quality of academic professionalism

Scholarships of discovery, integration, engagement

& academic citizenship

Knowledge Building

Starts from the questions of participants Mode 2 knowledge

constructed through communication and

negotiation

Research

Expanded definitions & conceptions Development of social knowledge and

personal meaningTeaching as research

Inquiry-based academic practice

Reflexivity

Teaching and learning

Student-focused conceptual change approaches to teaching and learning

Research-based learning

Communities

Mutual engagement in a joint enterprise

Learning as participation Personal Identity developed

through: engagement, imagination & enlightenment Inclusive scholarly

knowledge-building communities

From: Brew, A. (2006). Research and Teaching: Beyond the Divide. London

PalgraveMacmillan.

Inclusivity

Academics, undergraduates,

postgraduates and others in the university involved together

Relationships characterised by ‘democratic discussion’

Awareness of power issues

Scholarship

Scholarship as a quality of academic professionalism

Scholarships of discovery, integration, engagement

& academic citizenship

Knowledge Building

Starts from the questions of participants Mode 2 knowledge

constructed through communication and

negotiation

Research

Expanded definitions & conceptions Development of social knowledge and

personal meaningTeaching as research

Inquiry-based academic practice

Reflexivity

Teaching and learning

Student-focused conceptual change approaches to teaching and learning

Research-based learning

Communities

Mutual engagement in a joint enterprise

Learning as participation Personal Identity developed

through: engagement, imagination & enlightenment Inclusive scholarly

knowledge-building communities

From: Brew, A. (2006). Research and Teaching: Beyond the Divide. London

PalgraveMacmillan.

Inclusivity

Academics, undergraduates,

postgraduates and others in the university involved together

Relationships characterised by ‘democratic discussion’

Awareness of power issues

Scholarship

Scholarship as a quality of academic professionalism

Scholarships of discovery, integration, engagement

& academic citizenship

Knowledge Building

Starts from the questions of participants Mode 2 knowledge

constructed through communication and

negotiation

Research

Expanded definitions & conceptions Development of social knowledge and

personal meaningTeaching as research

Inquiry-based academic practice

Reflexivity

Teaching and learning

Student-focused conceptual change approaches to teaching and learning

Research-based learning

Communities

Mutual engagement in a joint enterprise

Learning as participation Personal Identity developed

through: engagement, imagination & enlightenment Inclusive scholarly

knowledge-building communities

From: Brew, A. (2006). Research and Teaching: Beyond the Divide. London

PalgraveMacmillan.

Brew, A. (2006). Research and Teaching: Beyond the Divide. London: Palgrave Macmillan.

Jenkins, A, Breen, R., & Lindsay, R. & Brew, A. (2003). Reshaping Teaching in Higher Education : Linking Teaching and Research. London: Kogan Page.

Brew, A. (2001). The nature of research:

inquiry in academic contexts. London, RoutledgeFalmer.