<p>My experience with huge classes was at the U of MN. I was able to get discussions going with 700+ students. Even the bigger Bio and Psch classes were good.</p>
<p>Rutgers Busch is sure an odd place. So is Livingston College campus -basically across the road from Busch. My son transfered to RU and all transfers had to live there, in one dorm. The sight of all those trees and deer were too much for him. (g) The Rutgers college area is where all the fun and games take place. They run a system wide, too slow, very crowded bus system. Takes the Busch kids about 20 minutes to get to the more lively area.
There is no doubt that the kids find plenty of excitement, parties and things to do. Maybe too much fun on occasion.<br>
What's happening with the budget cuts is scary, and no real way to predict it's effect on the 2007 students. DD got more Douglass paperwork today and it looks like they have some separate scholarships. Going to have DS email the women he knows who attended for some feedback on it all.</p>
<p>
[quote]
There was one lecture in Physics (AP French) that was so good--"shooting the monkey" to illustrate trajectories--that I went to it again the next year.
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</p>
<p>We had the same lecture at Harvard, but our prof wasn't a Nobel Prize winner. In fact he was only a "senior lecturer", but he was great. :)</p>
<p>Another great lecture was John Finlay who somehow talked about Aristophanies, jelly beans and his grandsons. It made sense at the time...</p>
<p>I liked having a mix of small seminars and big lectures.</p>
<p>I go to midsized public flagship (~10,000 undergrads as the state has a relatively small population) and am in the honors program. I've taken small seminar courses of around 20-25 and larger lectures (~220 for intro to bio II). I like certain aspects of each, but I don't mind being "talked at" for 50 minutes by a good talker! The professors should be knowledgable in their fields and so often what you learn is fascinating. Also, professors in large lectures aren't necessarily "untouchable." In my chem class of about 120 this semester, for example, there are always kiids coming up after class and asking questions (as well as during the lecture of course) and the professor is happy to answer. We break up abd due problems in small grioups around 3 times a lecture or so, so problems are more easily nipped in the bud. </p>
<p>In my psych class last semester of around 80 students, we had a professor who was part-time, young, and didn't have the highest degree in her field (she's in the process of getting it now, I think). The class was almost entirely lecture. Sound like a recipe of disaster? Nope! It was awesome, I'd-pay-to-sit-through-this again awesome. It was funny and engaging and informative. Furthermore, one day maybe half-way through the term, she came up to me, addressed me by name, and complimented me on my work. Never mind that I sat in the back or that we didn't have lengthy "philosophical" discussions, she knew who I was, she had an opinion of me, and she knew about my work. I wasn't nameless and faceless.</p>
<p>This is not to say that large lectures don't have drawbacks, or that I would necessarily want ALL large lectures (I do like that small classes allow for better meeting other students and for random "what-ifs" and whatnots in terms of questions and for checking in lecture understanding), but I don't think large lecture are doomed to be boring or even impersonal. A bad professor in a bad in any class, a wonderful professor is wonderul in any class.</p>
<p>TA's often get a bad rap but S has said that after attending his large(150+) Chem. classes led by the professor, it was really the TA who explained and helped with problems in the smaller group sessions. </p>
<p>His favorite class this semseter is one with around 100 students, Soil Science, says the prof. makes it very interesting. If someone can make studying dirt interesting they must be pretty good.</p>
<p>wolfpiper, I enjoyed reading your post (#44), particularly your statement that you didn't mind being "talked at" for a while by someone who knows his/her stuff. As you probably know, that position is completely contrary to current education theory; it is encouraging to find a student (an obviously smart one) who acknowledges that some things can be learned by listening to a lecture and taking notes.</p>
<p>midmo,
Thanks! I'm glad someone gets something useful out of my incoherent posts :) Yes, I know I'm at oods with modern educational theory; in one of my classes, we were asked for midterm suggestions for the class and most students put that they wented more in class activities. I wrote that I really liked the lectures. Of course, a bad lecturer isn't as fun, but it's less painful, imo, than a bad "active learning" exercise. I like to know things and sometimes, the only way you know is to be told.</p>
<p>midmo:</p>
<p>Just out of curiosity, what can be taught in a lecture that can't be taught just as well, or even better, by reading the lecture? For that matter, what can be taught in a lecture that can't be done better with video?</p>
<p>Tarhunt: Have you ever seen a play performed, as opposed merely to reading it or watching the movie? How about music? Why see a live performance, when you could listen to a CD or maybe even watch a DVD? And, you know, Dickens and Mark Twain made more off of their live-reading tours than they did selling books. People like "live".</p>
<p>Lectures can be fun, entertaining, inspiring, and involve some spontaneity. Opportunities are created by having a whole bunch of people in one room paying attention to the same thing at the same time: maybe they'll talk about it afterward, maybe they'll have a chance to ask the lecturer a question.</p>
<p>When I was in college, the largest lecture courses were the largest because they were the best. The teachers were not only brilliant, but brilliant performers, and the lectures tended to draw an audience that went considerably beyond those registered for the class.</p>
<p>Daughter had a couple of 800+ classes her freshman/soph year at big State U (25,000) in classes such as Chemistry, and some in the 100-400 range. She did what was suggested before - sat in the front few rows. Seated there, you often aren't even aware of what is going on behind you. Also, if her assigned TA was subpar, she would seek out another one who was good. It took time, but she learned how to work the system. Find out when the professor's office hours are and go in with questions. Then she/he has a face with one of the 800+ names. Also, TAs often 'share' an office and she would go in a different times until she found one who genuinely seemed interested and knowledgable. Not a panacea, but seemed to help. D is also in the honors program at State U. The problem is that when you are a freshman/soph, honors classes are often filled by the time it is your turn to select classes and you are stuck with what is left. All things we are keeping in mind as D#2 (senior this year) looks at schools. Older D has done fine with this arrangement, not sure younger D would.</p>
<p>Tarhunt,</p>
<p>The comparison I had in mind was lecture vs. "construct your own knowledge" activities and undirected, unfocused "discussions" in which everyone's opinion is given equal weight. Most certainly I don't advocate replacing seminars and discussion style classes with large lectures. Wolfpiper's post caught my attention because two nights ago I sat through a high school teacher's presentation of what my 15-year old could expect in her world studies class next year; the teacher has done away with "useless lectures", tests and "answering those questions at the end of the chapter". All knowledge will be attained and evaluated by group projects, the goal of which will be to "construct your own meaning of historical events." My thoughts on this are retrograde, I know, but I still see some benefit to allowing knowledgeable people to share what they know.</p>
<p>Now, for your question, which was live-lecture vs. reading or video. I'm a big reader, in fact I learn best by reading because I'm sure I retain more. Still, I think the live format is better as the primary mode of presenting introductory material because a good lecturer will utilize a variety of media, which makes things more interesting, and immediate give-and-take with students can be invaluable for clarifying difficult material. Video is wonderful for providing information to students who cannot be there in person, and holds great promise for improving education around the world; I think it works best when students can link up by internet afterwords and discuss the lecture among themselves and with an instructor. I still think the ideal is a live lecture--for some classes. For others, small seminars.</p>
<p>And of course, for natural sciences, hands-on stuff is essential, but I still always found it helpful to give a lecture before letting students loose with lab equipment, not to mention lethal reagents.</p>
<p>A good friend of my 12th grader is spending this year in a southeast Asian country, ostensibly as an exchange student. The classes are completely inadequate for her, so she is enrolled in several distance-learning courses offered through this state's flagship public university. After students have done the required reading and writing and research, a class "meets" on-line for discussion with an instructor several times a week. She reports that it works quite well, although the time-zone problem makes for odd hours.</p>
<p>800+ wow</p>
<p>I went to a State U, Mid-Sized (10,000) and never had a big lecture over 200 or so. Freshmen English and Math classes were capped at 25. It seemed only the intro Science classes were large and they all had discussion sessions and labs.</p>
<p>Almost all classes were taught by a professor or an adjunct (no Grad student TA's). I thought this was pretty typical. TAs did direct the science labs and discussion sessions though.</p>
<p>In many of the large lectures student asked questions and the professor sometimes invited students over to the Union to discuss the lecture. we met in front of the hall to walk over. Usually only a handful took advantage of the offer.</p>
<p>Some professors were great others stuck to the book and I missed a few of those classes as I could just read the book. The dynamic professors kept my attention.</p>
<p>Clearly, large lectures can be very good or very bad. My chemistry course at BU (again, in the jurassic) had hundreds of students, a prof with no dicernable personality, a BAD PA system, and a number of fuzzy b&w monitors positioned at neck-crinking heights. You could almost (but not quite) make out the formulea on them. It was utterly miserable. Other posters have had wonderful experiences. The point is, however, that one CAN survive (and even enjoy) large lectures, and that classes will get smaller.</p>
<p>Midmo -
"All knowledge will be attained and evaluated by group projects, the goal of which will be to "construct your own meaning of historical events." </p>
<p>Gracious! My son would have gotten in SO much trouble in that class. His BS alarm would be going off all the time ...</p>
<p>Man, i would kill for 300ish people classes, my school has 1 main campus and 2 satellite campuses! totalling over 50000 students(undergrads)
Most of my classes are in 1200ish (It's rediculous)! However, people manage to do well. I have had 2 or 3 classes with around 300-500, and those were so much more interesting that large lectures.
Even at Office hours, there's around 80-100 students lol, only in the small(300-500 ppl classes) do we get an office hour with around 20ish.</p>
<p>Would I rather be lectured to for 50 minutes by a scholar who has spent his/her life pondering a subject and then thinking about that lecture in prep of the next day's recitation/turorial OR spend 20 minutes of that time listening to discussion by students like me working out discussion points on the fly?</p>
<p>There is a reason that many scholars have been educated in the lecture/recitation pedagogy that includes esteemed instutions like Harvard and Princeton.</p>
<p>There is nothing intrinsically wrong with large lecture courses which include small recitations/tutorials that allow student to discuss, review and process the subject matter in a more personal setting.</p>
<p>Every large lecture course that I took at Ohio State used this method of instruction and looking back more than 35 years later, I can attest that I graduated excellently prepared to face the intellectual challenges facing me and excellently prepared to live a fulfilling life.</p>