Topics

Pensive college student using laptop

What Are We Communicating to Students When We Write?

Do we communicate more with students in writing than we used to? I think so. In addition to the course syllabus, the usual handouts, and written feedback on papers, projects, and performances, we now share all kinds of electronic messages with students. We exchange emails,

Read More »
students working in group

How Can I Structure a Flipped Lesson? [Transcript]

There’s more to the flip than just telling students to complete the work before class and then turning them loose when they arrive in the classroom.

Chaos will emerge. Students will get frustrated. You will get overwhelmed. Learning will not happen.

It’s a simple lesson:

Read More »
Writing good multiple-choice questions

Writing Better Multiple-Choice Questions

Eleven years ago, I discovered a life-changing pedagogy called team-based learning. It let me do things in large classrooms that I didn’t think was possible. I found that the key to successful team-based learning was writing really good multiple-choice questions. I would like to look

Read More »
movie film

The Classic Movies Come to Class

If you are a professor of a certain age, you may have had the experience that I had in my first semester of teaching. I asked, “Who’s seen Norma Rae?” (I wanted to use it to illustrate that working in a mill causes hearing loss.)

Read More »
group work

Group Work: Assessment and Grading

Grading small group work can be a challenge. Most instructors use a combination of individual product and group product, often developing a percentage split based upon the assignment (e.g. 70% individual work and 30% group work).

Read More »
student studying on laptop

Dos and Don’ts of Effective Feedback

Do provide feedback that is action-oriented and tells student what they should do with the feedback information. Don’t focus exclusively on the cognitive component of learning without considering the impact of feedback on students’ motivation in the online classroom.

Read More »
man on a ipad

Using VoiceThread to Support Close Reading from a Distance

Faculty know that the increased think-time provided by asynchronous online discussion allows for deeper and more active deliberation by students than is possible in face-to-face courses. But this advantage is often lost as online discussions revert to personal opinions and anecdotes. One method for keeping

Read More »

The Benefits of a Class Newsletter

It used to be that students were expected to get all of their course information from the lecture, including the syllabus and announcements. If students missed a lecture, they were expected to ask another student what happened.

Read More »
Archives
The 2025 Teaching Professor Conference

Get the Latest Updates

Subscribe To Our Weekly Newsletter