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| What are your course learning goals? You’ve likely outlined them in your syllabus. Now, as we reach the sixth week of the semester, ask yourself: Do your students really know and understand these goals?
“Critical thinking” frequently appears in learning goal lists for a liberal arts education. In my current sophomore-level math class, I estimate we engage in critical thinking about 97.3% of the time. |
CfLT Newsletter
The posts below are from the CfLT newsletter which includes curated, research-based digital resources to support ongoing faculty development and pedagogical engagement. As of August 2025, CfLT Director Karen Spierling oversees the content. Posts from July 2020-May 2025 were compiled by previous Director Lew Ludwig.
Teaching: Transparency, Dynamic Lecturing, & Review
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| I (Julie Dalke) am auditing Hoda Yousef’s class titled “The Making of the Modern Middle East,” and I am excited to share three teaching methodologies for this week’s “Caught in the Act” column. Her commitment to transparent instruction, dynamic lecturing, and effective review strategies significantly enhances student engagement and learning outcomes.
Hoda consistently employs the Transparency in Learning and Teaching (TILT) framework, ensuring that students understand the purpose behind their learning activities. |
Teaching: How should AI be used for creating personal stories?
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During our recent Faculty Learning Community on AI, Laura Russell shared a novel way she engaged her 100-level personal storytelling class in considering writing in the age of AI. The exercise centered around two main questions:
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Teaching: Take a moment to dwell on the positive
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| The first batch of major writing assignments will come in soon (if it hasn’t already), so I want to take a moment to dwell on the positive. In my class last semester, it was clear that only a small minority of students were misusing AI. Participants in the November Teaching Matters session on AI in writing instruction reported similar experiences. |
Tidbit: The Power of No
One of the more memorable, if improbable, scenes from Peter Jackson’s “The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies,” is when Legolas is battling his archenemy Bolg on a fallen tower that begins to crumble underneath him. In his own physics-defying, elfish way, he starts running up the blocks as they fall to the chasm below.
Tech: Why the HEIC can’t I open my photos?
iPhone and Android devices can compress images and videos taken with HEIC (High Efficiency Image Container), HEIF (High Efficiency Image File), and HEVC (High Efficiency Video Encoding). These formats offer better compression and take up less space than many other formats. But you may run into situations where you need to use the images or videos in a software suite that does not support those file types. |
Teaching: Sustaining Student Attention
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| I cannot give a professional talk or webinar without PowerPoint, but I never use it in my classroom. Nevertheless, the recent piece Effective Strategies for Sustaining Student Attention During PowerPoint Lectures offered some really helpful tips, regardless of whether you use this technology in your classroom or not. The article recommends three tried-and-true practices that I would classify as CATs—Classroom Assessment Techniques—small yet effective ways to check whether your students are actually picking up what you’re putting down. |
Teaching: Be Kind to Your Future Self
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| Lew Ludwig caught Susan Villarreal in the act of good teaching, he writes: Last Monday, as I scrambled to finish my notes for the first week of class, I was kicking myself. I’ve taught this course many times before, but it had been three semesters since the last round. I can barely remember what I had for lunch yesterday, much less the details of what worked- or didn’t- three semesters ago. |
Teaching: To Use AI or Not to Use AI? A Student’s Burden
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Tech: Help your students track projects and assignments
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| Google Sheets has a new feature that automatically creates a timeline from a spreadsheet that lists tasks. The timeline looks much like a Gantt chart you might find in project management software like Monday.com, Asana, or Microsoft Planner.
Have a look at this sample timeline for a student group research project proposal. To use the feature, at minimum your google sheet needs a task column and a dates column. |