Teaching Professor Conference, Kissimmee, Florida

I recently had the pleasure of attending The Teaching Professor conference in Kissimme, FL. The conference is designed to improve the teaching skills of professors in all disciplines, in both face-to-face and online teaching.

The conference opened with a welcome address from Barbara Walvoord on Saving time in the Grading Process. Dr. Walvoord's address reminded participants that as professors we should not spend more time grading work than student's have put into creating it! She also spoke about how to not get caught in a trap of "micro-grading", that is spending so much time correcting every grammatical error, etc., that when students turn in rewrites they have just fixed the errors, but not addressed any major writing issues. Her address started the conference out on a very positive note, and I am looking forward to her visit to WSSU on August 11 -12, 2008, for the Action Research Institute.

I attended a workshop by Keith Whittington from Rochester Institute of Technology called Simple Active Learning Activities Designed to Increase Student Learning and Satisfaction. Dr. Whittington shared with a very large group several activities designed to increase classroom interaction and to get accurate feedback from students. One activity he shared was to have students write down anonymously one thing they learned or one thing they liked the most or least about class or readings. He emphasized making it one thing, and providing absolute limits to help students focus their answers. You can collect them at the end of class, and structure your next lecture around the areas that are still unclear to students. A lot of the information he shared was based on research done by Angelo and Cross (1993). He also did a very interesting card activity in which he gave out cards from a deck randomly, grouped people by fours, and had us work on an assignment. We worked on the assignment by having one person start the answer, and we just kept passing it and adding on to it. It was a very non-threatening way to brainstorm, and it requires that everyone participate. When it was time to share, he chose cards from another deck to randomly select people to answer the questions. The audience really enjoyed this method, and I could see how this could be very effective with a large group.

I attended several workshops on how to create communities in online classes. One session, done by Lynda Nauright called No More Sage on the Stage: Strategies for Active Learning in Blended Face-to-Face and Online Courses, emphasized that faculty (and administrators) need to recognize that as our student population changes, so does the role of faculty members. She spends a lot of time trying to make sure her online classes work collaboratively, and when she places them in groups she tells them that their peers can decided to remove them from the group if they don't participate. If this happens, they are automatically removed from the course. This has only happened one time, but you can imagine what a discussion it started in our session!

Another session done by a very lively Economics professor, Dr. Ngoc Bich Tran, gave us How to Succeed in First-Time Online Teaching: Top Ten Tips. They are:
10. Enjoy it
9. Offer student support
8. Be patient and considerate to students
7. Keep open lines of communication
6. Provide clear and consistent instructions and feedback
5. Provide enhancement materials
4. Use available online content resources
3. Motivate your students
2. Be organized by planning and developing the course early
1. Be open-minded and enthusiastic when committing to teach online course

Her co-presenters also emphasized using the support of your institution's instructional designers and any offices with expertise in distance learning.

Finally, I learned a lot about my co-workers as part of this conference. WSSU had a strong presence, and having the opportunity to spend time with other faculty will allowed for increased chances for collaborations and increased collegiality.

I am grateful to CETL for providing this opportunity, and encourage all to utilize CETL as a resource to enhance your professional development.

Engaging Howard Gardner's Multiple Intelligence Concept to Enhance Learner-Centered, Active Learning: A SoTL Teaching Project

Have you ever wondered why students in your courses possess varying degrees of skill sets and would like to engage more of their competencies and enhance their learning in the process? Dr. Milton Cox of Miami University of Ohio utilizing Howard Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences (verbal-linguistic, mathematical-logical, visual-spacial, musical-rhythmic, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, naturalistic, existential) and the methodology included in Classroom Research: Implementing the Scholarship of Teaching offers a possible approach instructors could use for classroom exploration. Focusing on scholarly teaching and the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL), Dr. Cox demonstrated how awareness of the multiple intelligences and engagement in active classroom research could change our teaching and student learning. Citing specific examples of active learning and teaching/learning projects (identifying classroom problems, writing learning objectives, project opportunties/questions, creating assignments and examples, listing outcomes from the project), matching multiple intelligences to the learning objectives, assessing and motivating student deveopment, the presenter highlighted the importance of following these essential steps in the process. Finally, Dr. Cox listed the outcomes of his Calculus 151 course. This was a thought provoking session with applications for all instructors interested in improving teaching, learning and classroom research.

Active learning, student-centered teaching, reflective practice, and ePortfolios

The Lilly Conference on College and University Teaching (Greensboro, February 8-10) was a great opportunity to be in touch with colleagues who care about implementing powerful ideas for teaching and that do research on teaching. Just to get a flavor of the key topics, see the titles from keynote speakers presentations: "How to Wake Up Your Students" (Ed Neal), "A Portrait of the Student as a Young Dog: the Workshop - Using Canine Behavior Models to Increase Classroom Motivation" (Darby Lewes), "Creating Significant Learning Experiences Through Integrated Course Design" (Stewart Rose), "Using Academic Games to Promote Learning" (Barbara Mills). The common denominators: active learning, student-centered teaching, teachers as facilitators, intrinsic motivation and highly rewarding participation in course activities.

There were many interesting parallel presentations. Let me share what I learned about ePortafolios. Many of us are interested in the use to electronic portfolios to help students and teachers grow by means of reflection and documentation of their academic work. Interaction with John Zubizarreta and Laurie Richlin was very rich in this regard. John shared documents and experiences related to the use of this tool with students and faculty members (see paper and presentation from Zubizarreta). Laurie shared her experience concerning the use of ePortfolios for graduate student advising. My balance is that there are several ePortfolio free tools (see eFolio and zFolio links) but what matters is the method and strategy used in this reflective practice. I invite WSSU colleagues that might be interested in this type of faculty development activity to let me know, CETL will promote collaboration with experienced facilitators.

Alvaro H. Galvis

Director CETL

Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning