(Version 1.0)
Jeanine Meyer
Pace University
One Pace Plaza
New York, NY 10038 USA meyer@pace.edu
Name:
Class concept map
Intent:
To engage students in the process of making connections between technical terms.
Motivation:
Students often view the set of technical vocabulary terms located at the end
of a chapter as unconnected. By participating in the construction of a concept map, they are more
likely to appreciate relationships. Students have relatively small and overlapping
responsibility in this activity and so failure on the part of some students is not fatal to the
whole exercise.
Applicability:
This pattern can be used in many courses at different levels. However,
it was designed for a core course in Computer Information Systems required for all
undergraduates and taken mainly by first year students. It has some of the advantages of a
seminar without relying on each student to produce.
Structure:
Students are assigned individual terms from the selected chapter.
The assignment is to bring in a definition or description in your own words of "your term" and
then find two or three terms that relate to it.
Define or describe them and the relationship. The relationship can be "similar thing", "opposite", "uses", "attribute", etc. (Students familiar with object oriented analysis and/or entity-relationship modeling can be expected to be precise, but the exercise has value with beginning students.)
In class, the teacher starts off with an appropriate starting term and asks if anyone was assigned that
term initially or used that term in a relationship. The teacher writes the terms and draws connecting lines on the board.
Consequences:
Students must think about their terms.
They will hear other definitions.
They can be prompted for more subtle distinctions.
They see different relationships.
The teacher can contribute to the exposition at the point where students are thinking about
the subject.
Students also are required to speak in front of the class, which is an effort for many, but the talk is short and focused.
Implementation:
An efficient way to implement this pattern is to use e-mail to send the
terms, giving the same terms to two or three students. In the core course, we collect
e-mail addresses early in the term. The term can be put in the subject line of the e-mail and
the body of the note can be identical for all messages. Students are told to check their
mail on a particular day. In class, students need to be prompted to contribute even if their
terms are already noted.
Example Instances:
The exercise works well with any jargon-laden topic. Good topical areas
in the core course are Storage and Communications.
Resources Needed:
An e-mail facility and for the class session a large blackboard or white board.