Image courtesy of voltblack.
Well that was quick. That week you had to research and recharge was here and gone in a flash, and no doubt it’s left you feeling a little bit down. But before you freak out like the good doctor (see right), we think you should take a look at what the Center for Teaching Excellence at Duquesne University has put together on how to stay motivated after “Spring Break”.
The nice thing about the Center’s guide is that it offers solutions to those problems that are unique to faculty as well as those particular to students. For instance, to the winter-weary student who is getting restless spending their every day buried in their readings, the Center suggests there are benefits to seeking out the sun where possible:
As the weather warms, try to find a spot outdoors where you enjoy working that is free from distractions where you can study. Diffuse sunlight by a window can increase your energy.
And for the ultra-weary student teacher who is shouldering their own stress and tasked with motivating a class of students with the mid-semester winter blahs, the Center at Duquesne suggests that it can be therapeutic to celebrate successes-so-far:
Congratulate accomplishments to help students sense their mastery of the materials and to encourage further learning. A sense of mastery is a major motivational issue in learning. Students who sense achievement perform better than students who feel lost or overwhelmed. Spend some time getting students to recognize what they already have mastered and emphasize its importance. Encouragement goes a long way. Remember the Pygmalion phenomenon? Good teachers influence student performance.
This week we’ve been meeting with educational developers from all over Canada here in Calgary as part of the Educational Developers Caucus (EDC) 2014. We could have started with something like “Greetings, from sunny Calgary,” but that would have been misleading about the nature of winter here in cattle country. Metaphorically speaking, of course, the horizons seem bright in educational development. Perhaps the nicest thing about these meetings are the little oddities you pick up, like number two in the list below.
- Sesame Street Fighter has to be the most creative literacy building tool to come along since Hooked on Phonics. The video game appeals on a number of levels, from a scholarly interest in video game theory and design to a nostalgic affliction for all things Street Fighter. There’s also something to be said for the choice in subject matter and the way the game could give new life to topics such as “Russian Cities” and “German Scientists”.
- At one of the sessions here at EDC, @jaymiek alerted us to the existence of @Sweden, a national Twitter feed tied to the Curators of Sweden project. In the words of the project’s developers, “Every week, someone in Sweden is @Sweden: sole ruler of the world’s most democratic Twitter account.” Add this to the list of Swedish innovations, right after modular furniture and the zipper.
- Finally, because award season is gearing up, we thought we’d share CineFix’s clips that look at what this year’s Oscar-hopeful films would look like if they were cast with kids. Someone call the promotional team for Jimmy Fallon’s Tonight Show and tell them someone’s stolen their bit.
We weren’t sure if we should point out that Reading Week is drawing to a close, as it seemed a little like salt in the wound (this doesn’t count as pointing it out). So in being thankful for this Friday, we thought we would remind those of you thinking about a career in academia that a week of respite is not a replacement for good work/life balance. With that in mind, we present duffymeg’s thoughts on why you do not need to work 80 hours a week. While the focus in the article is on faculty, the same principles could apply to GAs/TAs and the myths we perpetuate about “regular” work loads.
It’s important to celebrate a job well-done, and so most professions celebrate particularly good jobs by lavishing those responsible with some kind of award that recognizes their all-around awesomeness. Actors have the Oscars. Singers have the Grammys. Singing actors have the Tonys. But what about you ultimate triple-threat professionals, the graduate assistants and teaching assistants?
Here at the University of Windsor, awesome GAs and TAs who have made outstanding contributions to the UWindsor learning environment are recognized through the GA/TA Awards, which will make their return in 2014. Sort of like the Tonys (but without the catchy nickname and ample categories), the GA/TA Awards recognize exceptional graduate assistants and teaching assistants in two categories: Educational Practice and Educational Leadership. In short, the awards aim to do the following:
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To recognize and honour exemplary GAs and TAs who contribute to a positive, learning-centred environment at the University of Windsor.
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To inspire GAs and TAs to recognize their potential for excellence in educational practice and leadership, and motivate them to transform that potential into reality.
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To publicize examples of excellence in GA/TA educational practice and leadership that can inform the practices of all teachers, while contributing to student and faculty pride in teaching and learning at the University of Windsor.
So, do you know anyone that fits the bill? Keep an eye out for those commendable GAs and TAs doing great work, and watch for a call for nominations in March.
Inspiration tends to be at a high for just about everyone during the Olympics. Even those claim they have no interest in the games are usually sucked in by the pageantry, the controversy, and (hopefully) sportsmanship. All too often we look at the athletes involved like some kind of alien beings completely separate from us. Not so. As teachers and student teachers, we have a lot to learn from (and a lot in common with) professional athletes when it comes to one area in particular: preparation and psychology deeply affect our performance. Below are just a few areas of sports psychology that intersect with the daily lives and practices of effective teachers:
Image courtesy of fundforteachers.org.
1.) Athletes practice in their minds.
One of the most memorable scenes of Cool Runnings is when the team gets ready for their race by practicing in the tub, envisioning the course and imagining their movements in each turn. Visualizing the race, simulating in-game experiences, and imagining the feeling of being on the podium are all popular strategies for professional athletes. It turns out they all come with a certain degree of psychological credibility. MindTools notes that visualization and guided imagery are useful stress management tools and allow individuals to imagine working towards specific outcomes.
So do teachers.
Effective teaching and learning doesn’t always have a finite outcome. Sometimes our objective in teaching is simply to help our students reach their own understanding of a given topic. Even so, visualizing the different twists and turns your lesson might take, timing yourself in each section, and envisioning your delivery can all help limit the amount of anxiety you carry into your lesson.
2.) Athletes need to decide what they want out of their sport.
Medals and championships are usually the result of careful planning and detailed goal setting. Effective goal setting balances long-term and short-term goals, but most importantly, your goals should be performance-based. David Harrison suggests that the benefits of goal setting are that it helps develop focus, motivation, persistence, and new learning strategies. Not everyone becomes a professional athlete with a view towards gold medals and championships either. Goals are individual
Not all GAs/TAs go on to become teachers.
Realistically, not all GAs/TAs aspire to be teachers. Some might even hate teaching. That doesn’t mean that you don’t have something to gain from your teaching experience. GA and TA positions help to develop transferable skills that can be applied to just about any field. So whether you have aspirations of being a tenured professor or a project manager on the Mars expedition, determine how being a GA/TA can help you achieve your goals.
3.) Good athletes have a Performance Plan.
Call it micro-managing, but some athletes find success by breaking down their performance into a series of executable steps. A Performance Plan collects these steps along with contingency plans for any and all possibilities that might arise in the course of the performance. Whether an informal checklist or a hundred page dossier, a Performance Plan can help athletes focus on the task(s) at hand. It can also break down an overwhelming obstacle into easily digestible stages.
Smart teachers use lesson plans.
Many a course has been undone by the rambling and meandering instructor, whose delivery of course materials suffers from a lack of organization and planning. It’s for this reason that 99.9%* of teachers proscribe to lesson plans to help structure their classroom time and make sure it’s productive for all involved. There are lots of resources out there on how to prepare a lesson plan. Just like Performance Plans, they can range from informal notes of things to cover scribbled on blank paper to elaborate blueprints to how your lesson should function. The important thing in either case is that your plan focuses on specific outcomes for your students.
Ah, Valentine’s Day. Who doesn’t love Valentine’s Day, right? Some of you may have very elaborate and romantic plans, but the majority of us in academia will probably spend our time doing research. If that’s true, we could all use a healthy dose of whatever these links are. Valentine’s Day or not, we celebrate Friday with a collection of enjoyable items from around the Internet.
Picture courtesy of UWindsor Daily News.
- They say music is good for the mind. And while we’re not brain surgeons (if that’s what you’re looking for, read this) we do know that it’s really fun to play around with Femur Design’s Web Audio Theremin. Because who doesn’t unwind by creating their own synthpop music?
- Most students have probably given up on selling their old textbooks now that we’re this far into the semester. The way we see it, those students have two options: 1.) keep the textbooks (because books are awesome) or 2.) make book art. Because you can also sell art. Otherwise, you can always hollow-out those textbooks and turn them into secret hiding places, like this company.
- Lastly, in light of today, we thought we’d share the latest from PhD Comics. Here’s the rhyme: “Markings are red…Blank screens are blue…Professors love data…That proves their hypotheses true.”
Lastly, if you’re still looking for a way to spend your Valentine’s Day, you might try a blind date with a book. Leddy Library is playing matchmaker for UWindsorites looking to cuddle up with a book, which sounds like the cheapest of cheap dates. Read more in the Daily News article: http://www.uwindsor.ca/dailynews/2014-02-11/librarians-urge-readers-get-under-covers-st-valentine%E2%80%99s-day
Motivation Mondays aren’t always about trying to get over the Monday blahs. Sometimes the hardest part of motivating yourself on the first morning of the week is not knowing where to begin with the project you’re behind on.
For instance, maybe you’ve done all the readings but you aren’t sure how to start your literature review. That would be pretty common, actually. Many students aren’t sure how to go about writing a literature review, and just as many instructors have a hard time explaining. Others think they know but are completely confused. If you think there’s a chance you could fall into any of those categories, you might want to review these tips from Dena Taylor at the University of Toronto. Taylor’s questions will help keep you and your students focused in your literature reviews, but imagine you had a tool to make the actual reviewing a lot easier.
That would be the synthesis matrix. Back in September, Academic Coaching and Writing™ posted about using a synthesis matrix as a tool to help organize and combine your insights as you compile your research. What is a synthesis matrix? Dr. Sally describes it as such:
There are a number of tools that can help you analyze and synthesize your key sources. In this blog, you will learn about using a synthesis matrix to organize the sources in your literature review and integrate them into a unique interpretation that not only serves as the foundation of your study but also contributes to the dialogue in your field and establishes your credibility as a scholar. There are limitless ways of structuring a matrix. This blog will provide several examples of how to construct a synthesis matrix.
Read more from Dr. Sally here.
Image courtesy of Master isolated images / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
This time next week we’ll all be relaxing on a beach somewhere toasting to the start of a great Reading Week. Right? Not likely. Realistically, we’ll all be working desperately to catch up on all that work we’ve been putting off. Well, in the mean time, here are a few things to help you unwind (albeit momentarily):
- Who hasn’t unwound by carrying on conversations talking like Yoda from Star Wars? Well, rather than get all grammatical in an attempt to explain Yoda’s unique way with words and how you can replicate it, we found this Yoda-speak generator. Yes, a Yoda-speak translator.
- Earlier in the week, we talked a little about postdocs as a way to put your degree to work. Just to balance out that optimism, we felt an ethical responsibility to share Adam Ruben’s comical assessment entitled The Postdoc: A Special Kind of Hell.
- Imagine a campus-wide scavenger hunt. No. A province-wide scavenger hunt. Now imagine that the hunt utilized those unique talents that only a scholar of your calibre possesses. Wait, this sounds a lot like the Research Matters Virtual Scavenger Hunt.
There are a lot of experts out there – academics and professionals alike – writing about the importance of developing transferable skills that will help students market their degrees. For instance, Jobs on Toast is a website dedicated to helping grad students find jobs outside of academia. The collective focus on translating academic skills into non-academic employment stems from widespread recognition that the academic job market is a tough nut to crack. But while it makes good sense to consider how your education can be applied to different contexts, there are some experts out there who think it’s still possible to make a career out of academic work.
Frank F. Furstenberg is one such expert. In November, Serena Golden of InsideHigherEd reviewed Furstenberg’s book, Behind the Academic Curtain: How to Find Success and Happiness With a Ph.D., and shared the highlights of her interview with the author. Among the topics of discussion, Golden and Furstenberg discuss the benefits of the “postdoc” research position:
Q: What are the most important factors in deciding whether to do a postdoc?
A: In the sciences and social sciences, post-docs are a common stage after completion of the doctorate. Almost all scientists and a substantial minority of social scientists move from grad school to a postdoc. Working with a mentor in a different department provides an opportunity to build on work done during graduate school, get papers out for publication, and widen social contacts within the discipline. Picking a postdoc in which you will have an able and engaged mentor who puts your interests first is highly desirable. Making that happen means doing some careful assessment of how previous postdocs have done in the places that you are considering. Don’t be shy about asking for this information!
Read more: http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/11/20/new-book-how-navigate-entire-academic-career#ixzz2sPUFfyg0
Inside Higher Ed
A while ago, we stumbled upon this funny infographic, “The Good and Bad Habits of Smart People”, shared by Kathleen Davis. All jokes aside, the creators at Online-PHD-Programs.org made sure to include two separate warnings in profiling the behaviour of smart people:
Follow in the footsteps of some of the world’s smartest people. Just make sure you only pick up their GOOD habits.
…and later, more sternly…
REMEMBER. WHILE EXTREME INTELLIGENCE HAS SOME NEGATIVE ASSOCIATIONS. EXHIBITING THESE TRAITS WILL NOT MAKE YOU SMARTER!
Chances are, however, that most of us busy GAs and TAs have already picked up one of the worst of those bad habits shared by so many smart people: the tendency to deprive ourselves of sleep. We’re not going to give you a bedtime, but every scholar owes it to him/her self to be informed on the sleep issues. With that in mind, we present the following perspectives on sleep in today’s Motivation Monday:
Healthy Sleeping
There are a number of professional bodies studying sleep in both Canada and the United States. Here in Canada, the Canadian Sleep Society works to inform people on sleep disorders, including everything from drowsy driving to sleep and depression. South of the border, the National Sleep Foundation has its own set of “Healthy Sleep Tips”. Among those tips, the Foundation recommends cutting out naps from your daily routine:
A power nap may help you get through the day, but if you find that you can’t fall asleep at bedtime, eliminating even short catnaps may help.
Famous Sleepers
The “Good and Bad Habits” doesn’t begin to capture how odd some successful people are about sleep. Many seem to have little regard for the advice of experts. For instance, Winston Churchill and Leonardo da Vinci were both prodigious nappers. Nikola Tesla, meanwhile, reputedly never slept more than two hours per night. Vivian Giang notes these and other examples of famously successful sleepers in her article “11 Bizarre Sleeping Habits of Highly Successful People”.
Academic Sleepers
While the best advice of well-informed researchers and some odd practices of successful people are useful perspectives on sleep, perhaps the most interesting study of sleep as it relates to productivity comes from Maria Popova’s article, Famous Writers’ Sleep Habits vs. Literary Productivity, Visualized. You’ll be hard-pressed to find any concrete trends here, but it’s useful to know that you can sleep in and still be as productive as Gertrude Stein.
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