Resource Database: Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences

Title	A Method to Make Tutorials Work Better
Originator	Richard Baker
Department	Department of Geography, School of Resource Management and Environmental Science, Australian National University, ACT 0200, Australia
Tel.	+61 6 249 4873
Fax	+61 6 2493770
Email	Richard.Baker@anu.edu.au
WWW	ANU staff pages

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This paper is about a system of pre-tutorial workshops ("Supertuts") that assist student facilitation of tutorials. An independent review carried out on this system concluded that: "the consensus offered by the students was that the supertut system was successful, and that it had the potential to revolutionise small group teaching by:

• providing a reasoned way of placing more responsibility for the success of the tutorial program in the hands of the students
• providing "supertut" participants with the opportunity to learn more about learning itself and how to facilitate it in themselves and in others
• engaging "supertut" participants more effectively in study of the course content
• prompting and rewarding a higher level of preparation in tutorials, and
• had generally caused the tutorials in the unit to be more effective or more interesting than the students had found tutorials in other units."

Further details can be found at:
http://sres.anu.edu.au/people/richard_baker/teaching.html

Keywords:

Pre-tutorial workshops
Small group teaching
"Supertuts"
Tutorials

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Page created 22 December 1997
Page updated 10 May 2004
Database pages maintained by Phil Gravestock