Promoting the Success of Individual Learners: Teachers Applying Their Craft at the Undergraduate Level

(Hardback)

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Responding to the educational ideal of supporting "each and every" student, individualizing instruction is put forward as the basis of effective undergraduate instruction. In the tone of "practitioners talking to practitioners," eight teachers representing various undergraduate institutions and disciplines share assumptions and strategies for supporting successful learning by individual students. In the words of K. Patricia Cross, how do undergraduate programs simultaneously serve all students, as well as each and every student Responding to the challenge of reallzing this educational ideal, this book explores guiding assumptions and instructional strategies for individualizing instruction to support and extend the learning of diverse students. Assumptions and strategies are provided by experienced teachers from undergraduate institutions throughout the country, representing eight discipline areas. Discipline areas include literature, composition, mathematics, chemistry, physics, educational psychology, accounting, and an interdisciplinary freshman year course. Chapters by contributing teachers are framed by four introductory chapters that establish the meaning of individualizing instruction, the nature of classroom learning, and provide a framework and set of general guidelines for individualizing instruction. Individualizing instruction is positioned at the intersection of two main premises: Talent Development as the most appropriate model of excellence for undergraduate education; and the reality of individual differences among undergraduate students, beyond demographic categories and learning-style taxonomies. Accepting these two premises, efforts by undergraduate teachers to work with students to create effective alternative learning/teaching paths leading to common curricular outcomes and standards becomes a critical factor in moving towards educational excellence.

Reviews

"Finally, a book that does more than identify issues and problems in undergraduate education. This book provides different instructional strategies to deal with the issues and problems we have been discussing for years. This is an excellent resource for both beginning and experienced undergraduate instructors. The material is carefully organized and integrated with excellent introductory and concluding chapters."-Myron H. Dembo Stephen Crocker Professor in Education, University of Southern California
"Overall, I find the book to be current, well-informed, and a useful bridge between the theory of individualized teaching and its practice. Informative for any teacher, I would especially recommend this book as a practitioner's resource for faculty members new to undergraduate teaching. It provides an informed overview of the national undergraduate population, some major challengs in higher education, some guiding assumptions about learning, the role and responsibilities of students, and the aims and responsibilities of teachers as they give rise to and frame instructional strategies. The classroom examples provide concrete ideas for readers who are considering adding to or reflecting on their instructional strategies. Instead of prescriptive guidelines, the book poses teaching, in general, and individualized instruction, in particular, as creative problem solving in collaboration with individual students."-Jennifer Meta Robinson Director, Campus Instructional Consulting, Indiana University

Author Bio

Jeffrey E. Porter is Associate Professor at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf, a college of the Rochester Institute of Technology, where he has held a variety of teaching and administrative posts.