Over the next few months, members of the university teaching community will revisit and revamp their courses for the next academic year. While many know that the Kaneb Center offers one-on-one consultations, not many know exactly what this process entails. Typical conversations during a consultation are structured around designing your course/syllabus, designing early semester feedback […]
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Posted in Course Design on Jun 1st, 2011
Thinking about designing or redesigning a course this summer? If so, you may want to consider using the backward design method. The Chronicle of Higher Education‘s ProfHacker has posted a summary of the backward design process based on Understanding by Design, Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe (available for checkout from the Kaneb Center library). As described […]
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Recently, Chris Clark posted on rubrics and Blackboard’s grading form tool (Blackboards grading forms gets a B-). Chris discussed the challenges involved in creating and implementing rubrics well. One thing he didn’t mention is how they can facilitate student learning and performance. How Rubrics Help Students Learn (Chronicle of Higher Education, November 28, 2010) provides […]
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The Myth of Learning Styles (Change, September/October 2010) makes a clear and succinct case that learning styles are not a useful consideration when planning our teaching. The article starts by identifying what is true about learning styles and offers a variety of alternative student characteristics that can be more useful to us when preparing and […]
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Reading the Chronicle of Higher Education on 8/10/2010 I was reminded that, as a new semester looms, tension is building for many who will be meeting a new group of students for the first time. Perhaps you find yourself among those feeling the effects of the rapidly approaching semester? During consultations and other interactions with Notre […]
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When teaching summer courses you should consider the advantages and disadvantages of the compressed time frame for teaching and learning. In “Best practices: teaching in summer session,” Kops suggests a number of items to take into account. These include: Restructuring the course to enhance focus on key student outcomes. Reconfiguring assignments to break them into smaller […]
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