Therese Huston

Interesting examples that are chosen to make it easy to recognize myself linked with data, research projects and compelling insights have made this a useful read.
Some of the points to take away -- we still live in a work environment dominated by masculine preferences; if women want to be successful without the constant doubt and stereotype threat, we need to change the physical work environment. Do pre-mortems to think through major decisions. Support each other when we take risks, even and especially when we fail.… (mehr)

Many students would be shocked to learn that many professors are teaching a class -- well, let's call it "outside their expertise." Yet it happens all the time in academia. Teaching What You Don't Know is an attempt to walk any faculty member through a new course that he or she doesn't entirely understand. (Unfortunately, with all the preparatory reading for class, the professor is unlikely to be able to read this book in time for it to do much good.)

The book has a good selection of tips and stories "from the trenches." Most of the tips belong to the "active learning" concept; the author is very interested in getting student input to help modify expectations about the course (in fact, one of the simplest tips in the book is to request student feedback, giving the students a voice in their own education).

One of the more interesting chapters is not really teaching what you don't know -- but whom. There's a fascinating study that suggests that students who ultimately become professors have wildly different study habits than "average" students. Knowing more about your audience -- even if they are personal anecdotes and seemingly have no relevance to your class -- helps deepen the professor/student relationship, which -- as the book somewhat reluctantly admits -- may allow the students to be more forgiving when the faculty member flubs an answer to a student question.

Overall, this is a worthy book to read -- preferably before the professor gets assigned classes for the semester. But it's also helpful to those who have taught for a while in giving them more active learning techniques.… (mehr)