This week: “Assessing Your Assessment Plan: A Workshop for Chairs, Directors (and Others),” (11/15, noon – 2, ATG-Faculty Lounge, brown bag + light refreshments)
Faculty Spotlight: This week we spotlight two professors recently recognized for their work at the global and the local level. Professor Elizabeth Demaray (Associate Professor, Fine Arts) was interviewed by the Philadelphia Inquirer (11/11/13) on for her innovative SkypeOnArt series that brings internationally renowned artists to Rutgers-Camden students via the web.
Also at the Inquirer (11/10/13), Dr. Stephen Danley (Assistant Professor, Public Policy) discusses his work on civic engagement with the Camden community.
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Question of the Month: Reading is Fundamental. But how do we teach critical and effective reading? Please share with us (and your colleagues) how you foreground reading in your courses as a strategy for academic success. Email: teaching.matters@camden.rutgers.edu. |
Two-Sentence Teaching Tips (cont.): We invite you to submit brief teaching tips to be featured in TMAC Weekly and on our website. When we collect ten tips—we’re 5/10 so far—we’ll publish the list and announce a recipient, chosen at random, of How Learning Works, an excellent resource for all educators. Be pithy. Be profound. Email teaching.matters@camden.rutgers.edu.
Conversation starters: At Slate, a proposal to address the exceptionally high MOOC dropout rates by recruiting celebrity lecturers.
A debate over developmental education develops as many states consider cutting funding and requirements for remedial courses at the college level.
From the Bookshelf: Joseph Williams and Joseph Bizup give practical, effective advice to both beginning and established writers in Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace. This is an excellent book to assign in writing-intensive courses across the curriculum.
New TMAC Resources: Check out a new section of the website on learning outcomes offering guidance and samples to help you craft meaningful, manageable, measurable goals for your course. This essay explains why you should do so.
Featured Peer Teaching Center: The Center for Teaching Excellence at Cornell University offers a Higher Ed Bibliography of the seminal texts on a teaching and learning.
Call for Papers: Double Helix: A Journal of Critical Thinking and Writing, Volume 2 (2014): Critical Thinking and Writing in the STEM Disciplines
Guest Editor: Lisa Emerson, Massey University (N.Z.)
Double Helix is an international journal devoted to linkages between critical thinking and writing in and across the disciplines, and is particularly interested in pieces that explore and report on connections between pedagogical theory and classroom practice. For this issue on STEM, we are especially interested in those pieces that address the following concerns at the nexus of critical thinking and writing: the role of language in the construction of scientific and mathematical knowledge the impact of oral discourse on scientific and mathematical knowledge the engagement of students with and their enculturation into practices of STEM disciplines the boundaries of STEM discourse. In addition to research articles on these topics (5000-10,000 words), the journal is interested in publishing reports from the field (2,500-5,000 words), book reviews (750-1,000 words), and letters (up to 500 words). The editors also seek submissions to The Provocateur section of the journal, which publishes pieces that disrupt and unsettle scholarly, institutional, and pedagogical conventions.
The deadline for submissions is March 28, 2014. For submission guidelines and other information, please visit the journal’s website: http://qudoublehelixjournal.org/index.php/dh
Upcoming TMAC events:
November 15 (Faculty Lounge) noon – 2 p.m.: “Assessing Your Assessment Plan: A Workshop for Departments and Programs”
Many departments and programs have developed an assessment plan that has yet to be implemented through a full assessment cycle. But perhaps the plan itself merits revisiting in light of changed expectations and needs. This hands-on workshop allows chairs, program directors and others to take a fresh look at their present assessment plan (or refine a plan in progress). (a ”brown bag” event with light refreshments.)
November 3 (Location TBD) 12:20-1:20 p.m.: “Grading: Frank Talk on Our Least Favorite Activity”
Join us for a “brown bag” conversation on grades, why we grade the way we do and the options available to us.
Follow us on Twitter: @RUCamdenTMAC
If you’re interested in writing or being interviewed for the Faculty Spotlight or have a link or topic you’d like to share, please email us at teaching.matters@camden.rutgers.edu.