How Faculty Can ‘Click’ Their Way to a More Inclusive Classroom

What do you think is important for an instructor to do when using classroom response systems (polling software or clickers)? Select all that apply.

A) Choose questions that most students will be able to answer correctly.
B) Vary the types of poll questions beyond multiple choice.
C) Ask students “Please discuss your answer with a neighbor.”
D) Stress that students answer questions independent of their peers.

Note: Kelly Hogan and Viji Sathy will be presenting at Winter Academy! Sign up for “Leveraging Technology to Cultivate an Inclusive Classroom” on Monday, December 10th at 9:15 am in Hillel 101 at go.wlu.edu/winteracademy.

Enhancing Learning through Zest, Grit, and Sweat

Early in my career, I focused most of my efforts on teaching content. That is, after all, what most of us are hired to do, right? With experience and greater understanding of how learning works, my attention shifted toward metacognition. I began investing lots of time and energy reading and identifying ways to help students grow as learners while they learned the content.

What Professors Can Learn About Teaching From Their Students

Marcos E. García-Ojeda wants to improve his teaching. He has flipped his classroom and embraced active-learning techniques. And he’s even invited some observers to sit in on his “General Microbiology” class here at the University of California at Merced on a recent afternoon.

The observers will give Mr. García-Ojeda, an associate teaching professor of biology, a detailed depiction of the teaching and learning in his class — actions that are central to a college’s purpose but rarely examined.

This examination is especially unusual because of who’s performing it: undergraduates.

Teaching Critical Thinking: Some Practical Points

We all endorse it and we all want our students to do it. We also claim to teach it. “It” is critical thinking, and very few of us actually teach it or even understand what it is (Paul & Elder, 2013).

What’s the blueprint for a 21st-century college campus?

With enrollments declining and technology advancing, colleges are breaking ground on spaces that give students and faculty new ways to engage.