Serendipity35

Just-in-Time Teaching (JiTT for short) is a teaching and learning strategy. It is based on using interactions between online content (study materials, references & assignments) and a face-to-face active learner classroom.

My first encounter with JiTT (or what I took to be just in time teaching) was at the middle school level with classes that were 84 minutes long. We began to teach a number of "mini-lessons" in each block based on perceived needs of that class at that time. If I was teaching fiction writing and noticed a need to teach a lesson on punctuating dialog, we would move into a lecture/demo mode for a short time. To me, this was just in time teaching.

Looking at the information and samples at the JiTT.org site, I found out that I was wrong.

It's more likely that students would be asked to respond electronically to a web-based assignment due shortly before class. The instructor then reads the student submissions "just-in-time" to adjust the classroom lesson to suit the students' needs.

So, a key element is the "feedback loop" created by the students' outside-of-class preparation that affects what happens during the follow in-class meeting.

We have a number of faculty at NJIT who use their podcasts in iTunes U this way. Students listen to podcasts prior to a class in order to work on an assignment hat starts off the next class session. Based on responses, the instructor continues, expands upon or reviews content from the podcast.

If you can get past the idea of JiTT sounding like an emergency fix ("Phew, we got that in just in time!") or another crossover from the corporate and training world where students are clients, then you might find value in this way of expanding the classroom.

JiTTDLwiki is one of the components of the Just-in-Time Teaching Digital Library. You can find additional information including presentations and workshops given on JiTT.

Learning technologies should be designed to increase, and not to reduce, the amount of personal contact between students and faculty on intellectual issues. (Study Group on the Conditions of Excellence in American Higher Education, 1984)