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Structuring knowledge

I think they like the way that I teach because I have - because I came from China, perhaps the way I explain things, whether it is theory or calculations, maybe my way of thinking, is more similar than, you know, to theirs....

Do you have any sense of what it is about your teaching that makes it more acceptable to them?

The way that I always emphasize an area which I think is important to understand, right? I always repeat things two or three times, whereas maybe other teachers - I'm not criticizing anyone, but I'm just saying, that maybe they go through quickly, whereas I always at the start of my lecture try to tell students the main content of learning for my lecture today, and at the end of my lecture what I want them to understand, you know, the main area of study. And I try to say, this is what you need to understand for today's three- or two-hour lecture. And the next week I'll repeat what I said last time – you know. This, I think, is very common in China, that lecturers or professors use that approach in their teaching.

— Economics lecturer

I quite liked my lecturer because he usually reviewed the last lecture at the beginning, and then move on to the new one, and at the end he will – like, apply the theory to the situation, or tests or questions, to help us to understand and how to apply the theory. I like that type of style, not just keep talking!

— Anne

Clerehan (1995) found that international students' lecturer notes tended not to capture the hierarchical information structure of a commercial law lecture, compared with the notes of the local students. Mulligan & Kirkpatrick (2000) highlight the importance of:

  • making the structure of each lecture clear to the students
  • clearly signalling transitions and key terms and concepts, and
  • ensuring that students understand how each lecture in a course links to the other lectures.

Structure

  • Provide outline and structure of lecture at the beginning.
  • Provide clear introduction, topic development and summary conclusion.
  • Make the aims of the lesson explicit and clear.
  • Follow a straightforward progression with a predictable format.

— Mulligan & Kirkpatrick (2000), p. 35

Signalling

  • Explicitly identify important information and key concepts.
  • Use clear discourse markers*.
  • Do not rely on tone or intonation alone to signal changes of topic, etc.

— Mulligan & Kirkpatrick (2000), p. 35

*See Language and Learning Online: Listen for important cues

Review and Further Study

  • Provide details of source materials used in lecture and where to find them.
  • Relate lecture content explicitly to other course content, previous/next weeks' lecture and/or assessment requirements.

— Mulligan & Kirkpatrick (2000), p. 35

All of these points are developed in further detail in Gibbs et al. (1992), pp. 59-90. Particularly valuable, too, are their comments on repetition used in conjunction with structuring moves, and on "Structuring the process" of lecturing (see Initiatives in the first weeks).

At each stage, instead of saying, "The next thing is (d)...." and diving in, you can repeat what has been covered so far: "So now we've looked at (a), (b) and (c), and we can now go on to (d)". You can go one step further than this and repeat the main elements of each section: "In (a) we saw that...., in (b) we saw that...., in (c) we have just seen that...., and now we can move on to (d)". Linked with the use of an OHP transparency [or a presentation slide]..., this form of repetition really drums the points home.... This building up and rehearsal of the content of a lecture as it develops can help us to link chains of ideas together, and can work well when the lecture is structured as a story, investigation, or other logical sequence.

— Gibbs et al. (1992), p. 73

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