Articles and resources to empower your teaching experience.
It’s that time of year. Course evaluations are an important feedback tool that can help inform our course design. Historically, providing a set time during class provides the highest response rate. As such, if there is something I want specific feedback on, I will have a brief conversation with the class the week before. For example:
This semester, we tried <blank> which was something new for the course.
At a recent meeting with colleagues, the discussion of student workload came up. Specifically, many of us are using the best practice of creating low-stakes assignments to keep our students engaged. But if we all do this, are we overloading students?
An important distinction came up in our conversation: low stakes vs. low workload. Some interpret low stakes assignments as counting for a small percent of one’s grade.
We’re pretty late in the semester. Have any of your students drifted off more than you like? It’s still not too late to try to reel them back in. This piece from the Chronicle gives four simple ways to try to get them re-engaged.
How much time do you devote to office hours? Three times a week, for 14 weeks, that’s 2,520 minutes a semester! This very short article from the Teaching Profession gives seven concrete ways to interact with students during office hours.
How much time do you devote to office hours? Three times a week, for 14 weeks, that’s 2,520 minutes a semester! This very short article from the Teaching Profession gives seven concrete ways to interact with students during office hours.
It’s that time of year. Students are getting their midterm grades, and you’re faced with that inevitable question, “Can I do some extra credit?” This short article from Faculty Focus argues that extra credit does not treat the issue – a deficiency in understanding. If a tennis player is struggling with their serve, doing extra practice on their backhand will probably not help their serve game.
Faculty careers are long, characterized by many transitions from achieving tenure and promotion to balancing work and family. The longest stage of the faculty career is the mid-career stage, which includes recently tenured associate professors up to faculty colleagues who are 10 years out from retirement. The purpose of this professional development workshop is to assist mid-career faculty across the GLCA in navigating in and through various transitions and career paths successfully.
As we near the half-way mark, consider getting mid-semester feedback from your students. Mid-semester evaluations:
Here are some sample mid-semester evaluations you can use or adapt for our course:
Now that we are back in-person, many of us are excited to engage in those lively classroom discussions. Could you use a few pointers? The Chronicle article, How to Hold a Better Class Discussion, has many practical tips and suggestions. The article is nicely divided into sections:
Don’t forget, you can access Chronicle articles directly through Denison’s institutional account.
Trying something new this semester? It’s never too early to get feedback from your students. Here is a simple feedback technique I head from Dr. Sarah Wolff in Mathematics she calls KQS. Students complete the following:
It only takes a few minutes, and is a low-cost way to get some valuable feedback and act as a conversation started of why you do something a particular way.
