Center in Action
The Teaching and Learning Center works with faculty to enhance the teaching and learning experience and explore best practices, new techniques and innovative technologies.
Russell Williams Seminars on Technology in the Classroom
Handouts and Resources
- Pointers on Classroom Technology [pdf]
- Smartphones, Laptops and the Classroom, Presentation - October 5 2016 [pdf]
- Notes from student/faculty technology workshop - February 14 2017 [pdf]
Digital Projects
Click here for information about digital advocate David Wrisley's visit to AUP.
Articles/Papers
- 'Use of Laptops in the Classroom: Research and Best Practices,' The Center for Research on Learning and Teaching, University of Michigan, 2011
- 'Ill Communication: Technology, Distraction & Student Performance,' Centre for Economic Performance, London School of Economics, May 2015
- 'The Pen is Mightier than the Keyboard,' SAGE Journals, April 23 2014
- 'Digital Distractions in the Classroom: Student Classroom Use of Digital Devices for Non-Class Related Purposes,' Digital Commons@University of Nebraska, Lincoln, October 15 2013
- 'Do Smartphones Have a Place in the Classroom?' The Atlantic, April 27 2016
- 'Multitasking may harm the social and emotional development of tweenage girls, but face-to-face talks could save the day, say Stanford researchers,' Stanford Review, January 25 2012
- 'Professors Know About High-Tech Teaching Methods, but Few Use Them,' The Chronicle of Higher Education, February 10 2015
- 'No, Banning Laptops Is Not the Answer,' The Chronicle of Higher Education, September 11 2016
- 'The Case for Banning Laptops in the Classroom,' The New Yorker, June 6 2014
- 'In Defense of the Lecture,' Jacobin Magazine, February 26 2017
- 'Why We Can’t Look Away From Our Screens,' New York Times, March 6 2017
- 'Do mobile devices in the classroom really improve learning outcomes?' The Conversation, 31 March 2015
- Teaching with Blogs: An Interview with Humberto Garcia
- 'Laptops Are Great. But Not During a Lecture or a Meeting,' New York Times, Nov. 22 2017
- Mobile Phones and Learning Outcomes The Conversation, March 21 2015
- Don't Ban Technology in the Classroom The Chronicle of Higher Education Sept. 11 2016
- High-tech Teaching Methods The Chronicle of Higher Education Feb. 10 2015
Elena Berg on Team Teaching.
Handouts and Resources
- TLC Seminar on Team Teaching, February 8 2017 [pdf]
- 'Oh What a Difference A Team Makes: Why Team Teaching Makes a Difference,' Anderson & Speck, 1998 [pdf]
- 'Team Teaching: Benefits and Challenges,' Center for Teaching and Learning, Stanford University, Fall 2006 [pdf]
Online Resources
Some helpful links and resources about the benefits and challenges of Team Teaching
- 'Team Teaching: A Brief Summary,' Brigham Young University, Center for Teaching and Learning
- 'Professors preach 10 commandments of team teaching,' Stanford University News, March 15 2006
- Team/Collaborative Teaching, Vanderbilt University, Center for Teaching
BRILLIANT IDEAS GENERATED BY FOOD
Christy Shields shares some extraordinary moments with us from research she does with her students on (or should we say while!) cheese tasting. Read this Savage Minds essay from AUP Professor Christy Shields for a nice example of how to integrate students into your research.
LINKS
The area of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) - and the international presence (ISSOTL) - is blossoming. Poole and Simmons (2013) provide a description: “The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) involves post-secondary practitioners conducting inquiry into teaching and learning processes in higher education contexts.”* Publishers are looking for articles and books written by faculty members who recount stories of teaching and mentoring students. Click here for information about the upcoming ISSOTL conference in October 2018.
* Poole, G., & Simmons, N. (2013). The contributions of the scholarship of teaching and learning to quality enhancement in Canada. In G. Gordon, & R. Land (Eds.), Quality Enhancement in Higher Education: International Perspectives. London: Routledg
Team Teaching in 2019–20
The most effective and ambitious team-teaching method is the fully integrated “collaborative” model in which two or more faculty members design a course together and are present in front of the class simultaneously throughout the semester. Thanks to support from the Mellon Foundation, AUP faculty are offering new collaboratively team taught courses during the 2019–20 academic year and again in Fall 2021.
Over the past decades the reliance on markets has expanded to a host of new spheres, including climate change, education and social security. Likewise, the idea of the commons has reappeared in debates about biodiversity, human knowledge and urban transportation. The course examines economic and political justifications and implications of using either markets or the commons for solving social problems.
Why do we get sick? What causes the ailments we suffer from today, and what treatments have we developed to solve these problems? In this course we will embark on a journey through medical history, from early human origins to the present. We'll consider the conditions in which our early human ancestors evolved and how our past has helped shape the health challenges we face today. In this fully team-taught course, you will become immersed in the history of science and medicine by tackling issues related to evolutionary biology, public health and disease, western medical practice, and alternative medicine.
Why is it important to talk with and listen to other people? This course will address the diverse, hybrid and dialogic activity of interviewing from the perspectives of anthropology and journalism. Interviewing is a specialized form of communicative interaction oriented towards any variety of goals, identities and contexts. Through this interdisciplinary dialogue, students will confront both theoretical and methodological dilemmas, and develop techniques for best practise across a range of interviewing styles.
”Becoming Free” will explore the lives of former slaves and former convicts from a law and history perspective. We consider the problem of liberation in the Americas, Africa, the Indian Ocean, and Asia from the eighteenth century to the present. With respect to former slaves, we will learn the mechanisms by which ex-slaves attained freedom, including flight, self-purchase, manumission, military service, insurrection, and general emancipation. With respect to convicts, we will examine how prisoners obtained (and continue to obtain) freedom, including the expiry of criminal sentence lengths, amnesty, pardon, prisoner exchange, ransom, and victory in wartime. This is a collaboration between Professor Spieler, a historian of slavery in the European and Atlantic context, and Professor Kuo, a legal thinker on punishment and race in the contemporary American context.
Team Teaching in 2020–21
Click here for the 2020-21 call for proposals
Application deadlines for courses to be taught in Fall 2021 (two rounds): April 22, 2020 (first round); September 23, 2020 (second round).