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| It is important to think through our own goals as advisers as a part of setting expectations for ourselves and our students. The “Situational Model of Academic Advising Styles” has four quadrants (Guardian, Accountant, Endorser, Mentor) and recognizes that we shift among versions of these different approaches depending on the needs of particular students at different stages of their Denison careers. |
Teaching Tips
Articles and resources to empower your teaching experience.
Teaching “Efficiently”
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| When you have 90 seconds between advising sessions, please take a look at our Read of the Week: Alan Levinovitz’s brief Chronicle essay, “Efficiency Isn’t Everything,”
This may seem like a strange topic for April and advising season, when time is of the essence. But I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the tension between arguments for the inevitability and value of embracing the “efficiency” of AI in the workplace and insufficiently explored questions about the place of “efficiency” in our classrooms and our students’ learning processes. |
Gauging Student Learning in the Age of AI
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| This edition’s read of the week is a pairing for your reading pleasure: 2 essays that work together well to underline the importance of rethinking our learning goals and what exactly we are assessing in our students work in our AI era–their ability to produce an output, their ability to think through, understand, and explain what they have produced, or a bit of both. |
Spring Cleaning
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| As I was preparing to head back to class this week, I was thinking about Marie Kondo. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve never read a single one of her books about “tidying up”–as anyone who lives in my house can attest. But I do know that her name is now synonymous with decluttering, with an emphasis on letting go of anything that no longer serves a clear purpose for you or “sparks joy.” |
Teaching Toward Slow Hope
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| Looking for an inspiring read? Try this interview with Douglas Haynes about his new book, Teaching for Slow Hope: Place Based Learning in College and Beyond.
Haynes says, “So, when I discuss collaboration in this book, I’m not just talking about assigning students to do more group projects. This, too, is important work that builds students’ communication and listening skills, as well as empathy, organization and more. |
Teaching Across the Liberal Arts
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As usual for Teaching Matters sessions, the conversation last Thursday (3/5) was rich with idea-sharing. We were talking about what “moves” we make in our classroom to help our students see the connections between all of their courses and articulate how their liberal arts education has impacted them. Here’s a list of some of our ideas:
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15 Tips to Align Your Teaching With Brain Science
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In the midst of everything we do, I encourage you to take a minute to support yourself by looking at our read of the week: 15 Tips to Align Your Teaching With Brain Science. Bookmark it, print it, or do whatever you need to do to make this easily accessible to your future self! 15 tips might sound like a lot, but this is a clear and concise overview of the brain science concepts behind many of the teaching strategies that Denison faculty practice across campus. If |
From Time-Saver to Teaching Transformer: Harnessing AI’s Pedagogical Power
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| It has become increasingly important to stay well-informed enough about the basic education-related capacities of genAI in order to be able to guide our students through challenging AI-related discussions and decisions. In this article, David E. Balch and Robert Blanck provide some clearly explained food for thought with their suggestions of ways that you might (or might not) consider using AI yourself and, just as importantly, leading thoughtful student conversations about ethical and intentional AI usage. |
Guest Column by Lucy Bryan, Visiting Assistant Professor in Journalism
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| When I began teaching at Denison in the fall of 2024, I designed an AI-policy that drew on my nine years as a faculty member in a university writing center. I told my students that they could use LLMs to do things they would feel comfortable asking a Writing Center consultant to do. What I found was that students had trouble limiting themselves to the parameters I’d set. |
Students, Research, and Information Literacy
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| A group of 20 colleagues came together to explore strategies for teaching our current students to embrace the methods and challenges of scholarly research. Amanda Folk (Director of the Library), in collaboration with Regina Martin (Director of the Writing Program), led us in a discussion of the Framework for Literacy for Higher Education. We began with some brainstorming about the steps in the research process that tend to cause “bottlenecking” for our students. |