Teaching- Getting Ready for a New Semester

Getting ready for a new semester

At the start of every semester, there are certain touch points I always return to. Here are three things to consider as you get ready for your claeese in the semester ahead:

  1. Inclusiveness: As we put the finishing touches on our syllabi, here is a quick list of things to consider to make your syllabus more inclusive. 

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Teaching- wrapping up this semester, looking to the next

Teaching – wrapping up this semester, looking to the next

As we wrap up this semester, please take a minute to reflect. Did classes go the way I planned? Are there things I would tweak for next semester? With all the projects, papers, and final exams, it may be time to reconsider late work policies. The Chronicle article, How Instructors Are Rethinking Late Workmay give you some ideas to make next semester’s classes go more smoothly.

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Teaching I- Rethinking the Optional Attendance Policy

Teaching I – Rethinking the Optional Attendance Policy

“We must reconsider optional attendance policies not least for the sake of students’ physical and mental health,” Eric Skipper writes in this Inside Higher Ed piece. Faculty members report continued attendance issues even though we are back to in-person classes. Some feel the optional attendance policies we created during the pandemic’s peak have created a “free pass” mentality toward attending class.

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Teaching II- Can our actions compound the imposter syndrome

Teaching II – Can our actions compound the imposter syndrome?

You may be familiar with the term “imposter syndrome” – one believes they are not as competent as others perceive them to be – but what about impostorization? Coined by Dr. Angelica Gutierrez, impostorization refers to the policies, practices, and seemingly innocuous interactions in the college environment that can make students question their intelligence, competence, and sense of belonging.

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Teaching- Recovering student engagement at mid-course time

Teaching – Recovering student engagement at mid-course time

Although the end is in sight, do some of your students seem overwhelmed, lack motivation, or feel disconnected from the class? Have you tried midterm course evaluations but still feel this lack of engagement? This short Faculty Focus article provides some low-stakes active learning strategies that may help you and your students successfully cross the end-of-semester finish line together.

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Teaching – Presentations and groups

We’ve reached that point in the semester – student presentations. For many students, this can be daunting. Help build student confidence with some low-stakes presentations, as explained in this short Faculty Focus article. Want more resources on presentations? Check out this Guide to Effective Presentations from the Learning Scientist.

Are you using groups this semester? How are they going? 

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Teaching – Your teaching doesn’t have to be perfect.

In the recent book, The New Colleges Classroom, the authors provide a host of activities to get students engaged: think, pair, share, and entrance and exit tickets, etc. But what happens when these fall short; the students aren’t engaged, and the class doesn’t gel? This short Chronicle article provides some advice on making that reset.

One way to get that critical “reset feedback” is midterm evaluations (the last TTT’s focus).

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Tidbit – ‘Stop With the Academic Clickbaiting’ on the Humanities

Did you see the recent article, This Is How the Humanities End, by Steven Mintz? How did it sit with you? Our own Karen Spierling had some thoughts on the article and shared them in this IHE letter to the editor, ‘Stop With the Academic Clickbaiting’ on the Humanities. In it, she cautions not to dismiss the efforts of fellow academics—and especially the hard work of junior professors—to keep the humanities vital.

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