Is Larry Bird a good basketball coach? John Wooden, the revered former coach of UCLA, suggested in a TV interview during last June's NBA finals that great players are rarely great teachers. He said they can't understand why the things that came naturally to them do not come naturally to lesser mortals.

Using that logic, one might argue that great economists are not necessarily great teachers. Some to whom the discipline comes naturally may have difficulty explaining things to those less gifted. These naturals may also be less patient with those who don't get it the first or second time around. Some of us may be better teachers precisely because we had to struggle a bit to sort things out. We may remember what gave us trouble and point out such pitfalls to our students.

On a slightly different point, the most polished classroom presentation is not necessarily the most effective. For example, most of us have taught the same course in back-to-back classes. During the first class, we usually work out any bugs in the presentation, making for a smoother second class. But it has been my experience that students seem to learn more from the first class, where I may need to slow down or even stop to work through some complication.

Put another way, when the material becomes second nature to me, my teaching goes on automatic pilot and may become less effective because the pace or the sequencing does not offer students enough time to absorb points or to reflect on the material. In fact, the more natural the material is to me, the instructor, the less I need to think during the presentation. In such instances, class could degenerate into the perfunctory transfer of information from my notes to the student's notes, without passing through the minds of either.

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What would you think of having someone evaluate your teaching after viewing just a soundless 10-second video clip of you in action? Sounds crazy, doesn't it? But researchers who study "thin slices" of expressive behavior have found that viewers of such a clip feel quite comfortable making an evaluation based on such limited input. What's more, this instant analysis tracks relatively well with students' end-of-term evaluations.

According to Harvard researchers Nalini Ambady and Robert Rosenthal, observers who were presented with a 10-second silent video clip of a teacher in a classroom setting had no difficulty rating the teacher on a 15-item checklist of personality traits. Moreover, when the clip was cut to five seconds, the ratings were the same, and they remained the same when the clip was cut to two seconds of videotape. These findings were discussed recently by Malcolm Gladwell in The New Yorker, ("The New-Boys Network," 5/29/2000, pp. 68-86). Gladwell admits that this all seems unbelievable, but after he viewed both ten second clips and two seconds clips, he concluded that the eight seconds were "superfluous," noting that "anything beyond the first flash of insight is unnecessary"(p. 70). Snap judgments are just that -- made in a snap.

The next step for Ambady and Rosenthal was to compare these snap judgments with judgements of teacher effectiveness based on end-of-term student evaluations. The correlation was relatively high. As Gladwell concludes, "A person watching a two-second silent video clip of a teacher he has never met will reach conclusions about how good that teacher is that are very similar to those of a student who sits in the teacher's class for an entire semester" (p. 70).

Here's how I can relate to these "thin-slice" findings. As an inveterate channel surfer, I typically judge a TV show, even a movie I have not seen, in a matter of seconds (most channels get less than a second). The same perception may be at work in making snap judgements about teaching performance. Likewise, when movie directors want to present a boring teacher, such as the role Ben Stein played in Ferris Bueller's Day Off, they can often do so in only a few seconds of screen time.

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By the time you read this, the CBS hit show Survivor may be yesterday's news, but since another Survivor from the Australian Outback is in the works and a Survivor board game is expected in November, the phenomenon may have legs. As the most watched summer TV series in history (51 million viewers at the end), chances are that many of your students watched it. Hence the show could serve as grist for class discussions. Here are some thoughts.

I'm no expert, but I watched enough to get a feel for the Survivor game. Team members voted one contestant off the island each week until just one survivor remained. Although that game has been likened to the corporate jungle or a Darwinian survival-of-the-fittest contest, it is the way in which Survivor's incentives and constraints differed from those of a market economy that may be of most interest to students. To begin with, Survivor was a zero-sum game, with the sixteen contestants competing for the top prize of $1,000,000, and lesser amounts for the next few finishers. Contestant behavior did not affect the total prize money, only its distribution. The market economy, on the other hand, is a positive-sum game. Participants in a market economy also compete, but through production and exchange, they increase the total value of the pot, with the distribution based on each participant's productivity.

In the first half-dozen shows, contestants were divided into two teams, or "tribes," which competed in various games. The losing team had to vote one of its members off the island. Tribal success in some of the early competitions depended on the performance of the least able member of the tribe. For example, one contest required all team members to swim out to a buoy, dive for a chest on the ocean floor, then bring it ashore. Team members could not begin diving for the chest until all of them had reached the buoy, and they could not claim the chest on shore until all members placed their hands on it. In effect, all participants performed the same task in parallel. The contributions of all but the least able member of the team meant little or nothing towards the outcome. A single poor swimmer accounted for the team's loss. In the real world, even where production is a team effort, the task is typically based on some specialization and some division of labor. This goofy structure breeds team conflict, which makes for good TV, but it doesn't much mirror a market economy.

And Survivor's procedure of voting team members off the island bears little relation to market competition. By week five, four tribe members coalesced to vote others off the island. By eliminating the strongest outsider each week, these coalition members made it to the final four. In terms of a market economy, that would be like a group of producers forming a cartel to systematically eliminate the strongest rivals. That may occur with organized crime, where they bump off the competition, but it's illegal and probably impractical in market economies.

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I believe my teaching has benefited from working on this newsletter, especially reporting the teaching ideas contributed by others in "The Grapevine." I recently won the University of Connecticut's 2000 Excellence in Teaching Award. At the risk of appearing self-indulgent, let me share with you a summary of remarks I offered at the award reception.

Emerson said, "The years teach us much that the days never know." What has a quarter century of teaching taught me? I have learned three principles for effective teaching: (1) have something worth saying, (2) say it well, and (3) get and give feedback. In a nutshell, an effective teacher focuses on the message, the medium, and the market. These principles may seem obvious, but success is a study of the obvious.

(1) The Message — Have Something Worth Saying: What is the most important use of today's class? What points do I want to convey and in what order? How will this class flow from the last one and set up the next one? I try to choose material that helps students the most. And I try to avoid the trap of selecting topics merely because they are relatively easy to explain.

(2) The Medium — Say It Well: As John Dewey noted, there can be no real learning without student interest. The key to saying it well is to stimulate student interest. First, I use examples that rely on student experience to build bridges from what students know to what they don't. I choose examples that need no explanation. Having to explain an example is like having to explain a joke -- the point gets lost. A second way of generating interest is variety. I try to mix it up, employing not only examples, but analogies, parables, proverbs, anecdotes, news stories, discussions, debates, exercises, experiments, games, blackboards, overheads, software, Web sites -- whatever applications that stimulate interest by helping turn the abstract into the concrete.

(3) The Market — Get and Give Feedback: How well am I coming across to students? By getting and giving feedback, I try to make sure that the message and the medium are on target for the market, whether that market is a large introductory class or a graduate seminar. Feedback mechanisms abound -- enrollment patterns, class attendance, early exits from class, body language, off-hand remarks, class discussions, questions, answers, office hours, e-mails, Web site use, exams, student evaluations, and so on. I use student feedback to fine-tune the message and the medium. But I must also provide feedback to students by establishing and reinforcing course objectives that are clear and unambiguous. I tell my students that I want them to be able to see right through me.

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Four years ago, this newsletter first discussed course syllabi and materials posted on the Web (Issue 12, Fall 1996). How goes the online revolution? Whereas most early entrants created their own Web pages more or less from scratch, recent entrants are making more use of Web platforms, such as WebCT, and this has accelerated online growth. But, because these newer platforms usually involve some level of password protection, any survey of Web courses runs into access problems.

Even if one could access all course pages, such a total would undercount use of the Web in economics courses. Here's why. Four years ago, few textbooks offered Web-based resources, such as course links and interactive material. Now most successful textbooks provide an extensive menu of online resources, including some programs that are more interactive (hence, more costly to develop) than anything found on a homegrown site. Some of these resources are also available on CD. Either way, students can use online resources even if the instructor has no Web page for the course.

How does economics compare with other disciplines when it comes to use of the Web for course pages? As of August 2000, links to 63 economic courses appeared on the World Lecture Hall site (http://www.utexas.edu/world/lecture/), a gathering place for course home pages. Compared to a dozen related disciplines, primarily in social sciences and business, economics tied with business administration for fourth place in World Lecture Hall totals, behind computer science (with 197 links), psychology (94), and history (70). So economics ranks above the median of related disciplines.

A good example of the resources found on a typical course site is the home page of Stanley E. Zin of Carnegie Mellon, one of the first economists to provide a link to his course page (http://bobbyorr.gsia.cmu.edu/macro/) on the World Lecture Hall site. His Web site is simple but does the job, with sections on the instructor, objectives, material, requirements, teaching assistants, assignments, outlines, lecture notes, student feedback, important dates, and a "course board," which posts messages from the instructor and comments from students. For ideas from other course Web sites, see "The Grapevine" on the next page.

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In his twenty years as head of General Electric, Jack Welch, who retires next April, has generated enormous wealth for stockholders. But is he really worth a $7.1 million book advance? Or is this yet another example of the winner's curse, where the winning publisher loses money? If he writes a 250-page book, or about 100,000 words, the advance would translate into $71 per word. Based on that rate, the following quote, should he repeat it in the book, would earn him over $2,000:

"There's no new economy. It's the same old economy with new technology. We get rid of some of the numbing, boring jobs and make society better and more creative."
-- Jack Welch

"What you learn at your cost you remember long."
-- Danish proverb

"When coins rattle, philosophers are silent."
-- Serbo-Croatian proverb

"Even between parents and children, money matters make strangers."
-- Japanese proverb

"A great fortune depends on luck, a small one on diligence."
-- Chinese proverb

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Here are some ideas found in my survey of several dozen course Web sites. Note that some of these ideas are relevant whether or not you utilize the Internet in your courses.

Most course pages explain the grade structure and composition, but I came across only one that spells out the probable outcome. On the home page for his MBA course, Understanding the World Macroeconomy (http://www.stern.nyu.edu/~nroubini/MACRO3.HTM), Nouriel Roubini of New York University notes "Although sections may vary somewhat, the Economics Department suggests [the following] grade distribution: 20%-25% in the A/A- range, 55%-70% in the B range, and 10%-15% C and below. This distribution is intended to make standards comparable across sections, as required by the school."

Mark Walbert of Illinois State asks students to give him feedback after each lecture by e-mailing him answers to the following questions: "What's the most important thing you learned in class today? What is the muddiest point still remaining at the end of today's class?" (http://www.econ.ilstu.edu/Mark_Walbert/ECO240/240Main.html)

Barry Haworth of the University of Louisville provides Web material for six courses altogether (http://econpage.com/). The collection of exams he makes available to students is quite extensive. For the Principles of Macroeconomics course, he provides "old exams," "practice exams," "interactive exams," and "current exams."

Several Web sites play accompanying music. For example, the home page of Carole Scott's Money and Banking course (http://www.westga.edu/~cscott/bank/) at the State University of West Georgia plays the theme music to what years ago was Alfred Hitchcock's mystery TV series.

Speaking of music, Barry Keating of Notre Dame has an audio button on his two course sites that plays the school's fight song. He also holds weekly office hours online (http://www.nd.edu/~keating/localhome.html).

Office hours for the courses surveyed range from two to nine hours a week, with most falling in the three-to-four hour range. Alfred Lorn Norman of the University of Texas at Austin specifies unique office hours for each course. For example, students in his Micro Honors class get an hour a week, those in his Micro Principles course get a different hour, and his Information Society students get their own two-hour slot (http://www.eco.utexas.edu/Homepages/Faculty/Norman/info.html).

In one of the most transparent home pages I found on the Web, Richard Hannah of Middle Tennessee State University (http://www.mtsu.edu/~rlhannah/homepage.html) offers a clear description of his expectations of students in his courses. For example, he advises students that he follows the syllabus closely; expects proficiency with financial calculators, spreadsheet software, and the Internet; and expects papers to be "of professional quality" (and he spells out what that means). With regard to exams, "Good answers to questions require logical reasoning, applied technical skills, an understanding of economic principles, and clear writing and illustrations." He also lists results from his student evaluations dating back to 1992, totaling 22 classes.

Thomas Cook at North Seattle Community College bills himself as a "coach" rather than an instructor. He appears on his home page as a coach, in baseball cap with whistle, holding up a clipboard as if diagramming a play (http://www.sccd.ctc.edu/~thomcook/). On that clipboard is a supply-demand diagram. Two-dozen links on his home page take students to sites with many more links.

Rick Nelson of Lansing Community College in Michigan provides on his course page some tongue-in-cheek feedback from students. In a section headed "Read what former students have to say about the course," he offers the following quotes. From J. M. Cains: "This course really multiplied my economic knowledge." From Eve Smith: "I learned a lot. The process was practically invisible." And From T.R. Malthus: "Want to be part of the informed population? Then take this course!" He also offers three buttons purportedly offering students the opportunity to "Hear what other students say about the course." But when you play the audio, you hear someone crying, someone snoring, and someone screaming. It's all pretty clever (http://vcollege.lansing.cc.mi.us/econ201/index.html).

Putting myself in an inquisitive student's shoes, if I could register for just one course out of the dozens that I reviewed, I think it might be "The Political Economy of European Integration," offered by David L. Cleeton of Oberlin. Great required readings, good links, and attractive pages make for a nice balance of course content and visual appeal. The final half hour of each week involves a class discussion of events in Europe; that discussion counts 10% of the course grade. Each student must choose a different EU country on which to report, answering a series of questions specified in the syllabus. These reports count for 20% of the course grade. To see the promise of the medium, take a look at his home page at http://www.oberlin.edu/~dcleeton/SYLL_225.HTM.

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Free Books Online

Last spring Princeton University Press published David Friedman's new book, Law's Order: What Economics Has to Do With Law and Why It Matters. Prior to publication, the manuscript was available on the Web in draft form. Now, surprisingly, it's there in book form as well at http://www.best.com/~ddfr/laws_order/index.shtml. The book consists of an introduction, 19 chapters on topics ranging from crime to marriage, and an epilogue. I read the chapter on intellectual property to see if it explained why Princeton University Press and Professor Friedman, of Santa Clara University, are willing to give away online a book that sells on Amazon.com for $23.96 plus shipping. I found no answer, but this situation is not unique, as you'll see.

Herbert Gintis's book Game Theory Evolving is a problem-oriented text emphasizing the application of game theory to economics and biology. It was published last May, also by Princeton University Press, and is available on Amazon.com for $44 in hardback and $23.96 in paperback plus shipping. But his Web site at the University of Massachusetts contains the complete text of 16 chapters along with Errata and Commentary (http://www-unix.oit.umass.edu/~gintis/gtevolve.html). Check out the chapter entitled "Beyond Homo Economicus", which Professor Gintis calls "probably the most important in the book." It begins with quotes from Alexis de Tocqueville and Ted Kaczynski, an unlikely pair.

The full text of the first four volumes of the Handbook of Econometrics, published by Elsevier, is now available online. The late Zvi Griliches and Michael Intriligator of UCLA edited the first three volumes. Volume One covers mathematical and statistical methods in econometrics, econometric models, and estimation and computation. Volume Two includes sections on testing, time series topics, and special topics in econometrics. Special topics continue in Volume Three, along with a discussion of selected applications and uses (this volume sells on Amazon.com for $110 plus shipping). And Volume Four, edited by Robert F. Engle of UCSD and Daniel L. McFadden of Berkeley, covers econometric theory (available on Amazon.com for $123 plus shipping). The full text of each chapter may be downloaded at http://www.elsevier.com/hes/books/02/menu02.htm in Adobe pdf format. Also forthcoming is Volume Five, edited by James J. Heckman of the University of Chicago and Edward E. Leamer of UCLA. The Elsevier home page for the series (http://www.elsevier.com/hes/homepage/menu.htm) now makes available online all or part of 22 Handbooks, some in multiple volumes, including the newest entries: Health Economics, Labor Economics, Income Distribution, Macroeconomics, and Regional and Urban Economics. The home page merits a bookmark.

Last June, Michael S. Bernstam and Alvin Rabushka, fellows at Stanford's Hoover Institution, launched a Web site entitled The Russian Economy (http://www.russiaeconomy.org/). In addition to about 40 links to Russian sources, the site offers the full text of their book, Fixing Russia's Banks, and the first four chapters of their work in progress, From Predation to Prosperity: Breaking Up Enterprise Network Socialism in Russia. New chapters and related materials will be added on a regular basis.

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