July 8, 2020 Diana Jacobs, PhD, and Trisha Prunty
Many years after graduating with our undergraduate degrees, we can still remember the stress of being a student. One lesson that stands out from those years: if a student…
Last spring, my college, like so many other schools, made a dramatic mid-semester pivot from face-to-face instruction to online classes. It was trial by fire for instructors and students…
You just submitted grades and you’re getting ready to teach again. You remember how your classes went, but each time you start planning, you wonder what your students thought…
On Friday, March 13th, I received the email. In response to the rising coronavirus pandemic, we were moving to one week of online instruction. Five days later, one week…
In Course Design, Online Education
June 29, 2020 Kristen Bailey, Thomas Bullington, and Luke MacIver
Dr_Tom 🎲 Dungeon Master (DM): Not every DM plays the villain. That’s not my style. I prefer to hover the party, telling the story, urging the student-adventurers onward. One…
In Effective Teaching Strategies, Online Education
June 26, 2020 Brad Garner, PhD
In our 24/7, always-connected world where we are inundated with information from all sides, the ability to identify quality resources to inform our research and actions has become a…
June 24, 2020 Abdullah Al-Bahrani, PhD, and Rebecca Moryl, PhD
COVID-19 has upended normal social connections that develop between students and professors. We are missing the connections that develop through casual interactions in office hours, pre-class discussions, post-class questions,…
June 22, 2020 Valencia Gabay, MEd, and Shannon Voyles, EdD
It is becoming increasingly important for universities to meet the needs of today’s global learners. As a result, online academic institutions are raising the bar on instructional practices and…
“There is nothing more unequal than the equal treatment of unequal people.” This quote, attributed to Thomas Jefferson, is often used in gifted education to justify the attention, resources,…
June 17, 2020 Lisa K. Forbes, PhD
Today, faculty are being asked to abruptly expand their teaching practices in ways many of us would never have imagined. For many, teaching online is something they’ve never done…
In Effective Teaching Strategies
June 15, 2020 Paty Cantu, MA, and Hayley Kazen, PhD
Although teaching first-time freshmen across all content areas presents challenges, first-year experience (FYE) courses also have unique obstacles which must be overcome, especially with the shift to online learning.…
Recently, I was asked to work with faculty on, among other things, writing teaching philosophies. During preparation for the workshop, I reviewed my own teaching philosophy which hadn’t been…
In Effective Teaching Strategies
June 10, 2020 Leanne Adams and Suzanne E. Cansler
As educators, we often struggle to provide an effective learning environment for the students who are easily distracted and clamoring for more support. Technology in the classroom has the…
In Course Design, Online Education
June 8, 2020 Miriam Bowers-Abbott
While there is no shortage of data about COVID-19, finding meaning within that data has been another matter entirely. Meaning would be especially helpful for faculty who are trying…
June 5, 2020 Mary Jo Hollandsworth, MEd, and Laura Trujillo-Jenks, PhD, FHEA
Should you give your students another assessment or worksheet from the textbook? Why aren’t your students engaged in your classroom? Traditional instruction may not be enough for our 21st…
In Online Education, Teaching and Learning
June 3, 2020 Bonnie Bechard, EdD
For the past three years, I have taught a social entrepreneurship course with a semester-long project called Climb Above Addiction. This social venture supports prevention and recovery from drug…
Instructors, and instructional designers, spend a lot of time thinking about the flow of a classroom and how to create an intuitive sensibility that paves the progression a student…
One of the most satisfying moments in teaching is leading a lively discussion in which students are deeply engaged in the material and contributing thoughtfully. However, as I’m sure…
In Effective Teaching Strategies
May 27, 2020 Nasrin Mirsaleh-Kohan, PhD
Since accepting my first tenure-track faculty position, I have wanted to create a safe environment for students to ask questions and discuss concepts. My passion for teaching and learning…
In Effective Teaching Strategies, Online Education
May 22, 2020 Christian Aguiar and Albert Pearsall, III
This spring, the COVID-19 pandemic forced many to make a sudden transition to online teaching, a field with its own rich body of research, best practices, and good ideas.…
May 20, 2020 Gwen Bass, PhD, and Michael Lawrence-Riddell
Over the past decade, many independent schools have intentionally expanded their missions to go beyond academic excellence and include goals related to character development, equity, accessibility, and social responsibility.…
In Online Education, Philosophy of Teaching
May 18, 2020 Mary Hoeft
It was Friday, March 12, 2020—the end of a long week of “What Ifs.” What if Covid-19 spreads across the U.S.? What if our university closes? What if our…
While it might seem like a different lifetime, it was not so long ago that our world was turned upside down by the emergence of COVID-19 and the onslaught…
May 13, 2020 Devshikha Bose, Sarah Dalrymple, and Susan Shadle
In response to the worldwide spread of COVID-19, most erstwhile face-to-face and hybrid courses have now transitioned into remotely delivered ones. In these new educational spaces, designing for student…
May 11, 2020 Stephanie Smith Budhai, PhD
The end of the academic term often brings final examinations and cumulative assessments to test students’ knowledge of course materials. With 30% of college students taking online courses (Allen…
Because I teach online courses, I hoped—foolishly—that my own students would not suffer too much from the destabilizing effects of COVID-19 on higher education. I knew them to be well-versed…
In Effective Teaching Strategies
May 6, 2020 Ann Obermann, PhD
This spring our campuses were closed, and we quickly moved all classes online due to COVID-19. Though we have continued to work and teach together, many of us did…
May 4, 2020 Laura Trujillo-Jenks, PhD, and Rebecca Ratliff Fredrickson, EdD
“Be anchor in life, be anchor in love, be anchor in what you believe.” —Unknown Watching a rock being thrown into the water can be exciting as the ripples…
In Effective Teaching Strategies
May 1, 2020 Tierney King
The Teaching Professor Conference is an event where educators who are passionate about the art and science of teaching gather every year. This year, the education realm has been…
April 29, 2020 Siva priya Santhanam, PhD
The transition to online teaching has been partially, if not completely, challenging for faculty teaching in colleges and universities. I am writing this article while reflecting on my own…
April 27, 2020 Eric J. Moore, PhD
As the clock seems to race through the final minutes of an exam, several students frantically scan questions and fill in bubbles to demonstrate their knowledge and content mastery…
Different generations of students have enrolled and graduated from higher education institutions for many decades. Throughout these decades, educators have been using the same strategies despite what generation is…
In Effective Teaching Strategies
April 22, 2020 Nathan Pritts, PhD
Students can have a hard time seeing how general education requirements and foundational classes help them achieve their goals. Students, especially adult learners, want to make measurable progress toward…
As a teacher of writing and mindfulness, I often use cross-genre approaches in my classrooms. For my writing classrooms, that might mean simple breath work, meditation, or movements to…
When I was asked to create an online course 20 years ago, I simply transcribed my face-to-face lectures into 10–15 page Word documents that I posted in our LMS.…
Having taught college for five years now, I sometimes take for granted that teaching methods that seem obvious now were once foreign to me. So, to prevent other first-time…
By now, most educators have seen the images of equity versus equality versus justice, and we argue over the merits of these images. What’s missing is a deeper conversation…
April 10, 2020 David Noffs and Jacob Guerra-Martinez
Editor’s note: This article was featured on The Teaching Professor in December 2018. For more articles like this, learn more about a Teaching Professor membership. Late last summer we…
Most professors would admit that they’ve found themselves frustrated when grading papers. Yes, sometimes those frustrations might stem from students ignoring your clear, strategic, and explicit instructions, but more…
The terms rigor and relevance have rocketed to the forefront of K-12 education initiatives over the past 10 years, and with good reason. Research has shown that students, when…
