The type of confidence Jim outlined in the article is not to be confused with arrogance—that overbearing pride that finds expression in classrooms where how much the teacher knows is regularly displayed and compared with how little the students know. Those overbearing types are not likely to be reading a blog like this so that’s not what’s on tap today.

We all know that effective teachers teach with confidence, but what makes Jim’s article so great is that he identifies the sources of that confidence. It starts with a clear-eyed examination of why you teach. For the money? Not likely, and not a sustaining reason. For the glory? Not likely. How many rich and famous college teachers do you know? For the students? Now there’s a more promising possibility. Because the future depends on people knowing what you teach? Another possibility with potential. There will be different reasons but they must be ones that energize the intellectual, emotional and physical demands of teaching. Teachers of any age will enter the class with confidence and poise if they are there for important reasons. It’s good to regularly revisit yours.

You teach with confidence when you know the ingredients and components of effective instruction—when you know what good teachers do. Good teaching is not a mystery; it isn’t a gift. It’s compromised of acquirable skills—meaning you can learn what the skills are and work to develop them. Research starting in the 30s has identified the ingredients or components of effective instruction with remarkable consistency. Jim’s article offers a neat summary of three: speak actively (be expressive and enthusiastic), teach actively (engage students, let your teaching be about their learning), and care actively (be concerned about your students; their lives and learning).

You teach with confidence when you are prepared—when you go to a course or a specific class with explicit goals in mind. You know what you want to accomplish and you’ve planned how that will happen. That doesn’t mean that you’re inflexibly married to the plan for the day. There should be digressions and unplanned opportunities for learning, but after they happen they can be folded into your larger course plan. Being prepared isn’t about perfection. Good teachers hold themselves to high, but achievable standards. You teach with confidence when you know you’ve done your homework, when you’ve prepared as intensely as you hope your students have. But you teach realistically; teachers tend to prepare more intensely than students.

You teach with confidence when you listen to what students have to say about your teaching and their learning. You aren’t making assumptions about what they know, you aren’t pontificating about what they should know, you are dealing with what they do know and building onto that what they need to know. Listening to students is not more important than listening to yourself. Confidence grows when you understand what’s happening in class. You and students both have a legitimate perspective on that. They can recommend changes; you decide whether they should be made. They can observe things about your teaching you may not see; you decide whether changing would make it easier for them to learn.

Teaching without confidence isn’t much fun. Things you don’t expect happen and you can’t explain why. That erodes your confidence further. Jim’s first maxim offers an old but effective remedy. If you want to feel confident, act confident. Yes, it’s an act. Yes, you aren’t really confident, but when you look and act like you are, guess what? Students start treating you as if you were and once that happens, guess what? You start feeling confident, start believing that you have reasons to be. Before you decide that couldn’t possibly work, give it a try.

Reference: Eison, J (1990). Confidence in the classroom: Ten maxims for new teachers. College Teaching, 38 (1), 21-25.

23 Practical Strategies to Help New Teachers Thrive

The college classroom can be an isolated place. College instructors can spend many terms without knowing how other instructors handle problems, or if their own approach is the most effective one. When you are new to teaching, you’re even more in the dark because you’re encountering everything for the first time.

As a new college instructor, you probably have many questions.

• How do I write a strong syllabus, then stick with it in the classroom?
• How do I strike the right balance between high-stakes and low-stakes assignments?
• What is the best way to start and end each class?
• How can I manage my students and my workload so I can stay enthusiastic for years to come?

For the new college teacher, it is best to learn from those who have been there. In the latest Magna Publications white paper 23 Practical Strategies to Help New Teachers Thrive, you will discover the tips and techniques that have proven successful for experienced faculty and explore how to use these in your own classes.

This 45-page white paper takes a step-by-step look at some of the strategies used by successful college teachers, with examples and take-aways for your own classroom.

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In this white paper, you will learn:

• An introduction to foundational theory of pedagogy
• How to write an effective syllabus
• How to write learning goals
• How to pace your course
• Metaphors for viewing your own role in the classroom
• How to structure assignments
• Tips for classroom pacing
• How to grade efficiently
• How to keep students interested and involved
• How to protect your own “off-time”
• Ways to deal with compromise in the classroom
• Who to go to for help
• How to stay active and enthused for an entire career

You will also receive a comprehensive list of resources for future reading and study, as well as a sample syllabus to use as a model.

Who will benefit?
This report will give you a wealth of ideas to improve your teaching and is written for new college instructors as well as experienced ones, including:

• New instructors
• Experienced instructors looking for new approaches
• Deans and department chairs supervising new faculty

Cost

You can download the PDF of this white paper, or get the print version mailed to you.

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A Campus Access License is available for an additional $200. It allows the purchasing institution to load the white paper onto the institution’s password-protected internal web site for unlimited access by members of the campus community.

23 Practical Strategies to Help New Teachers Thrive is based on a presentation delivered by Ike A. Shibley, Jr., an associate professor of chemistry at Penn State Berks, a small, four-year college within the Penn State system. He teaches chemistry, philosophy of science, and bioethics classes, and he has won both local and university-wide awards for his teaching. His research involves pedagogical approaches to improving science instruction at the college level.

College teaching can be a long and rewarding career. This white paper will help you address the challenge of the classroom and remain effective and enthusiastic for years to come.

Most of us in the humanities are vaguely aware that over the past 20 years or so, the National Science Foundation and other science education entities have invested considerable money in the reform of undergraduate science education. Lots of reports advocated for reform, although I’ve never been convinced the need for reform was all that much greater in science, math and engineering than in the rest of our disciplines. A variety of large and comparatively well-funded projects were completed or are still ongoing in these disciplines and because they were externally funded, their effectiveness had to be documented. The various projects that make use of group work and other more learner-centered approaches, most involving those pedagogies that engage students early in their college experience, were shown to effectively impact a wide range of learning outcomes. All very good news. The problem has been that despite their effectiveness, few of these reforms have penetrated other classrooms. The question is why?

Those of us who work in faculty development have long assumed that faculty can be persuaded to change instructional practices if and when they are confronted with evidence. If a particular method can be shown to be more effective at promoting learning than what is done currently, teachers will be motivated to change. In his paper, Fairweather says that’s not the case. All sorts of evidence exists (and I agree, the evidence is there) and faculty are not changing the way they teach. He thinks the problem is the reward issue—that teaching is still not valued as much as research, and until that imbalance is addressed, teachers aren’t all that motivated to make changes.

I’m not so sure the reward issue explains why teachers aren’t opting for those pedagogies that more directly focus on learning. Maybe at research universities, it’s the reward issue, but elsewhere? The question for me is whether faculty know that there is evidence that supports the efficacy of these approaches. Do they read educational research? I don’t think so. Do they read the scholarship on teaching and learning in their disciplines? A few do, but not many based on the circulation of those periodicals.

The crux of matter is that we have yet to address what kind of resources practicing teachers need to keep them informed and growing as teachers. A busy teacher who’s teaching four courses, advising, providing service to the institution and trying to keep up with developments in his or her field cannot be expected to go to educational psychology journals, for example, to find out the latest research on student motivation. Those findings need to be brought to individual teachers in a readable and accessible format that concludes with recommendations based on the findings. And maybe that does get back to the reward issue because there certainly is no reward or recognition for scholarship that translates, integrates and explores implications of findings.

But here’s where I ended up in my thinking about this. I do believed that faculty value evidence—they may want to explore it for themselves, they may want to look for other findings, they may want to challenge assumptions or argue methodology, but after they’ve done all that if the research documents that student motivation increases when students are given some choice and control over how they learn, most faculty would not only be willing to explore how they could give students that discretion, I believe most would want to do so.

We get tired, some of us are old and cynical, but almost all of us are teachers for very idealistic reasons. The satisfaction that comes from helping students learn is worth more than any dollars and cents reward—which is not to say teachers are paid enough or are getting all they deserve. It’s just that not all rewards are equal—some buy groceries, others establish our place in world as valuable human beings.

Resource
To access the PDF of Fairweather’s report Linking Evidence and Promising Practices in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) Undergraduate Education, go here »

Students have been asked at the beginning, middle, and end of their college careers. Alumni have been asked years after graduating. Colleagues within departments and across them have been asked, as have administrators, from local department heads to college presidents. So many studies have been done that there are studies of the studies.

Despite this large database, researchers continue to explore this issue and, surprisingly, find new groups to ask and new ways to analyze the results. Even more amazing is how much overlap and consistency there is across these many studies, and the study we’re about to highlight here is no exception.

The researchers studied a group of 35 faculty members who had received a Presidential Teaching Award at a public university in the Midwest. To be considered for the award, teachers had to write a 1,500-word essay describing their teaching philosophies and teaching goals. Using a qualitative methodology (hermeneutics), researchers analyzed these statements with the goal of identifying the factors that made these teachers successful. The researchers found four categories of comments characteristic of all these award-winning teachers.

1. Presence: “The term presence for this study is defined as a deeper level of awareness that allows thoughts, feelings, and actions to be known, developed, and harmonized within. Presence is also the essence of a relationship and of interpersonal communication.” (p. 13) Illustrating this particular category were comments in the essays indicating how important it is for teachers to get to know their students. “The classroom should not be a sea of faceless forms,” writes one teacher. (p. 13) Another observes, “In helping students achieve their highest potential, I realize I must cherish their individuality—their special needs, interests, and rich life experiences.” (p. 13)

2. Promotion of learning: These teachers also wrote of the importance of student learning and their roles in promoting it. They held their students and themselves to high standards, seeing students’ work in their courses and programs as preparation for lifelong learning. They also wrote of the need for students to do more than just memorize material. “Mere possession of scientific knowledge without the ability to apply it is of limited value in nursing practice,” wrote one nurse educator. (p. 14) Equally important was their shared view that promoting learning goes beyond content acquisition. Education is also about personal development, and teachers have a role in promoting that kind of learning as well.

3. Teachers as learners: These exemplary teachers described themselves as learners, each making it a priority to keep their teaching current. “As teachers, we must continue to re-engineer our curriculum, experiment with new and different methods of delivering course content, and bring emerging technologies into our classrooms.” (p. 15) These teachers valued opportunities to revise course content, to teach new courses, and to work on degree-program curricula.

4. Enthusiasm: “Effective teaching presupposes a command of the material and facility in communicating it with clarity, grace, fairness, and humor. But most of all it supposes enthusiasm.” (p. 15) This enthusiasm starts with a love of the content, but it goes beyond that and includes a genuine love of teaching and a passion for students and their learning. “I am also concerned that my students develop a passion for learning that goes on well after the course has ended.” (p. 15)

In their conclusion, the researchers note that “there is no formula for successful teaching. Each professor is unique and has an individual educational philosophy and teaching goals.” (p. 16) Even so, good teachers share common commitments and characteristics—they do in this study and have done so in many others as well.

Reference: Rossett, J. and Fox, P. G. (2009). Factors related to successful teaching by outstanding professors: An interpretive study. Journal of Nursing Education, 48 (1), 11-16.

Excerpted from Qualities of Successful Teaching, The Teaching Professor, 24.1 (2010): 6.

In the seminar 23 Practical Strategies to Help New Faculty Thrive, Ike Shibley, PhD, an associate professor of chemistry at Penn State Berks, talked about the importance of creating your own ‘teaching self’ that’s grounded in key best practices and teaching philosophies. It’s something that most beginning instructors get very little training on, if any.

“Unfortunately most of our graduate education is centered around this concept that if you know the content you can teach,” Shibley says. “That’s disappointing because the content, while critically important, really falls flat on its face if all you’re doing is sharing the content in a didactic fashion.”

During the seminar Shibley provided a comprehensive blueprint for instructors — from preparing the course syllabus and writing learning goals … to making effective use of class time and adopting efficient and effective grading strategies … to finding a work/life balance.

Here are four of the 23 strategies he shared:

1. Create multiple grading opportunities: Students have different ways of expressing their learning, and appreciate it when instructors offer a variety of grading opportunities rather than having their grade determined solely on a midterm and final exam. Shibley recommends a mix of high-stakes grading, such as exams, term papers and group presentations, and low-stakes grading such as participation, short writing assignments and quizzes.

2. Introduce and summarize: Most television series start each week’s episode with a recap of what happened the previous week. It’s a good strategy for faculty as well, and can help refocus students’ attention and get them ready to learn. Using minute papers is a good way to get students involved in the exercise, Shibley says.

3. Incorporate technology: When it comes to technology, each person has a different comfort level. But whether you’re an early-adopter who relishes in the opportunity to innovate with the latest tools or someone who takes a more cautious approach, incorporating technology into your teaching is an important aspect to engaging today’s students, and can improve your efficiency.

4. Find a mentor: Oftentimes, new faculty are assigned a mentor based on office proximity as much as anything else, but a mentor doesn’t even have to teach in the same discipline as you. While it’s good to have someone nearby to help you with some of the tactical issues, Shibley recommends finding a mentor who is truly interested in playing an active role in your development as a teacher, and will share teaching tips, reading lists and serve as an advisor and sounding board.

Finally, while the seminar was geared toward new faculty, Shibley talked about the importance of removing the stigma that can be associated with faculty development.

“Unfortunately, faculty development usually means remediation,” he says. “If you’re a good teacher, no one recommends you work with a faculty developer. If you’re getting good ratings, no one seems to think that you need to practice. This, in a big way, is a myth. I have yet to have a single class period go perfectly, let alone an entire course. Every day there are things to improve in big and little ways. Professional athletes practice, and professional teachers need to practice also.”

When I decided as a second career (or third, depending on how you look at it), that I wanted to teach at the postsecondary level, the first step was to enroll in a doctoral program. Because the field I teach encompasses several disciplines, I chose an education program to pursue. Over the two-plus years of classes, tests, papers, presentations and the final dissertation, I learned much about myself as a student that has transferred to my teaching of adult students.

Here are just a few of the things I like to keep in mind as I teach:

Be organized. As a student I rarely appreciated an instructor who was disorganized, didn’t meet deadlines, or who rambled during a lecture while appearing completely unprepared. If you want me to meet deadlines, then meet yours as an instructor, too. If you say you will respond by e-mail within 24 or 48 hours, do so. If you promise to have papers back within a week or two, then you need to meet that deadline. And, well, if you aren’t prepared, then say so because my time is valuable too and I can spend it working on something else. As an instructor, I try to follow this to an extreme, because I remember how valuable timely feedback and responses were to making feel that the professor was concerned about my learning.

Your experiences are interesting, to a point … Many of us are hired because of our background and history in business and industry, our prowess in a subject, or just our general sparkling personality. However, if you ask me as a student to read three chapters and do preparatory work for a class, I am not entirely thrilled to sit and listen to one, two or three hours of your experiences, your political opinions, or your problems with university administration. Ah yes, you can be the sage on the stage, after all that is what you are getting paid for, isn’t it? But limit your rambling to that which is relevant to the class. Otherwise, as an adult learner, my mind will soon be on what I need to pick up at the grocery store on the way home and why the heck I paid so much for this class. I use this philosophy to keep classes on task, and sprinkle in my experience sparingly.

Make it clear. Both students and instructors routinely dread the first test, paper, or quiz of the semester, primarily because we are still getting used to each other. As a student, I always wondered if a professor would appreciate my writing style, whether I studied the right things for the test or quiz, and how this would start my semester. That’s why I love rubrics and checklists! Come whatever, I felt like as a learner, that I had control over my learning, and that I wasn’t writing some paper that would be so far off the mark that I would never dig my way out of that hole. Studying for tests became more organized with checklists and the chances of using my time wisely and well were generally rewarded.

I do the same favor for my students. I post rubrics for everything – discussions, short papers, term papers and projects. Are they fun to put together? Not necessarily. But as an instructor, it forces me to think long and hard about my definition of exceptional, good, fair and poor. It gives me a more standardized tool to give back to the students rather than just a paper covered in red. It takes time in the beginning, but as rubrics are refined and tightened, it makes grading those large amounts of paper on the same topic infinitely more enjoyable.

Life does get in the way. We all set assignment dates, hoping against hope that we will have some breathing room between the classes to grade all those assignments and papers. It is the closest thing to control that we have as instructors during a semester to make sure the learning goes forward. However, I learned early and hard two weeks into my doctoral program when I broke my ankle and couldn’t drive to my classes that you can’t plan everything. Students (especially adult learners) have jobs, kids, families, cars, bills, illnesses and all the detritus of life that gets in the way. It doesn’t hurt to give a little, especially early in the semester. A little leeway earns a lot of student loyalty. However, students can and will take advantage, so set your own limits.

Talk to me. I encourage students to talk to me throughout the semester, whether I am their primary advisor or not. The reasons are explained in the previous section. Disappearing into the twilight and not making yourself available to your students can lead to student retention problems. So, dear students, please talk to me. I may not like what you say, but if you just disappear, or get frustrated and leave, I can’t help you. I had several professors that had that policy, and while I tried not to abuse their open door, ear, and telephone, it certainly sustained me during those days when I wondered why I was even trying.

It’s about learning…not teaching. I came in with the grandest of notions to the teaching profession … opening minds, inspiring the next generation, spreading my love of learning, etc. What I found is this profession is not about me, my ego, or my knowledge. This profession that we have chosen is about learning and how we can help our students be successful. I really don’t care if every student in my class gets an A and sometimes I am thoroughly disappointed to have to give anything else. Grades are a measure like anything else, and if my students are learning, then I am successful.

That’s it in a nutshell. My experience as a student taught me that taking classes to get the degree is the goal of some students. But, I try to instill the fact that this stuff is important to your future, you need to learn it, and I can’t be there two, five or ten years down the road to hold your hand. You, the student, have to learn it and take responsibility for the learning. You are certainly paying enough for it. I am here to guide you down that road and keep you moving. I hope to be here doing just that for a long time.

Vickie A. Kelly, EdD, is the program director and assistant professor of technology administration at Washburn University.

In the educational assessment study referenced below, the students were enrolled in two sections of an introductory statistics course for sociology majors. Both sections had the same instructor, same text, and same material presented in class. Students enrolled in each were similar in terms of gender and year in school. In the control section, students took two midterm exams (one at the end of the sixth week, the other at the end of the 12th week) and a two-hour cumulative final. In the experimental section students took an exam every other week starting at the end of the second week, for a total of six exams, plus the same cumulative final. Students were given one-third the amount of time for each of the biweekly exams.

As for the better results, students given the biweekly exams scored, on average, about 10 percentage points, or one letter grade, higher on the exams taken during the semester. They scored about 15 percentage points higher on the final than those students who only took the two midterm exams.

Measuring the Impact of Testing Frequency on Student Performance
There were some other persuasive results related to the impact of testing frequency on student performance. More than 11 percent of the students in the control section withdrew from the course. Not one student in the experimental section did.

Moreover, students in the experimental section evaluated both the course and the instructor more highly. Seventy-one percent rated the instructor as “one of the best” compared with instructors of other courses they had taken. In the control section only 36 percent gave that rating to the instructor. In this case the same instructor taught both sections. Forty-nine percent in the section with the biweekly exam said that they would definitely recommend the course to friends, compared with 14 percent in the section with midterm exams.

The faculty researchers who completed this analysis suggest several reasons for these dramatic results. First, students had less material to learn for the biweekly exam, which made them less likely to cram for the exams. Second, they got feedback earlier and more often, which helped them adjust their study behaviors. Third, repeated experience taking the exams increased their feelings of competence and confidence, and that in turn increased their motivation to study and do well.

The results could be explained by any one of these reasons, or these explanations may well have had a cumulative effect. Whatever the cause, the fact that students do better when we test them more often has been confirmed yet again.

Reference: Myers, C.B., and Myers, S.M. (2007). Assessing assessments: The effects of two exam formats on course achievement and evaluation. Innovative Higher Education, 31, 227–236.

Excerpted from Frequent Exams: Better Results for Students, The Teaching Professor, June-July 2007.

The Best of The Teaching Professor: Priceless wisdom from the newsletter devoted to the art and science of better teaching

Dear friend and fellow educator,

Does thinking of yourself in metaphorical terms help guide you through the challenges of teaching? Perhaps you think of yourself as a gardener, sometimes “tending flowers,” sometimes “pulling weeds.”

Dr. Ike Shibley is motivated by the story of encountering two bricklayers and asking them what they are doing. The first tells you he is just laying bricks. The second reports that she’s building a cathedral, a grand structure that will seat 2,000 and enhance the community in many different ways.

As teachers, we are doing much more than “laying bricks,” Dr. Shibley says. We are building student confidence, motivation, and intellect that should provide a better quality of life for the individual student and for future generations.

Professor Robert G. Kraft likens teaching to coaching. He reminds us that students need to understand the entire game, not just some small part of it, and that we have to let students play the game, not just read about it.

Professor Jon Sperling’s analogy of teaching as “fishing story” suggests learning can be more effective when we feel compelled to ask questions.

Professors Erin Steuter and Geoff Martin liken colleges and universities to cooking schools, where the faculty are master chefs with expertise in particular types of cuisine, and the students are apprentice chefs who benefit from the masters’ instruction on the basic principles and methodologies of cooking.

Professor Zopito A. Marini prefers the teacher as Sherpa guide metaphor.

“Learning has striking similarities to mountain climbing in that it requires a sense of adventure, perseverance, and a great deal of plain, hard work,” says Professor Marini. “If learning is like mountain climbing, then teaching can be seen as the process of facilitating the climb. And what better facilitator of mountain climbing than a Sherpa guide.”

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What’s your favorite metaphor for yourself as a teacher? Whether you think of yourself as a gardener, builder, bricklayer, musician, coach, fisherman, master chef, ringmaster, Sherpa guide or something else, I think you’re going to want a copy of The Best of The Teaching Professor for your personal library.

The Teaching Professor, the newsletter devoted to the art and science of better teaching, illustrates innovative, creative ways to reach, motivate and inspire students.

Plus, it speaks with authority because it’s based on consistent theoretical research into sound pedagogical practice through scholarship on teaching.

Typical topics include assessment and evaluation, engagement of student interest, faculty time management, and the learner-centered classroom.

And now we’ve taken the best of the best — 83 articles from first 18 years of The Teaching Professor — and compiled them in one volume: The Best of The Teaching Professor.

Do you want innovative, creative ways to reach, motivate, and inspire students?

Practical advice from The Best of The Teaching Professor: Articles that not only discuss theoretical issues but also offer detailed guidance

Dr. Shipley, who selected the articles for The Best of The Teaching Professor, characterizes The Teaching Professor as a humble newsletter.

“Although it contains what I think is some of the most practical advice available…its articles seem to engage the reader in a conversation. They talk with the reader, not at the reader,” he says.

“Receiving each issue of The Teaching Professor is a bit like hearing from an old friend — a well-read, incredible articulate, and still-youthful friend.

“Editing this collection has been both edifying and gratifying. Selecting the best articles was like trying to choose what to eat from a menu on which every item is appetizing.”

Generous praise, indeed. And if you’re a regular reader of The Teaching Professor, I think you’ll agree.

Now The Best of The Teaching Professor brings you a compendium of practical advice, with articles that not only discuss theoretical issues, but also offer detailed guidance.

Each chapter of The Best of The Teaching Professor explores specific aspects of learning, including learner-centered teaching, classroom activities, writing and technology.

You’ll discover the pervasive aspects of critical thinking, grading, motivation, plus an overall view of teaching in higher education.

The articles compiled in The Best of The Teaching Professor represent the outstanding, diverse, and thought-provoking writing that The Teaching Professor, routinely publishes.

The wisdom contained in the essays will challenge you to reflect on your own teaching practices and help you to clarify your own teaching philosophy.

Are you ready to unlock the secrets of how to connect with your students?

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Discover techniques to improve your teaching with new ideas, innovative strategies, and tactics you can use in the classroom today

The goal of The Best of The Teaching Professor is not to advocate for any one particular philosophy of teaching, but to encourage you to develop your own understanding, rationale and reasons for teaching.

To that, we add a generous helping of very practical ideas and advice.

In The Best of The Teaching Professor, you’ll discover diverse tips on classroom activities, from suggestions for learning your student’s names…to the benefits of “concept maps” for encouraging conceptual thinking…to using “minute papers” for soliciting feedback on the content presented in class.

You’ll learn how one professor discovered how to use “The Knowledge Game” to pique student interest beyond his wildest expectations in previously “boring” topics.

You’ll find practical advice on everything from how to pace your lectures…to how to integrate humor into the classroom…to how to coach students on note-taking skills…to dealing with cognitive overload…to reckoning with learning modalities.

Plus, you’ll find chapters on:

• Group work: How to design cooperative learning exercises that emphasize individual accountability more than collaborative learning
• Discussions: Quality advice on how to facilitate consistently satisfying classroom discussions
• Writing: How to encourage students to engage with the course material effectively through a variety of writing assignments
• Technology: An overview of technological tools including electronic journals, distance learning, PowerPoint, and the World Wide Web
• Critical thinking: Critically important reflections on resolving the mixed messages of “Question authority” and “Trust me, I’m a teacher.”
• Grading: Dealing with plagiarism and cheating, alleviating exam anxiety, and resisting grade inflation
• Motivation: How to construct learning experiences that capitalize on different types of motivation

Plus, insightful chapters on student work beyond the classroom; student ranking of teachers; reconfiguring the privacy of teaching; and the scholarship of teaching.

Are you ready to re-discover your love of teaching and learning?

P.S. If you’re like most college teachers, I already know two things about you.

First, you’re a master of your chosen discipline.

Whether it’s English, chemistry, theatre or mathematics, you love to learn and share your knowledge with others. If there’s one indisputable characteristic of teachers, it’s that we never get tired of learning and teaching.

And second, we love talking about our profession and sharing all the tips, techniques and wisdom that we’ve acquired about how to be an effective teacher.

These two enthusiasms — our love of learning and our love of sharing our professional experiences with colleagues — converged some 20 years ago in the creation of The Teaching Professor, the newsletter devoted to the art and science of better teaching.

Now you can have The Best of The Teaching Professor to read and enjoy again and again.

Think of it as a legitimate crib sheet for an overall view of teaching in higher education.

Or think of it as a beacon of hope for your own teaching that will inspire your optimism and help you facilitate student learning.

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