A Reflective Teaching Journal: The need to talk about breast-milk ice cream in the accounting lecture
I was assigned to teach a series of four lectures for a Master’s level course in accounting. The main objectives of this course are to expose the students with accounting academic papers and different theories in accounting, and encourage them to be critical about accounting practices. My goal for this course is to make theories more approachable and enjoyable to learn. With this pre-set goal, I can reflect on my practice in relation to the goal-setting and personal development.
Knowing the audience and preparation
The majority of students are international students from East Asian countries, where presumably accounting is narrowly conceptualized and mainly treated as methodology not ideology. Also, unlike in the UK, academic papers are rarely used as class materials in those countries. Thus, the students might not be familiar with reading academic papers. As an educator, I need to facilitate their transition to accounting education in the UK.
I tried to structure my lectures as a series of connected topics. This structure helps me guide the students in their learning journey; and provides them with a big picture of what the series is about. From Dewey’s assertion (as cited in OpenLearn, 2017), this advance planning could enable me with the ability to anticipate the discussion and questions happening during the lectures.
Exploring my own lecture room
At the beginning of the first lecture, I asked the students whether they had read the paper. Most of them gave me a faint smile, which might mean “sorry, I did not read it”. Thus, they might not have a basic understanding about the lecture topic. I could see this clearly when I saw different expressions from the students’ faces after I had been lecturing for a while. Some were showing interests in the topic, and nodding to provide support; while others looked confused, and sleepy.
At that time, I felt that I needed to grab students’ attention and engage them more with the topic. I decided to raise a brief example about a breast-milk ice cream business. The example got their attention; and helped individual student more or less construct their knowledge by making meaning to the examples and linking it with the theories (Ashworth et al., 2004, p.8).
Going forward…
I think the real challenge of teaching this module is to engage students with theories and encourage them to read academic papers.
Although advance planning of lectures is really important, reflection in action (like I did the story-telling) is crucial to react to the situation at hand (Schön, 1983, p.54). I reckon story-telling is an effective way to engage students to the lectures. After that first lecture, I have decided to do more story-telling and use analogies that students can easily relate to the theories.
I also feel the need to emphasize the purpose of each selected academic paper to encourage students to read. I provided them with the reason why I choose a particular paper, rather than simply tell them that they need to read it. That makes them more willing read and acknowledge the importance of each paper.
At the end of the last lecture, I got some compliments from students. A couple of them also asked if I would be teaching any of their electives for the second semester because they might be interested to register for my course. Unfortunately not! Anyway, those compliments and some gestures from students in those lectures made me learn that this teaching style actually worked for them.
References
ASHWORTH, F., BRENNAN, G., EGAN, K., HAMILTON, R. & SÁENZ, O. 2004. Learning Theories and Higher Education. School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering at ARROW@DIT.
OPENLEARN. 2017. Learning to teach: becoming a reflective practitioner [Online]. Available: http://www.open.edu/openlearn/education/learning-teach-becoming-reflective-practitioner/content-section-2 [Accessed 10 November 2017 2017].
SCHÖN, D. 1983. The Reflective Practitioner How Professionals Think in Action.
About my PGCHE and this assignment
I have started my Postgraduate Certificate in Higher Education (PGCHE) at the University of Birmingham. This programme is a Master-level programme for academics at the university improve their teaching skills and gain relevant teaching qualifications.
Along the journey to complete this degree, there will be 10 formative assignments (or they call “patch”). This is the second assignment, or Patch 2. We were asked to write a reflection about a specific teaching experience. I chose to write about a module for MSc International Accounting and Finance because I found this module challenging, but enjoyable, to teach. Thus, writing reflective teaching journal on it is a good way to rethink about what I have done and to improve my teaching.
There are 10 assignments, or 10 Patches, in total for this PGCHE course. Here are the list of all the patches I have blogged.
Patch 1: Teaching Philosophy
Patch 2: A Reflective Teaching Journal
