We’re ready to share responses to our call for insights, experiences, and opinions on quizzes. You can expect to see them over the course of the next several weeks. I’ll start here with an overview of the issues to consider if you want to start
When I first started working on teaching and learning, I focused on teaching. The instructional development program I headed at Penn State had as its mission “to support faculty efforts to maintain and improve instructional quality.” I read, thought, and wrote about characteristics known to
Online classes most often begin with an “introduce yourself” discussion forum for students to get comfortable working with peers in discussions and other activities. Most follow the standard model of asking each student to say something about themselves, which can lead to perfunctory comments meant
“Facts are stubborn things,” John Adams wrote over 250 years ago. He was right in more ways than one—for our field of history and probably for yours too.
Despite all the manufactured uproar over the teaching of “divisive concepts” like critical race theory (Waxman 2021),
The format of face-to-face education encourages “big-block” course design. Faculty are assigned one to three classes per week, each between 50 minutes and three hours long, and those become the atom units of planning. They devote most classes to delivering learning content as lectures and
I hadn’t given any thought to what student success means because like other widely used descriptors, its meaning appears obvious. And then I read Weatherton and Schussle’s (2021) essay. They point out that we think we know we’re talking about but in fact success has
In my experience, most students have difficulty translating their ideas to acceptable prose. It’s my belief that it’s the responsibility of every professor—including mathematics professors—to try to enhance the writing abilities of their students. Writing is a fundamental skill, one common to all disciplines. Many
How many of your students still cram for exams? Students should be studying just before tests, but it should not be their first time seriously looking at course materials. Multiple research findings make clear that one frenzied period of study right before the exam generally
Nearly all teachers today use PowerPoint or Google Slides presentations to accompany their synchronous lessons. At the same time, students have laptops, tablets, or smartphones open during face-to-face classes. This offers teachers the option of adding interactions to their lessons by inserting slides with questions,
Why this article is worth discussing: For most teachers, change keeps their courses fresh and invigorated. It’s an antidote to all about teaching that doesn’t change: content fundamentals, courses taught, passive students, exams, assignments, and grading—a list we can polish off with committee work. Despite
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