Explorations into the

Scholarship of Teaching and Learning

SoTL Background/Resources

by

Donna Killian Duffy & Kathleen Jennings Sweeney

Background Review for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning

The following pages highlight some significant documents and ideas that emerged in 1990, 1997, 1998, and 1999 to set the stage for current discussions of the scholarship of teaching and learning.

1990:  Carnegie Foundation published the report, Scholarship Reconsidered:  Priorities of the Professoriate, in which Ernest Boyer offered a new paradigm for recognizing the full range of scholarly activity by college and university faculty.  Suggested that scholarship can have 4 separate but overlapping dimensions.

Scholarship of Discovery:  focuses on traditional research but also creative work of faculty in the literary, visual, and performing arts

Question:  What do I know and how do I know it?

Scholarship of Integration:  makes connections within and between the disciplines, seeks to interpret, draw together, and bring new insight to bear on original research

Question:  What does the information mean?

Scholarship of Application: considers how to apply knowledge to problems of society

Question:  How can knowledge be responsibly applied to consequential problems?

Scholarship of Teaching:  initiates students into the best values of the academy, engaging them in new fields of study and enabling them to understand and participate more fully in the larger culture. 

Question:  In what ways does my teaching expand and transform knowledge?

Source: Boyer, E. L. (1990). Scholarship reconsidered: Priorities of the professoriate. Princeton, NJ: Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.

1997:  Publication of Scholarship Assessed: Evaluation of the Professoriate by Charles Glassick, Mary Taylor Huber, and Gene Maeroff

Devised a common language in which to discuss the standards for scholarly work of all kinds, a language that demonstrated clearly what discovery, integration, application, and teaching share as scholarly activities:

Clear Goals

Does scholar state basic purposes of his work clearly?  Does the scholar define objectives that are realistic and achievable?  Does the scholar identify important questions in the field?

Adequate Preparation

Does the scholar show an understanding of existing scholarship in the field?  Does the scholar bring the necessary skills to his or her work?  Does the scholar bring together the resources necessary to move the project forward?

Appropriate Methods

Does the scholar use methods appropriate to the goals?  Does the scholar apply effectively the methods selected?  Does the scholar modify procedures in response to changing circumstances?

Significant Results

Does the scholar achieve the goals?  Does the scholar's work add consequentially to the field?  Does the scholar's work open additional areas for further explorations?

Effective Presentations

Does the scholar use a suitable style and effective organization to present his or her work?  Does the scholar use appropriate forums for communicating work to its intended audiences?  Does the scholar present his or her message with clarity and integrity?

Reflective Critique

Does the scholar critically evaluate his or her own work?  Does the scholar bring an appropriate breadth of evidence to his or her critique?  Does the scholar use evaluation to improve the quality of future work?

Source: Glassick, C. E., Huber, M. T., & Maeroff, G. I. (1997), Scholarship assessed: Evaluation of the professoriate. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

1998: The two books on scholarship set the stage for a new initiative called the Carnegie Academy for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning  (CASTL) begun in 1998.  CASTL seeks to support the development of scholarship of teaching and learning that will:

• Foster significant, long-lasting learning for all students
• Enhance the practice and profession of teaching
• Bring to faculty member's work as teachers the recognition and reward afforded to other forms of scholarly work in higher education

CASTL has 3 parts:

1. Pew National Fellowship Program for Carnegie Scholars:  Year long commitment of faculty from different disciplines working on course projects related to scholarship of teaching and learning.  Create and disseminate examples

2. Teaching Academy Program:  Work at own institution with groups of faculty discussing ways to enhance more scholarship in teaching across the institution

3. Work with Scholarly and Professional Societies:  Integrate programs that value teaching and support members engaged in investigation of teaching in the disciplines

1999: Definition of scholarship by Lee Shulman

For an activity to be designated as scholarship, it should manifest at least 3 key characteristics.  It should be:

• Public
• Susceptible to critical review and evaluation
• Accessible for exchange and use by other members of one’s scholarly community.

Shulman questions: “What can one ask about a course in order to understand the ways in which its creation and conduct constitute a coordinated act of scholarship?”

Teaching, like other forms of scholarship, is an extended process that unfolds over time.  It embodies at least 5 elements:

Vision

Design

Interactions

Outcomes

Analysis

Scholarship of teaching will entail a public account of some or all of the full act of teaching--vision, design, enactment, outcomes, and analysis--in a manner susceptible to critical review by professional peers, and amenable to use in future work by members of that same community.

Source: Shulman, L. S. (1999). Course anatomy: The dissection and analysis of knowledge through teaching. In P. Hutchings (Ed.), The course portfolio: How faculty can examine their teaching to advance practice and improve student learning. Washington, DC: AAHE.

Selected References on the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning

Books

Brookfield, S. D. (1995). Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass

Cross, K. P., & Steadman, M. H. (1996). Classroom research. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Glassick, C. E., Huber, M. T., & Maeroff, G. I. (1997). Scholarship assessed: Evaluation of the professoriate. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Huber, M. T.,  & Morreale, S. (Ed.). (2002). Disciplinary Styles in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning: Exploring Common Ground.  Washington, DC:  AAHE.

Hutchings, P. (Ed.). (2000). Opening Lines: Approaches to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. Menlo Park:The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.

Hutchings, P. (Ed.). (1999). The course portfolio: How faculty can examine their teaching to advance practice and improve student learning. Washington, DC:  AAHE.

Hutchings, P. (Ed.). (1996). Making teaching community property: A menu for peer collaboration and peer review. Washington, DC:  AAHE.

Wiggins, G., & McTighe, J. (1998). Understanding by design. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Wiggins, G. (1998). Educative assessment. San Francisco:  Jossey-Bass.

Websites

Online journal focused on the scholarship of teaching www.doiiit.gmu.edu/inventio

Information on the Carnegie Academy for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning can be found at www.carnegiefoundation.org

Information on the AAHE Teaching Academy Program can be found at www.AAHE.org

Navigating the Web of Discourse on the scholarship of teaching and learning

http://www.ala.org/acrl/resjuly02.html     Association of College and Research libraries

The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in higher Education: An Annotated Bibliography

http://www.carnegie foundation.org/elibrary/docs/bibliography.htm

Tutorial on Scholarship of Teaching and Learning at: 

http://aahe.ital.utexas.edu/sotl_tutorial/home.html