By: Andrea Novicki

Dr. Canelas clearly enjoys her students and teaching. So how and why would she put her students on the spot by calling on them at random to answer questions in her 100+ person chemistry class? She discussed her techniques during a session at our 2015 Center for Instructional Technology Showcase.

First, she sets the students expectations and establishes a "we're all in this together" attitude from the beginning of the course. She begins by calling on students by name, asking them what their plans

Read More

By: James M. Lang

4 quick ways to shift students' attention from life's distractions to your course content

When I teach my writing course on creative nonfiction, we spend a lot of time analyzing the opening lines of great writers. I work frequently with students on their opening words, sentences, and paragraphs. In that very short space, I explain to them, most readers will decide whether or not to continue reading the rest of your essay. If you can't grab and hold their attention with your opening, you are likely to lose them before they get to your hard-won insights 10 paragraphs later.

The same principle, I would argue, holds true in teaching a college course. The opening five minutes offer us a rich opportunity to capture the attention of students and prepare them for learning.

Read More

By: Fredrick Singer

Today, technology is allowing us to capture unprecedented data on our daily activities. Wearables like Fitbit track movement, calories burned-even sleep. GPS enabled mobile devices capture my car's every turn. The Internet of Things helps us understand temperature preferences to optimize energy consumption at home. In each case, widespread broadband access coupled with the explosion of mobile computing is making it easy to measure activities that were, historically, almost impossible to capture.

Read More