Review of Teaching the Large College Class: A Guidebook for Instructors with Multitudes
Review of Teaching the Large College Class: A Guidebook for Instructors with Multitudes
by Frank Heppner
Jossey-Bass, October 2007. Paperback, $33.00.
Reviewed by Greg Beatty
Teaching the Large College Class is the single best book on teaching I’ve ever read. In fact, it is so strong that it is somewhat mislabeled, and sells itself somewhat short.
It is mislabeled because while the book does focus on teaching the large class (100+ students), the realism and clarity it offers would help any teacher. And author Frank Heppner sells himself short because he indicates early in the text that his book is aimed primarily at the new teacher.
This is one of the rare cases where Heppner may not know what he’s talking about. There are any number of faculty members who have been teaching a long time who have developed habits instead of expertise. All of them would benefit deeply from the ways Heppner strikingly recasts the teaching process, and, again, from the realism with which he discusses teaching.
If I had to say what made Heppner my new teaching hero, it would be a combination of three factors. First, as previously mentioned, this book is extremely realistic. This realism often takes the form of being practical, providing specific tips, and debunking standard beliefs. These are often quietly humorous, as when Heppner shares brief anecdotes about students who didn’t put in their contacts for morning classes, thus rendering all attempts to make notes visible moot. Such humor is often self-depreciating. Heppner does not seem like a know it all; he does often sound like a “tried-it-all” and “seen-it-all,” as, indeed, seems pretty likely for someone has taught large lecture classes for several decades.
The practical tips Heppner shares range from suggestions for how to judge the size of text you want on an overhead, to financial matters (handouts for 300 students are expensive!), and on into surprising areas. The most surprising tips come in Chapter 3: “The Teacher as Actor.” While some professors may think of themselves as showmen, I promise you that few delivering large lectures have thought to consult their colleagues in the theater department—or to wear make-up to make their facial expressions visible to any students in the back rows who bothered to put their contacts in.
The second factor that contributes so strongly to this book’s quality is that Heppner’s realism has not destroyed his idealism. He can discuss how to deal with student assessments, how to redirect sexual energies so as to minimize their disruption of the class, and even things like which days to expect students to skip class due to hangovers—without a tone of resentment creeping in. Heppner makes me want to invent terms like “realpedagogia”(parallel to real politick): teaching that deals with the world as it is. Except, as I said, he doesn’t sound resentful. Nor does he sound cynical. Instead, when he discusses the teachers who inspired him, and the Last Lecture tradition he experienced at Berkeley in the sixties, Heppner still sounds awestruck by learning and intensely grateful to the teachers who inspired him.
The third factor enriching Teaching the Large College Class is that Heppner embraces the paradox of teaching large classes. That is to say, he pours energy into describing how to seize and hold student attention, how to structure lectures, classes, and courses, and how to think about vocal tone and visual appeal. Heppner works at managing attention—but he does not make the mistake of thinking this is about him. He’s clear that often students aren’t engaged in, or disengaged from, the class because of anything a professor has done or can do. They are already on fire to learn, already eager to earn, or already planning escapes to other schools, professions, and activities, and are passing their time half-drunk and horny till they get there. Heppner recognizes his place in the pedagogical structure and the possibility of campus stardom delivering large lectures offers without mistaking that for being the center of the pedagogical universe.
This last factor is what makes the book so useful for all teachers, not just the new, and not just those teaching large classes. Sure, instructors responsible for 12 person discussion classes won’t have any need for the chapter on managing assistants—but the attitude involved may carry over. This is, ultimately, a text on designing learning experiences within an institution frame, and is invaluable as such.
The book is slender—even with notes it is only 190 pages long—but rich with useful insights. Heppner opens the book by elaborating a conceptual framework for thinking about the large class. These dozen pages are marked by a series of guiding principles such as “Large classes can’t be ad-libbed” (p. 5) and “Put it in writing” (p. 7), each of which is explained, and most of which are illustrated with examples of why these rules are so needed. Chapter 2 then moves on to planning the class. Here again Heppner provides frames for thinking about the class—are you preparing a “Value” class that covers the basics, or the “Deluxe” class that will be the final word on a subject? Or are you, as most instructors end up doing: preparing a “Standard” class with judiciously positioned elements of the Deluxe? As he introduces these prompting and framing ideas, Heppner also breaks down the preparation process, indicating how long things should take, when they should be planned for, and what kinds of preparation yield the best results. He moves somewhat into the area of policies in this second chapter, but primarily in the context of planning.
The third chapter’s already been mentioned. “The Teacher as Actor” directly address the challenges involved in holding the classroom stage, and does one of the best jobs of showing how to learn from experience and one’s peers I’ve ever seen. While that chapter focuses on the instructor in the spotlight, in Chapter 4, “Managing Assistants and Graders,” Heppner turns his analytical attention the other way, focusing on the teacher as manager. While this chapter could definitely have been expanded, it was useful to admit that professors get little management training, and to sketch in the basics one needs in this area to direct any graders, assistants, and support personnel one might luck into.
The fifth chapter, “Using Media Effectively,” is intelligent, and makes good general points, but is probably the least useful chapter. The advice is all good, but one can find technical advice just about anywhere, and all of it will become dated fairly quickly as technology changes. By contrast, Chapters 7 & 8 both address assessment and grading in solid but almost timeless fashion; Heppner’s advice would apply to any large class, and most classes, throughout time.
Chapters 6 and 9, “Auditorium Classroom Activities” and “The Seasons of a Class,” both return to the subject of planning one’s time. Chapter 6 focuses on the single class, and what can be done in addition to lecturing/to break up the lecture. Chapter 9 focuses on the large scale, and on time as it passes through the semester. This final chapter is marked by Heppner’s intelligent discussion by how the teacher can most benefit from his or her time in the large class, and how he or she can use the structure of the lecture class to inspire students. (The five appendices should be read in conjunction with these chapters, as they are tools for planning the first day, the first lecture, etc.)
I wish I had had the chance to take undergraduate classes from Frank Heppner, or to work for him as an assistant. If his knowledge of his field is half as strong as his understanding of teaching, or a quarter as strong as his love of it, I’m sure the experience would have been extraordinary. Since I missed those opportunities, I will simply recommend that any teacher preparing a lecture class (and any seriously dedicated to teaching) pick up Teaching the Large College Class.