Putting Your Year In Perspective

On April 28, 2014, in Being a GA/TA, Think About It, by gregorynpaziuk

Every Monday from April to June, the GATA Network will be sharing advice on how to make your summer productive. This week we start by leading you in a healthy annual review.

annual-review-time-now courtesy of Nim Design

Image courtesy of Nim Design.

The dreaded ‘Personal Review’. Didn’t you just do one of these last semester? Hopefully, yes, but we’re now another semester older and a whole academic year further in our teaching and learning development. While that year is still fresh in our minds, it’s useful to think about just how successful it actually was. Particularly in the summer months, it’s easy to forget about and become detached from our classroom experiences. It’s important to strike while the iron is hot – strike being the operative term for a piercing reflection in this case, and the iron being your recent teaching/learning experiences.

Read more:

Assessing the Semester

Especially in these early stages of post-semester review, it’s important to build some kind of consensus about how you think the semester went, the first reaction you have and the first words that come to mind when summing things up. Les McKeown might call this “managing the narrative” for a business leader, but the same idea applies when constructing your classroom narrative. For example:

“I really reached my students.”

“I never quite hit stride.”

“Classroom discussions proved to be a nightmare”

“The results on the final assignment were completely out of pattern.”

As a general perception or thematic concern, your narrative might reveal your attitude, some general successes/challenges, or some questions you’ve been left with. Whether it’s negative or positive, this initial assessment is a good rallying point for further questions, such as “What was so nightmarish about them?”, “What factors contributed to their nightmare-ness?”, and “How would I have led discussions differently?”

Now return to those questions you asked yourself in December from “Let’s Review“:

  • What were your major teaching successes this semester?
  • What were your major teaching challenges this semester?
  • What have you learned this semester?
  • How is your life/work balance?

In tying Fall and Winter together, ask yourself the follow-up questions below:

  • Were you able to maintain your successes from Fall into Winter? How?
  • Were you able to over-come the challenges you experienced in Fall, or did they continue into Winter? How? 
  • How did your successes/challenges change from semester to semester?
  • How did you apply what you learned in the previous semester? What were the results?
  • Did your life/work balance change this semester? Why? What impact did it have on your teaching/studies

 

Reviewing Your Practices

Most annual reviews come with at least two sections: one that analyzes performance (as in the reflection above) and another that evaluates daily practices. While the two are related, it’s important to consider these practices in and of themselves, transcending context and delving deeper into the specifics actions you take to facilitate learning for yourself and others. As a student teacher, ask yourself the following:

  • How would you define your teaching style?
  • What strategies do you rely upon in engaging students?
    • What makes them effective?
    • What limitations do they have?
  • When and where are you most efficient? least efficient?

More importantly, this is the part in your review where you should be re-evaluating your practices for what works and what doesn’t. If a strategy didn’t work in Fall and still fell flat in Winter, chances are it isn’t worth a third or forth try, or that it needs to be recalibrated.

 

Take a Look in the Mirror

With all the discussion or performance-based pedagogy and results-based teaching, it’s easy to forget the personal side of teaching and learning as a teacher. Presumably you’re a living and breathing human being, not a teaching and learning robot. That means you have feelings, you’re habitual (but also, unpredictable), and you’re always changing. It’s useful to spend a little time now and then take stock of yourself and your perspective on teaching and learning. Consider these questions from Yale’s “What’s Your Teaching Philosophy?” primer:

Who are your role models in teaching? What makes them great teachers?
What do you think motivates students?
What are the teaching expectations at the institution where you are applying?
How does your teaching complement your research?
What do you get from teaching that you don’t get from other professional activities?
What are your objectives as a teacher?

 

The Next Steps

All this reviewing is only good if it leads to some sort of plan, and while you’ll likely have some time before you’re back in the classroom, it’s still useful to be thinking about a plan of action. This could be something formal, like WorldWork’s Personal Development Plan. It could also simply mean seeking out new personal and professional development opportunities from campus sources  like Graduate Studies or the Centre for Teaching and Learning, or from outside sources such as Lynda. Either way, the next step starts with identifying areas of improvement, setting goals, and finding resources.

 

2014 GATA Awards Call for Nominations

On April 23, 2014, in Announcements, Being a GA/TA, UWindsor, by gregorynpaziuk

Someone tell Pharrell to buy back his Arby’s hat: the GATA Awards are coming! The official call for nominations was released earlier this week on the CTL’s website (see below). Whose educational practice deserves our applause? Which GA/TA stands out as an educational leader? Get those nominations in before May 30th and recognize the hard working GAs and TAs among us.

Access the application here: http://ctl2.uwindsor.ca/gata-awards/sub/

More on the GATA Awards:

 

GATA Awards

Nominations invited for GA/TA Awards

GA/TA Award for Educational Practice and the GA/TA Award for Educational Leadership
Deadline: May 30, 2014

GATA Awards

The Centre for Teaching and Learning is calling for nominations for two awards recognizing contributions by graduate and teaching assistants to the University’s learning environment. Both the GA/TA Award for Educational Practice and the GA/TA Award for Educational Leadership aim to:

  • recognize and honour exemplary GAs and TAs who contribute to a positive, learning-centred environment at the University;
  • inspire GAs and TAs to recognize their potential for excellence in educational practice and leadership, and motivate them to transform that potential into reality; and
  • 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.

Eligibility

  • The GA/TA must be currently employed at the U of Windsor, or have been employed within 12 months of the call for nominations.
  • The GA/TA may still be nominated if he or she has previously won another teaching award (for example, at the department level).

Nomination Process

  • A GA/TA who meets the eligibility criteria may be nominated by a past or present student of the GA/TA, or by a colleague, faculty member, or staff member. GA/TAs may not nominate themselves.
  • Any nominee who wishes to meet with the CTL for consultation and advice regarding dossier preparation is encouraged to contact Michael Potter at the email address or phone number below.
  • Late nominations will not be accepted.

The deadline for nominations is May 30, 2014 at 5:00 PM. Questions and comments may be directed to Michael Potter, pottermk@uwindsor.ca.

 

Making Your Summer Break Productive

On April 21, 2014, in Being a GA/TA, Monday Motivation, Tools, by gregorynpaziuk

To be fair, depending on where you live, it might not even feel like summer yet. Even here in Windsor, we’re suspicious that “Winter” is just wearing spring clothing. However, according to the exam schedule, summer is indeed imminent, and unless you’ll be taking classes this Summer/Intersession, that means your summer vacation starts now.

But remember last summer break? The summer break you told yourself  “I’m going to get so much done” but didn’t? Remember how you made that huge list of things to do, stuff to get caught up on, and so on, and isn’t it funny how that list is still taped to your wall fresh and unchecked?

Let’s not be heroes this summer. Let’s try to be realistic about the things we want to accomplish and the time we have to do it. Let’s also try to think seriously about what we are prioritizing.

As others have written in the past, there is no one-size-fits-all definition of productivity. Perspective and context are essential to a productive summer break, as they are in most aspects of academia. But if you’re looking for advice, or at least open to it, we have some suggestions on how you can make this the most productive (and restful) summer break ever.

Over the coming weeks, we’ll be dedicating Motivation Mondays to the pursuit of the worthwhile summer break. We’ve taken some cues from Les McKeown at Inc.com and TIME Magazine online, because we play to strengths, and the business world knows productivity. We’ll discuss the following:

  1. Putting Your Year In Perspective (April 28th)
  2. The Importance of (SoTL) Reading (May 5th)
  3. Reviewing Your “Project List” (May 12th)
  4. Slaying Your Email Demons (May 19th)
  5. The GA/TA Budget (May 26th)
  6. Taking a Break from Academia (June 2nd June 3rd)
  7. Writing Your Teaching and Learning Philosophy (June 9th)
  8. Making the Time for Personal Development (June 16th)
  9. Finding Your Workspace (June 23rd)
  10. Connecting With Other GAs/TAs (June 30th)
 

Yes, it’s true, the semester is indeed over.  Celebrate as you will. No doubt, this holiday you’ve earned looks mighty appealing right now. But Fridays never end, so here we are, celebrating Friday with another list of scantily academic things you can distract yourself with.

  • Research doesn’t always go as planned. This can be very frustrating for some students, especially in the middle of a dissertation. But take comfort in the fact that many of the best discoveries were accidental, like these 10 Awesome Accidental Discoveries from Popular Mechanics. Warning: reading about the discovery of Teflon might make you never want to cook with Teflon again.
  • You can be interested in the Stanley Cup Playoffs and still keep your GA/TA, academic cred. In fact, the scholarship of hockey is, as the kids say, “a thing”. No really. For instance, we stumbled upon this blog post, “Hockey and Canadian Culture“,  written by a friend of a friend of the Network, Paul W. Martin. Now if only there was a SoTL of hockey education too…

 

 

The CTL at Campus Technology Day

On April 16, 2014, in Announcements, Conferences, UWindsor, by gregorynpaziuk

In case you haven’t heard, Campus Technology Day is right around the corner.

Technology is not just for our computer overlords. Nay, there are so many interesting ways technology is being used in classrooms across the University of Windsor to add to the student-learning experience. Campus Technology Day is a way to celebrate those developments here at UWindsor — a free event taking place April 29th, 2014, with presentations from technology users from all backgrounds. It just so happens that some of our friends at the CTL will also be presenting:

Improving student engagement both on and off campus: Introducing the Lecture Tools and Echo360 student engagement platform pilot with Nick Baker, 1:00pm -1:45pm

Engaging students in and out of the classroom is a perennial challenge faced by instructors. In large classes, tools such as clickers may be effective at engaging students and providing feedback on learning, but they have limited capabilities and require students to have a device that cannot be used for anything else. Utilising online tools accessed by students using devices they already own and are familiar with, such as laptops, tablets and smart phones, can provide not only a cheaper option for students, but also a means of encouraging them to actively engage with the learning content. The recently acquired Lecture Tools is an online platform that provides many options to instructors and students to help facilitate active in learning in the classroom. It is available to all instructors under the pilot and can be used both within and outside the classroom.
Another significant new capability being piloted is the Echo360 lecture capture system. This system allows for scheduled or on-demand recording of presentations (two video streams plus audio) in our 15 largest classrooms, live streaming of classes from those rooms to students anywhere they have an internet connection, recordings that can be played back on any device with an internet connection, and social learning tools such as discussions built right into the recordings. Students will be able to bookmark parts of lectures, make notes on the system, and even search for terms used in the lectures when they are studying. The system also allows instructors to capture a lecture from their own computer anywhere in the world and upload it to the system for students to view in CLEW.

Both of these tools also provide instructors with powerful learning analytics that they can use to understand how their students are doing in their class, and help them target instruction where it is likely to be most effective.

Ontario-wide Course-Sharing and Teaching Evaluation Toolkit Development: Technology Central to MTCU Grantswith Alan Wright, Beverley Hamilton, Jessica Raffoul, and Graham Fawcett, 1:50pm – 2:40pm

Information, communication, and instructional technologies are ubiquitous and essential tools and transmission vehicles in two major grants awarded to the University of Windsor as lead institution in a multi-institutional Productivity and Innovation Fund (PIF) competition launched by the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities (MCTU) in the latter half of 2013. UWindsor teams were awarded about $800, 000 for three multi-institutional projects. This session, with a focus on two of the projects, will describe how technology encounters pedagogy in a funded feasibility study exploring mechanisms for the development of shared, modular courses and a second study designed to promote better university teaching in Ontario through the gradual building of a teaching evaluation toolkit. Both of these projects require constant use of new communication technologies by the teams from six universities as well as a fundamental commitment to the exploration and integration of learner-friendly technologies in teaching modules and teaching evaluation compilations and portfolios.

Six Minutes in Social Media with Alicia Higgison, 3:00pm -4:00pm

What is a Tweet, and what does it do? How can a Pin encourage student engagement? Can Google bring us more than great cat videos? We’ll get you thinking about how giving students permission to have their phones in their faces might enhance the learning experience after all.

Register for Campus Technology Day 2014 before April 24th to make sure you receive your complimentary lunch!

 

Is there differences between teaching art and teaching science? “Of course there are,” you say, but what if someone asked you what those differences were? What if someone asked you where those differences reside? Worse yet, what if someone asked you how you knew there were differences at all?

Maybe you’ve got this business of teaching and learning all sorted out, but some of us are still trying to figure out what both look like in their many splendid forms. This past Thursday, April 10th, a group of scholars met at McMaster University to discuss the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) in the arts and humanities.  As part of “SoTL through the Lenses of the Arts & Humanities“,  presenters from all over North America brought forth insights from all areas of the arts and humanities field — from law to history — in an attempt to add to our understanding of successful learning. The GATA Network was there, as were some friends from the Centre for Teaching and Learning, and from that discussion we bring you the following questions to inspire you on this blustery Monday (the last Monday of exams!):

What does teaching and learning sound/look/smell/taste/feel like?

Maybe don’t answer for all of those questions, but have you thought about what your senses can tell you about successful teaching and learning? Nancy Chick from Vanderbilt University opened the discussion last Thursday with her presentation on a SoTL of the senses, which argued for the the importance reflecting on those extra-textual elements of a classroom that don’t always get recorded in an assignment. It’s a useful point, given that the arts and humanities are so focused on perception, perspective, and interpretation.

  • What does your classroom sound/look/smell/taste/feel like…
    • when learning is successful, vibrant, and easy?
    • when learning is flailing, dull, and struggling?
  • Where can you sense these indicators?
  • What do they indicate about you/your students/the class?

 

What are the ways of knowing (and learning)?

And more specifically, are they the same in all disciplines? Pierre Boulos  challenged our understanding of constructivism as part of “Epistemology and Pedagogy: Constructivist SoTL?“.

  • Is experiential learning more effective than knowledge transfer? How do we know?
  • What does a commitment to experiential learning include/exclude?
  • Are experiential learning and discovery-based learning  suited to all disciplines?

 

What counts as evidence?

There are at least two ways to “read up” on something: either get the story first-hand or consult the data. However, not all disciplines treat stories or anecdotes with the same kind of respect they might statistical data or “hard evidence”. Allyson Skene had a few ideas in “Is Anecdote Evidence? The Art of SoTL“, but we pose these questions to you:

  • What kind of knowledge can an anecdote offer?
  • What kind of knowledge can statistical data offer?
  • Which is a better measure for teaching/learning? Why?

 

 

 

It may not feel like it under the weight of all those assignments you’re writing/marking, but today is Friday. And because you’ve been working ever so hard, you probably deserve to take a break and look at something mildly academic but mostly distracting.

  • Imagine every visit to the library was filled with mystery worthy of a Dan Brown novel? Apparently, at Western University, it is. Being from Windsor, we’re no really allowed to like something from London, but this is pretty okay.
  • Don’t pretend in your vaulted status as a GA/TA that you’ve never experienced these essay writing panic moments. In the very least, it should make you sympathetic while marking.
  • True, this isn’t even mildly academic, and Roll Up The Rim is over, but don’t you wish you’d thought of this “Pre-Cup” agreement? How many free cars would we all be enjoying if we’d only had these on hand when buying coffee for office Glen?

Alright, you’ve had your fun. Now get back to work. (And here’s something from Rutgers to help you think about that grading you’ve been putting off
http://tap.rutgers.edu/articles/end-of-semester-grading.php.)

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Don’t Be That Marker

On April 7, 2014, in Being a GA/TA, Teaching Tips, by gregorynpaziuk

Not all markers get a passing grade. More than likely we’ve all had sloppy markers we’d like to fail for the way they seem to disregard best practice and common decency. So we put together this list of mistakes not to make when marking student papers, exams, and the like to make sure your students don’t wish they could flunk you.

  1. Image courtesy of Tony Vincent.

    Image courtesy of Tony Vincent.

    Don’t give lazy feedback. Lazy feedback can be defined as anything that doesn’t give your students direction, lead them to reflect, or connect to course content. For example, the comment “Awkward/Revise” doesn’t give any constructive suggestions on how your student might improve, nor does it identify what’s awkward about the section of note, nor does it relate the issue to the relevant course content. You won’t always have time for lengthy comments (nor are they always needed on final exams), but assess what’s appropriate for the situation. Also, don’t forget that your comments act as a guide for your thoughts.

  2. Don’t take the “one comment fits all” approach. It may save time to put together generic comments, especially for summative and concluding comments, but these formulas likely won’t capture what was actually important about your students’ assignments. At the very least, if you are going to reuse phrasing in your comments, make sure you also include specific references to the important parts of their assignment (e.g., “Your examination of Karl Marx’s theories seems to neglect the issue of class struggle”, NOT “Your examination of Karl Marx’s theories seems to be missing some elements.”).
  3. Don’t write illegible notes. Practice your prescription scratching somewhere else. Students are going to want to be able to read their marks and your comments whether they’ve aced the test or flunked the essay. Moreover, in an ideal world, the more clearly your feedback reads (and is understood), the fewer questions you’ll field from confused and/or disgruntled students.
  4. Don’t forget to check your math. We’ve said it before, and we’ll say it again: mistakes do happen. When compiling grades, always check your math at least fifty times, give or take.
  5. Don’t forget to point out the good stuff. It’s not that you should mince words or skirt criticism, but students need to know what they are doing well too. That’s partially because we could all use a little encouragement now and then, but also because, as Peter Elbow argues, “good writing teachers like student writing (and like students)”. Whether you’re a writing teacher or a biology instructor, don’t under-estimate the power of liking your students’ work.
  6. Don’t mix up assignments. Have you ever had a reviewer tell you your paper was good but that your last example with the fire truck was not clear, only the problem is that the fire truck example was in your friend’s paper, not yours? Sure, you laugh now, but graders mix up assignments in final comments all the time, especially when they mark one question at a time and forget to read over their comments. Don’t be that grader. Really, don’t.
  7. Don’t contradict the guidelines/rubric. The assignment description and whatever directions, criteria, guidelines, objectives, or rubrics it comes with are what your students will be using when putting together their answers. Whenever you go “off-script” and start grading according to some unwritten rule, momentary whim, or new paradigm. Consistency is the name of the game.
  8. Don’t compare your students to yourself. First of all, because it’s vain and you’re better than that. More importantly, your students are at a different level of development than you. Be realistic in the expectations you have for them.

Read more in Elbow, Peter. (1994). “Ranking, Evaluating, Liking: Sorting Out Three Forms of Judgment.” College English 55(2), 187-206.
Retrieved from http://works.bepress.com/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1045&context=peter_elbow

 

Still not sure what the GATA Awards are all about? We’ve been catching up with more past winners to give you a sense of what the awards have meant to those they recognize. Now we’re sharing their feedback.

Melanie Santarossa was recognized with the GA/TA Award for Educational Practice in 2011 for her work in English Composition 26-100. Her thoughtful approach and considerable expertise later brought Melanie to the GATA Network where she was the GATA Handbook Editor. Here’s Melanie’s profile from the 2011 GATA Awards:

melaniesantatrossaMelanie Santarossa (English)
The quality of Melanie’s work and understanding of teaching, learning, and assessment was evident throughout her   nomination dossier. Not only has she worked at mastering a breadth of pedagogical approaches, she has integrated them into a coherent personal teaching style, in which the cognitive, affective and performative dimensions of her teaching are reflectively aligned. Her teaching strategies are systematic, active, and appropriately pitched for students at various levels. Melanie has also become active in teaching and learning communities locally, provincially and nationally.

Nowadays, Melanie works as an educational developer at OCAD University’s Faculty and Curriculum Development Centre. There she works on just about everything from professional and personal development workshops for faculty to curriculum redesign. We caught up with Melanie to ask about her experience with the GATA Awards and the difference between educational practice and educational leadership.

What was the most difficult part of the nomination process? Why?
The most difficult part of the nomination process was gathering all the materials needed to showcase my teaching (lesson plans, classroom activities, reference letters from students and mentors, etc). However, because of undergoing this process, I now have all of these materials organized and continue to add to the collection. It’s a great process for reflecting on one’s teaching.

Had teaching and learning been a big part of your life before you won the award? How did the award change your views on teaching?
Yes, teaching and learning was a part of my life before I won the award. In fact, I was very much involved with the Centre for Teaching and Learning long before I put my name forward. The award confirmed that enhancing teaching and learning at the university level is an ever growing (and important) movement, and to be a part of that movement is invigorating indeed.

How do you differentiate between educational practice and educational leadership? What types of things do you include in your personal practice?
For me, educational practice is what happens each day in and outside of the classroom that impacts classroom learning (preparing lessons, creating assignments, designing rubrics, facilitating discussions, lecturing, etc). Educational leadership is that which propels others into teaching and learning (sharing teaching resources with colleagues, volunteering to be a book reviewer for the Educational Developer’s Caucus, conducting scholarship of teaching and learning, etc).

How has the GATA Award impacted your life, if at all?
It may have have been one of the selling features of my CV when I applied for my first full-time job in educational development.