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ERIC Number: ED188689
Record Type: RIE
Publication Date: 1980-Apr-11
Pages: 16
Abstractor: N/A
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: N/A
EISSN: N/A
Team Teaching in an Introductory Course to Social Science.
Moore, Betty Jane; Silverman, Sherman E.
Since Spring 1969, Prince George's Community College (Maryland) has offered a team-taught, interdisciplinary course incorporating economics, geography, and political science in an introduction to social science for technical education students. As the course was originally designed, each of the instructors of the three disciplines was given a three-week period to present his/her material. Lectures were augmented by small group discussions which, during the last weeks of the semester, utilized role-playing in studying urban problems. The departure and replacement of two of the three instructors contributed to a course reorganization, utilizing a thematic approach, which resulted in a series of minicourses. Student response to this approach was very negative; complaints were registered about the enormous amount of material presented, the lack of continuity of the course, and the boring, poorly used textbook. In 1974, a new team took charge of the course and decided to: (l) combine all students in a large lecture class and provide for small discussion groups before exams; (2) reorganize the course content around interdisciplinary themes, beginning with an introduction to social science and proceeding to local, national, and international problems; and (3) write an original textbook which paralleled the lectures. Though students remained unenthusiastic about taking the course, their evaluations were more positive. (JP)
Publication Type: Reports - Descriptive; Speeches/Meeting Papers
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Note: Paper presented at the Annual Conference of the Eastern Community College Social Science Association (Baltimore, MD, April 10-12, 1980).