Notes on Teaching and Learning

“Practice makes perfect” … right? If you have ever competed in a sport, played a musical instrument, or prepared for a driving exam, you know that not all practicing is equal. For instance, if you were to drive to school every day but never parallel park or learn how to merge onto the highway, chances […]

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With the semester drawing to a close and final exams approaching, review sessions are sure to be at the front of your student’s minds. While typically not as focused as a regular lecture, review sessions can help students draw connections between the various topics covered throughout the course. What follows will be four techniques to […]

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The following is a guest post by Bridget Arend, director of university teaching at the University of Denver. “We’ve reviewed this type of problem in class many, many times. Then I change a few details and my students act like they have never seen it before!” Have you ever found yourself uttering this sentiment? This is a […]

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Take a break this fall and check out a book on teaching or pedagogy from the Kaneb Center Library. Two recommendations from our staff are Teaching What You Don’t Know and Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning. Teaching What You Don’t Know by Therese Huston is a well-researched and practical guide on how to not only survive […]

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In a previous post, we discussed how to use graduate school teaching experience to prepare for the academic job market. But what about those preparing for careers in industry, business, government, service, or other non-academic or alternative-academic jobs? Should graduate students interested in non-academic jobs spend time teaching their own class or learning about teaching during graduate […]

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The semester is one month old, and for better or worse the climate of your classroom has largely been cemented.  Students know what to expect, and their expectation shape-and sometimes limit-what learning objectives can be accomplished.  Hopefully things are going well; but if you are like most teachers, you probably have identified ways the learning […]

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Graduate school offers many opportunities for students to talk about and present their research, but often provides fewer opportunities to discuss teaching. For those planning an academic career, the reality is that, in many jobs, at least some portion of your time will consist of teaching and interacting with students. Thus, whether you are just […]

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It’s the start of the third week of class and you’re teaching a discussion-based course. You’ve attended a Kaneb workshop on leading discussion and remember hearing that if students don’t speak on the first day of class, they’re more likely not to speak at all. So on the first day, you had students partner up […]

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The first week of class is already over, and the semester is off and running, ready or not.  How was the first day?  Did you make any mistakes? Is there anything you would like to do over again?  Well, you cannot get that first day back again, but there are still many things you can […]

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Students are back in the residence halls, syllabi are (mostly) written, and somewhere, right now, a professor is planning the first day of class. A few minutes for the syllabus, then letting out early? Maybe go around the room and check attendance before they leave? While the first class may seem unimportant, it can actually […]

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