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53 POWERFUL IDEAS

SEDA is publishing online both on its website and on its blog one of Graham Gibbs' '53 Powerful Ideas All Teachers Should Know About', with the intention of prompting debate about the underlying basis of our work. Graham has also invited a number of well respected international thinkers and writers about university teaching, and how to improve it, to each contribute one idea to the '53 Powerful ideas' collection. To comment on and discuss these ideas, have a look at our blog. Once all 53 ideas have been published, the intention is to hand over to our community and publish one idea from members each week, to continue the debate.

2016

43. Title Most assessment involves (unreliable) professional judgement - and is all the better for it 42. 'Student engagement' is a slippery concept 41. Rewarding excellent teachers may not improve teaching much

2015

40. Self assessment is central to intrinsic motivation 39. Student choice often lacks substance 38. Clearly stated goals are not always helpful to students 37. You cannot design learning activities until you are clear about your outcomes 36. Standards applied to teaching are lower than standards applied to research 35. Conventional higher education does a poor job of facilitating learning transfer 34. Courses work as integrated systems 33. Motivating students is not magic 32. Students don't always learn from experience 31. Much learning is acquired by doing, but seldom only by doing 30. Departments differ widely in their teaching quality 29. Students approach topic areas in different ways 28. Making feedback work involves more than giving feedback Part 2 The students 27. Making feedback work involves more than giving feedback Part 1 the assessment context

2014

26. Students are selectively negligent, and successful students neglect the right stuff 25. Fear and anxiety are the enemies of learning 24. Students have limited attention 23. There is such a thing as too much information 22. There is often a gap between teacher's thinking and practice 21. The most useful training of university teachers does not 'involve' training 20. Lectures are used far too often 19. Class size matters 18. You can measure and judge teaching 17. Research can help student learning 16. It is difficult to demonstrate that students benefit from their teachers also being researchers 15. Ideas and concepts being taught may not replace students existing ideas 14. Universities (and departments) have quite different organisational cultures and some of these cultures help teaching more than others 13. Teachers’ beliefs and practices are framed by their social setting 12. Teaching is driven by beliefs and assumptions 11. Students do not necessarily know what is good for them 10. Students' marks are often determined as much by the way assessment is configured as by how much students have learnt 9. Many patterns of teaching in HE simply follow conventions 8. It has more impact on educational effectiveness to change learners than it does to change teachers 7. Students' expectations are formed early 6. Learning takes effort 5. Much of what is learnt is forgotten 4. Good student performance is achieved in different ways than learning gains 3. Transferable skills rarely transfer 2. Students respond to clear and high expectations 1. Students are trying to get different things out of being at university Introduction Prologue

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