Are College Lecture Unfair Analysis

Are traditional lectures ineffective ? Lecture format is developed over centuries, that present information to people about a particular subject and is highly accepted in field of education. In New York Times essay "Are College Lectures Unfair?" Annie Murphy Paul, a science writer, asks "Does the college lecture discriminate? Is it biased against undergraduates who are not white, male, and affluent?" as well as favors active learning approaches against traditional lecture style, while on the other side the author, Molly, Worthen in her essay "Lecture me. Really" discuses the importance of traditional lectures, as well as feels how it is faded from teaching methods in favor of "active learning" method. Being a student do we really feel

According to Worthen, "these newer and innovative teaching methods are moving out the traditional lecturing method " while on the other hand according to Annie Murphy Paul, the active learning helps students to openly interact with one another and participate in lecture. Annie Murphy Paul says, "The act of putting one's own thoughts into words and communicating them to others, is a powerful contributor to learning. Active-learning courses regularly provide opportunities for students to talk and debate with one another in a collaborative, low-pressure environment". Whereas as per Worthen, "Absorbing a long, complex argument is hard work, requiring students to synthesize, organize and react as they listen". I do agree with her that it is a hard work but at the same time I also feel there is no scope of interaction for students during traditional lecture teaching. I would say the key to lecturing method is to keep them short as well as one needs to in cooperate other innovative teaching approaches like active learning. This helps students to interact with the given piece of information which promotes active thought, with the help of activities like discussions, debates , seminars, showing educational videos, application of principles etc. Students are doing more than simply listening which helps in skills development rather than just note-

I do agree with her that flipping the classroom, gives exposure to students to understand the things on their own by watching video lectures at home and makes them capable enough to give their opinion in classroom discussions as well as putting forward the quizzes which helps to enhance the memory of students for particular concepts is an excellent idea, but at the same time the argument she makes about the use of lectures or active learning favors certain group while it's discriminating to women, minorities or low-income is not true for everyone. As per my opinion, all students have different level of thinking, understanding or grasping power which leads to their performance. Some benefits through lecture while some clears most of their doubt through class