Learning Together: Pedagogy, Technology & Course Redesign Conference VII

Schedule of Sessions and Abstracts

Wednesday, June 6, 2007

In this interactive workshop, leaders borrow from Frank Barrett's application of seven key principles of jazz improvisation to learning organizations. Workshop participants put into action principles such as "hanging out," "turn-taking", and "retrospective sense-making" and consider the application of these principles to educational settings.

Elizabeth Boquet, Fairfield University
Michele Eodice, University of Oklahoma
Roben Torosyan, Fairfield University

Thursday, June 7, 2007

As society has evolved into the Information and Global Age, a high quality college education has become more important than ever. However there is mounting evidence that students are leaving college without the kind of education that will allow them-and society-to "thrive and survive" in this new age.

This suggests that we, as college-level teachers, need to re-think some fundamental questions about how we do our work. In this presentation, Dr. Fink will identify four such questions, put in the context of major ideas on teaching (see recommended reading), and offer some alternative ways we might respond to them.

Dee Fink, President, Dee Fink Consulting

Session A
"Creating a Course Legacy that Promotes the Caring and Human Dimensions of Learning"

Science courses are not typically viewed as attending to the "caring" and "human dimension" aspects of significant learning experiences as classified by Fink (2003). This presentation will outline how we designed several learning experiences specifically intended to create memorable social interactions and a course legacy that has persisted for over 10 years.

Robert K. Noyd, United States Air Force Academy

Session B
"Exploring Inner-Sense: Nourishing and Sustaining the Passion"

Many times as faculty search for ways to ignite student learning, they forget to think about what they need to support their passion and enthusiasm for their profession. This workshop uses the MARI® coaching tool to explore goals and paths to maintain the passion for excellence.

Pamela J. Hopkins, Paul L. Stepanovich, Southern Connecticut State University

Fairfield University joined Apple's iTunes University last fall. Staff and faculty have worked to develop audio podcasting, video and document downloads, and integration with other technologies such as Camtasia. We will demo current pedagogies and student responses, both undergraduate and graduate (see sample iPod course design ideas from Middlebury College, Duke University, etc.).

Elizabeth Langran, Jeff Potocki, Richard Regan, Jay Rozgonyi, Fairfield University

Session A - DSB 110

"Improving Student Academic Performance with Student Generated Rubrics"

Today's students tend to be pragmatic learners with high expectations for active learning, good at multi-tasking, but often poor readers. Student-generated rubrics (see sample assigned reading, prompt for task, and rubrics) can increase student motivation in the assessment process and provide an active learning dimension, leading to improved student academic performance and rich feedback for the faculty member about the assignment.

Bruce Saulnier, Debbie Clark, Quinnipiac University

Session B - DSB 105
"Exploring Faculty Misbehaviors: Student and Faculty Perspectives"

This interactive workshop focuses on faculty misbehaviors in and out-of-class, and their potential impact on students. Key outcomes include identifying common student misbehaviors, summarizing research on faculty misbehaviors, exploring specific categories of faculty misbehaviors, and identifying strategies for minimizing disruptive faculty behaviors both in and out of the classroom.

Bonnie Farley-Lucas, Margaret M. Sargent, Southern Connecticut State University

Session C - DSB 112
"Do you know your LGBTIQ's? Infusing LGBTIQ into the classroom"

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersexual, and queer (LGBTIQ) students are often invisible in our classrooms as well as in our own curricula. LGBTIQ students are in our classrooms, whether we are aware of them or not. When gender and sexuality are not explicitly part of the classroom content, LGBTIQ students are marginalized and do not benefit fully from the educational experience the classroom can offer. This presentation will discuss how to create a safe and equitable learning environment through the infusion of LGBTIQ into the classroom, and offer specific strategies for diverse classrooms.

Lysandra Perez-Strumulo, Ramapo College of New Jersey

Session A - DSB 110
"Calibrated Peer Review (CPR)™ - Demonstration Presentation"

Calibrated Peer Review (CPR)™ is a Web-based program that enables frequent writing assignments in which students review the work of peers after a structured process validating their assessment capabilities. Although CPR stems from a science-based model, CPR has the exciting feature that it is discipline independent and level independent.

James Biardi, Fairfield University

Session B - DSB 105

"Sustainable Pedagogy"

Sustainable Pedagogy promotes Ecological Literacy through both learning content and process. The content is anticipatory, involving critical thinking. By its very nature, the process is participatory, fitting the experiential or constructivist mode. Participants will be engaged in a consideration and discussion of how to employ Sustainable Pedagogy at their own institutions and in their own classrooms.

Michael R. Edelstein, Ramapo College, NJ

Session C - DSB 112

"Fitting Course Assignments to Student Learning Styles"

The purpose of this panel is to introduce learning styles as they relate to both faculty instruction and student learning. Specifically, teaching effectiveness involves: understanding learning, understanding teaching, assessing outcomes, and accommodating differences. To address each of these critical pedagogical elements, this panel will discuss instruments for measurement, instructional strategies for various learner types, as well as resources and assessment tools for accommodating diverse learning styles.

Meg Sargent, Southern Connecticut State University

Friday, June 8, 2007

This session will explain how the current incarnation of the web is substantially different than what has come before, and what implications this might hold for educators and students. We will demonstrate key Web 2.0 technologies (see presentation) such as Blogs, RSS feeds, del.icio.us shared bookmarking, and Google Docs & Spreadsheets - with particular emphasis on how these technologies can be used to enhance classroom learning.

Leslie Porter, Jackie Kremer, Curtis Ferree, Fairfield University

Session A - DSB 110

"Revisioning: A Pathway to Critical Wisdom"

This panel addresses the practice of revision in teaching for critical wisdom in the First Year Studies Program at Rensselaer. Questions include:

• Can critical thinking be overdone? Where and when is critical thinking appropriate?
• How should we "revision" cultural myths that place humans at the center of "creation"?
• How can decentering techniques in writing, such as shifting point-of-view, changing voice and describing less noticed contexts, transform relationships with self and others?

By exploring fundamental assumptions of values, feelings and claims to know and engaging interpretive frameworks from within our respective disciplines, we encourage students to critically examine and re-envision their worldviews.

Julie Gutmann, John Gowdy, Jim Fahey, and Bram van Heuveln; Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

Session B - "Web 2.0 Environments: Challenges and Opportunities for Learning and Teaching" - B.E.S.T. Classroom, DSB 113-114

This workshop reveals the underlying mode of Web 2.0 environment by demonstrating such key Web 2.0 tools as wiki, blogs, VoiceThread, slideshare, and flickr. The goal is to explore why these Web 2.0 tools represent a further quantum leap in teaching/learning over the prior generation of Web 1.0 tools. See photos.

Ludmilla Smirnova, Terri Hall, Mount St. Mary College

Most of us would like to see our students be more engaged in our courses and leave after having achieved more important kinds of learning. We can get that to happen, regularly and intentionally, by learning how to design our courses more systematically. In this workshop, we will learn how to define what we might mean by "significant kinds of learning" and then how to design that kind of learning into our courses.

Dee Fink, President, Dee Fink Consulting