ERIC Number: EJ1107420
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2015
Pages: 5
Abstractor: ERIC
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0963-9284
EISSN: N/A
Improving Student Engagement through Consultation. Postcards from the Podium
Gallagher, Sinéad M.
Accounting Education, v24 n6 p564-568 2015
The author has lectured in an Irish third-level institution since 2002. She enjoys and takes pride in her job as a lecturer and is very focused on facilitating high-quality learning among her students. Since the inception of the Master's in Accounting programme at her institution, which typically has a class size of between 15 and 20 each year, the author has taught the Advanced Financial Accounting module. In previous academic years, the delivery of this module involved one three-hour lecture each week throughout the academic year (two semesters). However, due to a recent programme restructuring, the delivery of Advanced Financial Accounting is now scheduled for six hours per week in just one semester. Further compounding this situation, the six hours are timetabled on the same day, with the lecture running from 9:30 am to 1:30 pm and 2:30 pm to 4:30 pm. To cover the syllabus for the module, each six-hour lecture often covers a number of topics. In advance of each session, lecture notes on each topic are posted online. Then, in class, the key elements of the topic are reviewed and the students attempt cases and questions to help them apply the knowledge presented. Further, to help break up the six-hour session and to try to add variety in class activities, the author has incorporated additional small group work (critique of articles, working on a group assignment, peer assessment of student solutions to questions, etc.) and videos in the lectures. Nonetheless, despite efforts to facilitate student learning, based on the author's observations and some student feedback, it was clear that many students were struggling during the six-hour lecture, particularly in the afternoon session. Accordingly, the author felt that the Master's students were not getting the best educational experience possible and therefore set set about improving their experience by increasing their engagement. In this Postcard, the author will share with the first phase of her journey to improve the student experience in this Advanced Financial Accounting module, when she used Whitehead and McNiff's (2006) action research model to plan her action inquiry. As someone new to action research, Whitehead and McNiff's model resonated with as it was easy to understand--it consists of a series of questions and those which are included in Appendix 1.
Descriptors: Learner Engagement, Accounting, Business Administration Education, Graduate Students, Action Research, Educational Change, Foreign Countries, Questionnaires
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Descriptive; Tests/Questionnaires
Education Level: Higher Education; Postsecondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Ireland
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A