Michael W. Kramer

Teaching

The opportunity to teach was the primary motivation for my career. Receiving recognition for my teaching has been very satisfying. I received three teaching awards.

 

	2010 Outstanding Professor (student organization award)
	1999 Kemper Teaching Fellowship Award (campus-wide award)
	1995 Provost Junior Faculty Teaching Award (campus-wide award)

I don't know why you would be interested, but if you are interested in particular courses I taught in the past, you may view the syllabi below.

• Com 3575 Business and Professional Communication (MU)
• Com 3263 Organizational Communication (last taught Spring 2020 at OU)
• Com 4974 Senior Project (MU)
• Com 8110 Introduction to Graduate Studies (MU)
• Com 8120 Seminar in Quantitative Research Methods (MU)
• Com 5333  Seminar in Organizational Communication (Spring 2012 at OU)
• Com 6233 Seminar in Small Group Processes (Spring 2021 at OU)
• Com 9430 Topics in Organizational Communication (MU)

My approach to teaching was to attempt to involve students in their learning as much as possible. This meant that rather than lots of lecturing, I usually spoke to the class for less than 5 minutes at a time and then engaged students in discussing the concepts and providing examples and applications from their own experiences. I frequently divided the class into pairs or small groups for short discussions and then had the pairs or groups report their ideas back to the class. I do activities in class when appropriate.

If you would like to know a little more about my teaching experience here is my history:

Martin Luther High School, Maspeth, New York, 1976-79
Luther High School South, Chicago, Illinois, 1979-84
Concordia Lutheran College, Austin, Texas, 1984-1991
University of Missouri-Columbia, Missouri, 1991-2010
University of Oklahoma, 2010 to 2021

Perhaps it is an indication of dedication or the blessing of good health, but in my 45 years of teaching, I never missed a day of teaching due to illness.

I do not plan to do any teaching of course material in retirement, but am available to talk about topics like maintaining work-life balance, how to publish in the field of communication, or advice for new department chairs. In other words, there won't be a lot of citing of sources; it will be talking about experiences.