The Center for Teaching Excellence

In this final newsletter of the academic year, we share a few recommendations for honing your teaching practice and exploring innovative and evidence-based approaches that increase student engagement and foster deeper learning.

As the semester ends, take time to reflect on the learning experience you have shared with your students. End the semester thoughtfully by expressing gratitude, providing “wise feedback,” and reinforcing the knowledge and skills they have gained.

The final weeks of the semester often means investing hours in grading students’ written work. Here we explore strategies to strengthen your ability to provide students with targeted, actionable feedback while streamlining your grading process.

Reflection and discussion activities have long been used to engage students in all modes of teaching. Thoughtfully implementing them in your courses can expose students to differing viewpoints, invite respectful disagreement, and open opportunities for inclusive learning.

Ignoring a diversity of experiences, preferences, and expectations leads educators to advantage the needs and style of the dominant group and perpetuate existing gaps in achievement. In this issue, we examine pedagogical considerations that can reduce or eliminate this type of systemic bias.

There is much about teaching and learning that is challenging. In this week’s newsletter, we highlight some simple steps you can take to make the process a bit easier.

Tools like ChatGPT are forcing many educators to re-examine their approach to learning and communicate the value of learning to students. Many educators are concerned that these tools will enable widespread cheating while others see tremendous opportunity for using the tools to help students improve their writing and understanding of course content.

The latest Student Voice survey, conducted by Inside Higher Ed and College Pulse, gathered students’ thoughts on cheating – how often it occurs, what kinds of behaviors count as cheating, and what makes them more (or less) likely to cheat (Ezarik, 2021a). Importantly, faculty can play a meaningful role in promoting greater integrity through specific communication practices and assessment design.