LinkedIn Learning | Team Building

Connect Through Conversations

Professional Development Annual Goal

Process Improvements

Help Desk Submission Steps

R.I.S.E. Project - INCLUSIVENESS

R.I.S.E. Research

LinkedIn Learning: Creating Winning Teams

In today's workplace, teams matter more than ever. If you can build an effective team, you can accomplish more than you ever could with the strongest individual contributors. In this course, Britt Andreatta, PhD, shares how to build a team that will take your organization to new heights. Learn how coordination, cooperation, and collaboration are the building blocks of teamwork styles. Britt then shares the critical factors of team building, and explains how to implement belonging, trust, and purpose on your team. Finally, explore a model to understand and measure success on your in-person and remote teams.

Teambuilding 

LOWIM (Lindenwood Online Walking in Memphis)

The LOWIM Tour - The Lindenwood Online team challenged each other to walk to Memphis for BBQ. Since August, the team acquired two new teammates and what’s better than a little competition with rooting along the way to get to know each other better and build comradery? Through this team building opportunity, their goal was to give to a worthy organization and have fun along the way. It turned out that they all enjoy walking, biking, and food; the idea came together organically for them to head to Memphis for BBQ as a team. Each member contributed $20 to Circle of Concern food bank to continue their philanthropic work of providing food to those in need. They encouraged each other and had many good laughs as “Pegman” moved south on the map. Records were developed in an excel spreadsheet to keep track of miles and a Google Map was used to follow where and how they were going to make it to Memphis. 

Three hundred miles later, they made it and celebrated at Pappy’s! Where are they walking next? Stay tuned!

(Photo from left to right: Cindy Lane, Brittany Weiss, Dr. Hannah Kohler, Myron Burr, Kaitlyn Maxwell, Dr. Adam Valencic) 

​Connect Through Conversations: Giving Feedback

Date: December 2, 2021

Time: 10 - 11 a.m.

Location: Lindenwood Learning Academy, LARC 009.

The Learning Academy is hosting a three-part series called, Connect Through Conversations, this semester. The objective for this learning opportunity is focused on providing the tools to conduct conversations that achieve intended goals. We want employees to be able to communicate and respond in ways that meet the unique personal needs of team members and others they work with across campus. New employee, Meredith Pool, reflected on her experience in this development series so far. She said, “Connect Through Conversations did just that, connected the attendees to one another through various aspects and perspectives. Being able to engage with other staff and faculty was eye opening to how others process and view emotions and behaviors.”

First, learners reviewed the concept of emotional intelligence and then completed an assessment to measure their ability to acknowledge their own emotions. Based on the assessment score, participants were able to gauge where improvements are needed and can focus on those in the future. During the second session, attention was focused on the emotions of others; what is your ability to empathize with and recognize emotional cues in others? Pool said, “It was interesting to see how everyone viewed themselves and how similar we all were, but for different reasons. I know from that session I can take a step back and think about my emotions and where they are coming from before reacting.”

While these sessions build on each other, they can also be taken independently. Please join us in December for the final session, where we will discuss a framework to provide candid feedback to others. 

Professional Development Annual Goal

Fall 2021 Process Improvements 

Cayte Billman: Q2 Service Excellence

This year’s Q2 service excellence fellowship is multi-faceted. The first component will assist in our Q2: Every Student Counts Retention Campaign. Starting this November, we began hosting in-person student focus groups consisting of 6-12 students. The goal of the focus groups is to measure four elements in the following areas: Student Centeredness, Service Excellence, Inclusive Community, and Academic Engagement & Support.

Help Desk Submission Steps

Inclusiveness

Inclusive Classrooms by Megan Woltz

Why inclusivity matters in the classroom

Inclusive classrooms are important for all students, regardless of which discipline you teach. Diversity and inclusion matter to your discipline because your students are diverse and it affects their success in your classroom. Your students have different backgrounds, races, ethnicities, cultures, countries, religions, sexualities, gender identities, and life experiences. Some are parents. Some are veterans. Some work part- or full-time.

Graduation gaps continue to persist for students of color, low-income students, and students who are underprepared for college (Gabriel 2018). These students come to college with preparation deficits compared to White, wealthy students. Those deficits are not your fault. However, the way we interact with these students in our classrooms can either exacerbate these gaps or reduce them. The way you teach your classes has a huge impact on student success and retention. Failing to acknowledge the diversity of students in your classroom hinders development for marginalized students – in other words, if you aren’t explicitly being inclusive, marginalized students will feel excluded (Gabriel 2018).

Megan is our R.I.S.E. Scholar Expert on Inclusiveness. Scroll to the bottom of the Scholars page on the LLA website to read more about inclusivity in the classroom and inclusive teaching strategies.

Schedule a R.I.S.E. Scholar Consultation Today: As you plan your courses for next semester, remember that the scholars are ready to talk with their colleagues about rigor, inclusiveness, support, and engagement!

You can contact your R.I.S.E. Scholar to talk over ideas or teaching strategies, to request feedback on something, to request to view their teaching materials and much more. 

The R.I.S.E. Team would like to thank everyone for their participation during Inclusiveness Roundtable #1! 

During the roundtable, we reviewed what inclusiveness is, why it's important, and discussed what we all currently do to make our classrooms inclusive. The R.I.S.E. Scholars shared minimal-effort strategies (e.g., correctly and frequently using students’ names and pronouns, sharing experiences, etc.), moderate-effort strategies (e.g., making course material accessible, gauging students’ prior knowledge, etc.), and significant-effort strategies (e.g., implementing the principles of Universal Design) to help everyone enhance inclusivity in their courses. Faculty feedback shared with the R.I.S.E. Scholars and on the post-roundtable survey was overwhelmingly positive, and the vast majority of faculty said that they learned something valuable about inclusiveness during the roundtable session.

At the end of the roundtable, faculty were given a few moments to plan changes to implement in their courses to help enhance students’ sense of belonging and make their courses more inclusive. In the post-roundtable survey, several professors shared plans for teaching changes they hoped to apply to their courses soon:

• Calling out students by their names during class time
• On-ground students will list their preferred pronouns in the beginning of each semester
• Making sure slides are more inclusive for different disabilities
• I am working on bringing in different perspectives in all of my classes, but making sure students get background information on the diverse authors we are reading.
• I may try the "give students a turn kicking off the discussion" idea
• Learning names for each student sooner
• More student selection in topic for research papers
• Ask students what they'd like to learn from the course
• I am fairly familiar with UDL and other practices mentioned in today's presentation, but I intend to continue to rethink my course design, particularly in online courses to ensure that I am providing space for student-created and contributed content. For example, I am considering what assigned discussion leaders may be like in a asynchronous course.
• Use universal design

More R.I.S.E roundtables to come! R.I.S.E. Scholars will lead several roundtables within college or department faculty meetings throughout the year on this schedule:

• October – December: Inclusiveness Roundtables
• January – March: Support Roundtables
• March – May: Engagement Roundtables



R.I.S.E. Inclusiveness Guides and Resources: Were you unable to attend the first Inclusiveness Roundtable? Would you like a refresher about the strategies presented during the roundtable? Are you interested in learning more strategies to make your courses more inclusive? If you answered yes to either of these questions, please see the R.I.S.E. Guides, Definitions, Research, and Teaching Resources section of the R.I.S.E. Project website! In this section, you will find definitions of each pillar, research demonstrating its benefits, teaching strategies for enhancing inclusiveness in a course, and recordings of the first Inclusiveness roundtable.

R.I.S.E. Research

What is R.I.S.E. Research?

As a reminder, the LLA is conducting two research studies to assess the impact of the R.I.S.E. Project and to contribute to faculty development scholarship as well as scholarship of teaching and learning. For each R.I.S.E. research study, we aim to connect the dots between faculty development and student learning, test the utility of the R.I.S.E. framework, and validate particular pedagogical strategies.

Introducing R.I.S.E. Research Study #1 Participants

The first R.I.S.E. research study is off to a great start with a wonderful group of faculty researchers! Each researcher has committed to implementing teaching changes to enhance one or more of the R.I.S.E. pillars they learn about through roundtables, peer coaching, and/or online resources. Additionally, they will help to provide self-report data, teaching and learning artifacts, and/or student perception data. Detailed information about what our faculty researchers are exploring and finding in their classrooms turned laboratories will be featured in future Learning Logs and during other R.I.S.E. events. 

There is still time to make your classroom your laboratory and participate in R.I.S.E. Research Study #1! Interested in joining this wonderful group of faculty researchers and examining how your small teaching changes can impact your students’ learning? If so, come join the R.I.S.E. Research Study #1 Team. Interested in learning more or participating? Check out the Faculty Guide R.I.S.E. Research and contact Shenika Harris. 

Lindenwood Learning Academy

LARC 009

209 S. Kingshighway

St. Charles, MO 63301

636-949-4408