III. Typical Teaching Situations

The type of teaching that works best for you and your students depends on complex combinations of many factors: requirements of your discipline, your personality, your goals, the class size, the instructional materials you choose, and the response of your students, including their diverse levels of intellectual and cognitive development. This chapter first summarizes research on students' cognitive development, offering examples of predictable student reactions to new information and perspectives, as well as ways to help students grow intellectually. The majority of the chapter details suggestions about individual teaching methods from experienced U.Va. instructors.
For the sake of clarity, most sections are written as though you were teaching the entire class with the described method, but you can effectively mix methodologies. We encourage you to experiment: How about adding mini-lectures to a discussion of historical documents, for instance, in order to offer new perspectives or useful background information? Could you ask students to solve a problem on your web site during class? Why not encourage students to discuss solutions to a problem during lab? What would happen if you brought a case to a discussion where you usually analyze primary texts? Why not have students solve a problem or share ideas during a lecture, even if you have a hundred students? Varying your techniques will motivate and interest students, promote development of their critical thinking skills, and help you remain excited about teaching material you know very well.
To get the most from this chapter, consider suggestions in the context of your course, referring to other handbook sections as recommended. In order to avoid repetition, we have placed general advice, such as teaching the first day of class, in the relevant handbook section.

Introducing students to new and challenging methods of examining that which
they have come to understand as familiar prompts them to question their own
implicit assumptions about the world.

—Craig Barton, Architecture