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In some ways the lecture proved effective: Kelvin covered the material efficiently (in about 20 minutes), related
the topic to other ones in the course, defined and explained all key terms clearly, and did his best to relate the
material to what he thought were students’ own interests. These were all marks of good lecturing (Christensen,
2006). Students were mostly quiet during the lecture, but since only about one-third of them took notes, Kelvin had
to assume that the rest had committed the material to memory while listening. The students quietness bothered
him a little, but as a newcomer to university teaching, Kelvin was relieved simply to get through the class without
embarrassment or active resistance from the students.
But there were also some negative signs. In spite of their courtesy, few students lingered after class to talk about
children’s play or to ask questions. Worse yet, few students chose children’s play as a term paper topic, even though
it might have made a highly interesting and enjoyable one. On the final exam few seemed able to relate concepts
about play to their own experiences as teachers or leaders of recreational activities.
There was an even more subtle problem. The lecture about play focused overtly on a topic (play) that praised
action, intrinsic motivation, and self-choice. But by presenting these ideas as a lecture, Kelvin also implied an
opposite message unintentionally: that learning is something done passively, and that it follows an intellectual path
set only by the teacher. Even the physical layout of the classroom sent this message—desks faced forward, as if to
remind students to look only at the person lecturing. These are features of lecturing, as Kelvin later discovered, that
are widely criticized in educational research (McKeachie & Svinicki, 2005; Benedict & Hoag, 2004). To some
students the lecture format might even have implied that learning is equivalent to daydreaming, since both
activities require sitting quietly and showing little expression. An obvious solution might have been to invite
students to comment from time to time during the lecture, relating the topic to experiences and knowledge of their
own. But during Kelvin’s first year of teaching about play, he did little of this. The lecture medium, ironically,
contradicted the lecture message, or at least it assumed that students would think actively about the material
without ever speaking.
Questions and answers
Because of these problems, Kelvin modified his approach after a few years of teaching to include more asking of
questions which students were invited to answer. This turned the lecture on children’s play into something more
like a series of explanations of key ideas, interrupted by asking students to express their beliefs, knowledge, or
experience about children’s play. Kelvin’s preparation notes changes in appearance as a result (see Table 21).
Asking questions and inviting brief responses was reassuring because it gave indications of whether students were
listening and understanding the material. Questions served both to motivate students to listen and to assess how
much and how well they knew the material. In this regard Kelvin was using a form of communication that was and
continues to be very popular with many teachers (Cazden, 2001).
But there were also new challenges and problems. For one thing the topic of children’s play took longer to cover
than before, since Kelvin now had to allow time for students to respond to questions. This fact forced him to leave
out a few points that he used to include. More serious, though, was his impression that students often did not listen
to each other’s responses; they only listened carefully to Kelvin, the teacher. The interactions often become simply
two-way exchanges between the teacher and one student at a time: Kelvin asked, one student responded, Kelvin
Educational Psychology 167 A Global Text