Workshops By Request | Refining Teaching and Learning
Departments are invited to schedule a CTLT "Workshop By Request" session to engage departmental faculty in topics of broad interest. Other topics are possible – just inquire and we likely can offer it from our existing repertoire or develop a custom one.
- Each session can be considered for a 50-minute time slot, although longer sessions are possible based on conversations with the facilitators.
- Scheduling is first come, first served based on CTLT staff availability.
- Requests should be submitted at least one quarter prior if at all possible.
For questions about a specific session or interest in a related topic, contact the CTLT facilitator directly. To request a workshop, click on this link to go to the Request Form page, or click on any title.
Crafting Better Course Learning Outcomes
Facilitator: Patrick O’Sullivan, CTLT Director
Clear, well-crafted course learning outcomes are essential for fostering students’ motivations, engagement and progress. This session will provide principles and exemplars of high-quality learning outcomes and tools for refining those in the courses that you teach. What you learn can be applied immediately to all of your course syllabi, which benefits instructors as well as students.
The Power of Formative Feedback
Facilitator: Patrick O’Sullivan, CTLT Director
One of the more effective yet easy-to-implement teaching strategies to improve student engagement and achievement is providing quick and engaging forms of formative feedback early and often. If you ever find yourself wondering during a term whether your students are “getting it,” more formative feedback is the answer. This session offers methods for helping you, and your students, know what they have learned and what they still need to learn, which can enhance motivation and achievement. Grading not required!
Fostering Students' “Growth Mindset”
Facilitator: Patrick O’Sullivan, CTLT Director
Emerging research has found that the core beliefs individuals hold about their capacity to grow affect their attitudes and actions with direct consequences for learning. Faculty who learn to foster a “growth mindset” (Dweck, 2006) among students can enhance students’ motivation to learn, their receptiveness to feedback, and their willingness to tackle challenges. This workshop will show you how to foster a growth mindset in your classes and in your course materials.
The Promising Course Syllabus
Facilitator: Patrick O’Sullivan, CTLT Director
A course syllabus can be much more than an official document listing policies, procedures, and assignments. Beyond covering the nuts and bolts of a class, a syllabus can dynamically introduce a course, invite students to learn, and serve as a central reference and planning guide throughout the term. This workshop will consider the research on effective syllabi – what Ken Bain terms the “promising syllabus” (What the Best College Teachers Do, Harvard UP, 2004) – and encourage faculty to review their syllabi drafts from the perspective of students, who want to learn more about a course and the instructor’s philosophy of teaching. Utilizing a workshop model, we will draft and revise course syllabi that best reflect our teaching philosophies and align our learning goals with the needs of our students.
Mastering Immediacy Cues To Enhance Your Class Culture
Facilitator: Patrick O’Sullivan, CTLT Director
An accumulating amount of research has identified how the “immediacy” cues that faculty display shape students’ perceptions, attitudes, and motivation. Understanding what these cues are and how to use them effectively can enhance connections to students and foster a positive class culture. While verbal and non-verbal cues that foster affiliation are well known and strongly linked to improved connections between instructors and students, recent research has identified visual and linguistic immediacy cues apparent in online communications that are also powerful tools that enhance positive relationships in education. You will learn what these are and how to use them effectively to enhance your class culture.
Is Anyone Out There Listening?: Countermeasures to In-Class Distractions
Facilitator: Patrick O’Sullivan, CTLT Director
One of the more disconcerting experiences for instructors is when students appear distracted, disengaged and disregarding class activities. Research provides some useful findings about students' capacity to sustain their attention over a typical class period. In response, scholars recommend expanding what they call "non-lecture pedagogies" -- or what we might label "active learn by doing." Educators adopting active learning methods (and there are many) see significant improvements in measures of student learning. This session explores a sample of powerful, quick and easy-to-implement methods to keep students engaged through cognitive work essential for attention -- and for learning.
Designing Class Discussions for Improved Engagement
Facilitator: Patrick O’Sullivan, CTLT Director
Discussions should be in just about every educator's repertoire of favored teaching methods for promoting student thinking. However, the frustration of seeing participation from a select few students can prompt concerns about whether students are learning. This session provides ideas and specific guidance for how to design discussions so that the purpose is clear to students, pre-discussion priming activities involve all students, discussion questions provoke students' thinking and increase likelihood of better-informed contributions from more students. Methods to debrief the experience with students can highlight the intended takeaways and enhance student learning. Participants will complete a draft design for an upcoming discussion design and identify steps for implementing the design.
Making Day 1 More Meaningful and Productive
Facilitator: Patrick O’Sullivan, CTLT Director
What happens on a typical Day 1 of many classes? A cursory syllabus review and dismissal before the end of the class time? That tradition is a HUGE missed opportunity! This session examines ideas for starting each class each quarter that can accomplish so much more that can pay off throughout the term. In addition to following Academic Senate rules to spend at least part of the time on the syllabus, faculty can use that time to build students’ relationship with you and each other while previewing the course in ways likely to motivate and excite them about the coming quarter. Participants will explore ideas to complete a draft of a Day 1 plan that can be adapted for different classes so that it becomes a fixture of your teaching repertoire.
