Assessment, Learning & Teaching Reflections |
Monday 19th December
It has been said that technology is a way of organising the world so that we need not experience it. I have never been happy with the degree of disengagement from our environment that is implied here. Applied to teaching, it would mean that we only ever think about the lecture room if there is something wrong with it: too cold, too noisy, students can’t see the board, etc. In his 18th November reflection, David Kirk questioned how suitable the traditio nal lecture theatre is for modern approaches to teaching. I became acutely aware of the less-than-satisfactory quality of some of our accommodation while trying to teach Building Acoustics (of all things) in a room domi nated by noise from the inner ring-road.
But the picture isn’t universally bad. Our teaching rooms have improved markedly over the years and the demise of Brunswick Building will make things better still. In my experience, our FMD colleagues work hard to create good teaching environments, but they need to know exactly what is required. Innovative, interactive approaches to teaching impose greater demands on the quality of our rooms. We need to make it known which rooms are good to teach in (and which ones aren’t).
Tim South
Senior Lecturer, School of Health and Human Sciences
