As we shifted to remote teaching this spring, we have (hopefully) been reminded to think about humanizing online learning, which Michelle Pacansky-Brock has conceptualized as encompassing not only facilitation (creating a lively, approachable presence that cultivates empathy and awareness) but also course design. Okay, I thought, I’m human. I can humanize. Yeah, well, I’m also […]
It’s April. It’s possible that you’re excited about your teaching or scholarship, but probably, you’re tired. If you’re like me, you’re a bit cranky. And what if this is the “April” of your academic career? There’s some decent time left before retirement—5 or even 10 years remaining—but there’s also potential for ennui or a sense […]
Did you know that classroom discourse patterns are so engrained in our K-College system that they have a name? Courtney Cazden coined the term I-R-E back in 1988, to represent what she calls the “default pattern” of classroom interactions: Initiate, Respond, Evaluate. A colleague recently pointed out that this spells IRE, as in Irate. As […]
It’s that time again—the papers are queuing up. Also, not coincidentally, the time when your closets are miraculously organized, lasagnas appear in the fridge, the barbecue grill is scrubbed—whatever form our grading procrastination takes, it manifests—all to avoid the stacks of paper hovering in cyberspace or piled on desk corners. How can we make grading […]
I would have loved to be a student at Yale in 1960 when historian and professor Edmund Morgan looked over his glasses at the assembled freshman class. “The world does not much like curiosity,” he began, citing the often-used expression, “Curiosity killed the cat.” He observed that curious children overwhelm their parents “with a string […]
I have a not-so-hidden agenda that every class should be a reading class, that every class should focus students on how to access material in a particular discipline. While I have to admit that it is more stimulating to develop a good lecture or plan an engaging activity, these tasks often depend on a (generally […]
