Peter Weise at work in his office.
In this section, Peter Weise discusses how he routinely engages in reflective practice at the end of the semester. He notes that he makes use of a student questionnaire to help him evaluate aspects of his teaching, and that he pays particular attention to how time was used during the course and the relevancy of the course content.
At the end of the semester, when I’m finished teaching, I ask my students to complete a questionnaire about the course. I ask them specific questions, such as, Was there too much material at the beginning of the course, and not enough at the end? and Did you like the group exercises? The results of the questionnaire are just for me. I try to get as much feedback from students as possible so that I can use that information when redesigning the course for the following semester.
In reflecting on my teaching, I specifically look at how effectively I used class time during the course. What activities took too long? Instructions are important, but if it takes me five minutes of class time to explain the activity, was the activity worth it? If the activity is so complicated that students can’t understand the directions within one minute, I need to find something else. I’m always tweaking things like this.
"If the activity is so complicated that students can’t understand the directions within one minute, I need to find something else."
I also want the content of the course to be relevant, so I update it regularly. The last two iterations of the course have focused on renewable energy. This topic has worked because it’s still a big issue in Germany and in the United States. I have updated some of the texts, but the topic has remained the same. Who knows what the big issue will be the next time I teach the course? I’ll change the materials to reflect the current issue.
