Learning and Teaching More Effectively

• Compiled by Dr. Richard W. Slatta Professor of History, North Carolina State University, winner of the 2000 CHASS Lonnie and Carol Poole Award for Excellence in Teaching AND Dr. Maxine P. Atkinson Director of First Year Inquiry Program and Associate Professor of Sociology, North Carolina State University, winner of the 2001 CHASS Lonnie and Carol Poole Award for Excellence in Teaching. Drs. Slatta and Atkinson are available to conduct teaching and learning workshops on a variety of topics:
  
  

  course planning and development	innovative teaching methodologies
  outcomes-based assessment	teaching student research skills
  first-year student needs	inquiry guided learning
  active learning through technology	teaching effectively online

  Workshops may be customized to suit your needs

  Rich's Home Page *********** Maxine's Home Page ********** 25-Aug-2006

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  Some students are satisfied to take a course at face value and to perform the tasks required. Other students wish to know more about the "whys" of a course. Why do we do what we do? What value is it to you? What theory or assumptions lie behind the course design and assignments? The links below explore many of the pedadogical issues important to good course design. Many of the links will also help you know yourself and your special learning needs and challenges better. Many of the tools will help teachers teach better.

  Online Essays

• An Inquiry Guided Approach to Learning and Teaching
• Rubrics: Why and how to build them
• Slatta's Teaching Philosophy
• Help for Instructors of First Year Inquiry Courses
• Maxine P. Atkinson, "Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Revisited" Emphasis: Teaching and Learning, 12: 3 (May 2003).
• Maxine P. Atkinson, "The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning: Reconceptualizing Scholarship and Transforming the Academy," Social Forces, 79.4 (2001) 1217-1229. Accessible from NCSU campus; requires NCSU username.

  Learning and Teaching Table of Contents

  Aphorisms on Learning and Teaching	SoTL: Scholarship of Teaching and Learning	Learning and Teaching Issues
  University Centers for Effective Teaching and Learning	Inquiry, Problem-Based, Collaborative Learning	Teaching Character and Values
  Writing, Speaking (Communicating) Across the Curriculum	Service Learning	Concept Mapping
  Publications on Teaching and Learning	Rubrics and Assessment	Advice to Students from my father, J. E. Slatta
  Resources for First Year Seminars

  SoTL: Scholarship of Teaching and Learning

  1. Journal of Scholarship of Teaching and Learning(JoSoTL)
  2. Maxine P. Atkinson, "Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Revisited" Emphasis: Teaching and Learning, 12: 3 (May 2003).
  3. Maxine P. Atkinson, "The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning: Reconceptualizing Scholarship and Transforming the Academy," Social Forces, 79.4 (2001) 1217-1229. Accessible from NCSU campus; requires NCSU username.
  4. Doug Wellman, "The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning" Emphasis: Teaching and Learning, 10: 2 (November 2000).
  5. Articles (PDF) on the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education from the Carnegie Foundation
  6. SOTL Resources, Indiana University

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     Learning and Teaching Issues

  7. Jon Mueller's Excellent Authentic Assessment Toolbox
  8. How to Mentor Graduate Students PDF * Good advice from the Univ. of Michigan
  9. All Kinds of Minds Dr. Mel Levine's excellent institute (in Chapel Hill, NC) for undestanding differences in learning. "It's harder to be a kid than an adult. Kids are asked to be generalists in school, to do eerything fairly well. We adult don't ask that of ourselves."
  10. Definitions of Critical Thinking (CT) Many of the essays you write are designed to hone critical thinking skills. Explore some of the many definitions of CT.
  11. Blue Web'n: Annotated links to a wide range of learning sites Aimed at K-12 but excellent access via subject
  12. Some Thoughts on Teaching and Learning
  13. Index of Learning Styles Questionnaire by NCSU's Rich Felder and Barbara Soloman effort. Take this brief inventory to learn more about your learning style. A good course offers challenges to a wide range of learning styles. What's your predominant style? Knowing it can help you better match your mind and your course work.
  14. Theory Into Practice Database Learning theories, domains, concepts
  15. Holistic Critical Thinking Scoring Rubric Despite the weirdo name, some good, applicable ideas.
  16. Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) Identifies the four dimensions underlying the MTBI and describes several teaching approaches that will appeal to different MBTI profiles. I have reservations about this reductionist scale, but the whole world seems to love it, so check it out. Again, the more you know about yourself, the better.
  17. Teaching Goals Inventory Take this very helpful 53-item online inventory to assess your classroom goals. (C) 1993 Thomas A. Angelo and K. Patricia Cross. Source: Classroom Assessment Techniques: A Handbook for College Teachers

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      University Centers for Effective Teaching and Learning

  18. NCSU Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning Lots of good infor. See Resources.
  19. Univ. of Deleware Center for Teaching Effectiveness Many useful links on Learning Styles, Critical Thinking, Assessment and Evaluation and more
  20. Incorporating Active Learning into a Web-based Ethics Course by John A. N. Lee Department of Computer Science, and Center for the Study of Science in Society Virginia Tech
  21. Interactive Learning with a Web-based Digital Library System by John A. N. Lee Department of Computer Science and Center for the Study of Science in Society Virginia Tech

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      Inquiry (IGL), Problem-Based, Collaborative Learning

  22. Teaching and Learning Through Inquiry: A Guidebook for Institutions and Instructors Information on a Fall 2004 book from Stylus Press exploring IGL instruction at North Carolina State University. Teaching and Learning Through Inquiry, edited by Virginia S. Lee.
      • Inquiry-guided learning (IGL) is a pedagogy that promotes student learning through guided and, increasingly independent investigation of complex questions and problems. Rather than teaching the results of others’ investigations, which students learn passively, instructors assist students in mastering and learning through the process of active investigation itself.
      • North Carolina State University is at the forefront of the development and implementation of IGL both at the course level and as part of a successful faculty-led process of reform of undergraduate education.
      • This book documents and explores how faculty arrived at their current understanding of inquiry-guided learning and how they have interpreted it at various levels -- the individual course, the major, the college, the university-wide program, and the undergraduate curriculum as a whole -- and how they have assessed its impact.
      • The book has been written with three audiences in mind: instructors who want to use inquiry-guided learning in their classrooms, faculty developers considering supporting comparable efforts on their campuses, and administrators interested in managing similar undergraduate reform efforts.
      • Virginia S. Lee served as Associate Director of the Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning, North Carolina State University. She has played a leadership role in the Inquiry-guided Learning Initiative as well as other campus-wide initiatives related to teaching and learning.
  23. Univ. of Buffalo Case Studies in Science
  24. PBL at the Univ. of Delaware
  25. PBL Overview (Problem-Based Learning) Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy
  26. Collaborative Learning (CL) Tips on encouraging active, cooperative student participation in the learning process.
  27. Constructivism and the Seven E's Excite, Explore, Explain, Expand, Extend, Exchange, Examine
  28. Inquiry Based Learning: Instructional Models
  29. GENERIC PROBLEM-BASED LEARNING ESSENTIALS
      1. Students must have the responsibility for their own learning.
      2. The problem simulations used in problem-based learning must be ill-structured and allow for free inquiry.
      3. Learning should be integrated from a wide range of disciplines or subjects
      4. Collaboration is essential
      5. What students learn during their self-directed learning must be applied back to the problem with reanalysis and resolution.
      6. A closing analysis of what has been learned from work with the problem and a discussion of what concepts and principles have been learned is essential.
      7. Self and peer assessment should be carried out at the completion of each problem and at the end of every curricular unit.
      8. The activities carried out in problem-based learning must be those valued in the real world.
      9. Student examinations must measure student progress towards the goals of problem-based learning.
      10. Problem-based learning must be the pedagogical base in the curriculum and not part of a didactic curriculum.
      11. A more accurate title might be "student-centered, problem-based, inquiry-based, integrated, collaborative, reiterative, learning."

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      Teaching Character and Values

      Wittingly or unwittingly, we all teach values. What should those values be?
  30. Plagiarism Page by Sherman Dorn Computers and the Internet make plagiarism quick and easy. Student are tempted. Thus academic honesty is a core value that should be taught in every course.
  31. Plagiarism and Anti-Plagiarism Rutgers University. Excellent tips on how to identify e-plagiarism, such as papers copied from the Internet.
  32. Character Counts trustworthiness, respect, responsibility, fairness, caring, citizenship

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      Writing, Speaking (Communicating) Across the Curriculum

      Essential skills for everyone in our information age
  33. LabWrite NCSU program to improve science lab writing.
  34. Kairos: A Journal for Teachers of Writing in Webbed Environments
  35. Great Books and other resources online Full-text primary sources, ideal for student projects. Students, these sources are fully searchable, making them excellent research tools. Faculty, you can add these sources to your course reading list, and it doesn't cost students a dime. A BIG variety, including, Du Bois, W. E. B. 1903. The Souls of Black Folk; Frost, Robert, lots of poems; Wollencraft, Mary. 1792. Vindication of the Rights of Woman; Woolf, Virginia. 1921. Monday or Tuesday. You get the idea!
  36. Teaching strategies for improving students'communication Agcomm, Iowa State University
  37. The Elements of Style by William Strunk, Jr. First published in 1918, it remains an excellent guide to good writing. Some NCSU students very resistant to "writing across the curriculum," indeed, to writing at all. Strunk shows that my "radical" new writing demands--clarity, active voice, correct grammar --are very old, well established, and still worth applying.

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      Service Learning

      Thanks to Janey Musgrave, NC State University, Center for Student Leadership, Ethics and Public Service, for assistance in compiling these links.
  38. Service Learning Links, NC State Center for Student Leadership, Ethics and Public Service
  39. Association for Experiential Education
  40. [Robert] Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership
  41. Energize, Inc., an international training, consulting and publishing firm specializing in volunteerism
  42. Learn, Serve and Surf Online SL resources from the University of Texas at Austin
  43. Do Something, a national nonprofit organization that inspires young people to believe that change is possible
      

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      The following links come from Connecting Past and Present: Concepts and Models for Service-Learning in History edited by Ira Harkavy and Bill M. Donovan (Washington, DC: American Association for Higher Education Series on Service-Learning in the Disciplines, 2000).

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  44. American Association of Higher Education Service-Learning Project
  45. Dummy's Guide to Service Learning
  46. Campus Compact Higher education in service to the nation: Service-learning agency
  47. National Society for Experiential Education (NCEE)
      Service is the rent we pay for living. ~Marian Wright Edelman, president, Children's Defense Fund
      Everyone can be great, because everyone can serve. ~Martin Luther King, Jr.
      The true meaning of leadership is service. ~Carter Woodson, educator

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      Concept Mapping

  48. Inspiration One of the best concept mapping software programs, PC and Mac formats.
  49. More on Concept Mapping from Graphic.org

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      Online Publications for Effective Teaching and Learning

  50. National Teaching and Learning Forum Newsletter
  51. DeLiberations on Teaching and Learning in Higher Education: A Magazine for Academics, Librarians, and Educational Developers
  52. For Your Consideration from UNC-Chapel Hill Center for Teaching and Learning
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