Bartolome's "Contingency Theories of Leadership and Ob Teaching": Refinement of the Theory

Abstract

Few discussions on teaching dilemmas have hit as close to home for me as the recent series of commentaries on the use of contingency theory in the classroom. Like Bartolome and his respondents, I, too, have struggled with how to reconcile students' apparent preference for structure with the desire to foster independent learning. In this article, I describe my approach to resolving that dilemma. RecapitulationThe series began with an article by Bartolome (1988) in which he described how his current &dquo;Gulag&dquo; approach to student participation in the teaching process emerged. According to Bartolome, his prior efforts to use a &dquo;gentler, less directive&dquo; style of teaching had resulted in students coming to his classes insufficiently prepared, participating poorly, and producing work of low quality. In response, Bartolome became increasingly more controlling in the classroom to the point that during the semester preceding his writing the article, he had implemented a highly structured teaching environment, stringent course requirements, and coercive extrinsic rewards.