SoTL raises some unique questions when it comes to the Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval for research involving human subjects. Is your project “research” according to federal regulations, or is it “curriculum quality improvement?” What are the implications of each of these designations for how you approach your project? What special measures must be taken to protect the rights of student research participants who will be graded by the researcher? These and related questions will be answered during this session, which will be led by Dr. Ted Marcy, IRB Chair of the Committee on Human Research in the Behavioral and Social Sciences. The session will provide information that you can use to adequately protect the rights of students as research participants, apply for the appropriate study designation from the IRB, and obtain IRB approval in a timely manner. 

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access!

Navigating literature in the field of education can be tricky. Educational terminology changes constantly, search tools require unique strategies, and Scholarship of Teaching and Learning topics sometimes require searching in areas not previously considered.  This session will provide tips and strategies for navigating educational literature in preparation for a SoTL project. The session will be led by Dan DeSanto, Library Associate Professor, who will provide an introduction to searching with the ERIC database as well as other tools to begin SOTL literature review work. To help jumpstart searching, participants will be afforded search time with their own topics of interest and will leave with a plan for moving forward with their literature search. 

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting. If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

Do you have a question about your teaching or students’ learning that you would like to investigate but are unsure of how to approach the research? Rest assured, you are not alone. Faculty members come to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) from diverse disciplines with disparate kinds of research training. Therefore, many aspiring SoTL researchers are unfamiliar with the educational research methods that are available to them to help answer their questions about teaching and learning. This session will provide an overview of the most common methodologies, including non-western methods used in SoTL research. Anyone interested in learning more about educational research methods that can be used to answer pressing questions about teaching and learning is encouraged to attend. (It is a good idea to attend the Introduction to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning workshop first.) 

Facilitated by Holly Buckland Parker and Lizzy Pope. 

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting. If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

Do you ever wonder if changes to instruction or pedagogy are making a difference? Are you curious about how students approach complex assignments outside of class? Do you want to know what would increase student engagement in your class? If you answered yes to any of these questions, you may be interested in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL), which is an increasingly popular approach to using your classroom to answer questions about your own teaching and learning techniques.

This workshop introduces participants to the basics of SoTL research. Opportunities for doing SoTL at the University of Vermont will be discussed. Anyone who is curious to learn more about SoTL is encouraged to attend.

Facilitated by Holly Buckland Parker and Lizzy Pope.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting. If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting. If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting. If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

This session introduces you to project-based learning via a participatory exercise, illustrating the design and scaffolding of a student project experience.  Working in small groups, we will work through the initial steps of a project and reflect on its educational design and strategies.  From there we will examine sample project assignments all with an eye to developing an understanding of what it takes to create high quality experiential learning opportunities for our students.  We will close by sharing strategies to overcome the hurdle of adding projects to courses that already keep students and faculty busy.

This workshop is facilitated by Dr. Kristin Wobbe, director of Worcester Polytechnic Institute’s Center for Project-Based Learning. Read more about her and the center on this CTL page.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting. If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

One of project-based learning’s key benefits and challenges comes from using team-based projects.  In this session we will share and use tools that reduce stereotyping and bias on student teams, resulting in more effective and equitable teaming.  Participants will begin a guided process of developing projects for their own classes, and the session will conclude with the group identifying remaining challenges and brainstorming solutions to these challenges.

This workshop is facilitated by Dr. Kristin Wobbe, director of >Worcester Polytechnic Institute’s Center for Project-Based Learning. Read more about her and the center on this CTL page.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting. If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

UVM has administered the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) every three years since 2005, but the survey and its data have not previously been shared in faculty-to-faculty conversations about teaching practices. We at the CTL feel that student responses could prove useful for guiding programming to support faculty development. The role of this session is to introduce faculty to the survey and most recent set of findings in order to gather initial impressions of the data and its potential uses for faculty. Please join us at one of these sessions to learn more about NSSE and give us your thoughts!

Facilitated by Laura Almstead, Eva Cosoroaba, Mary Burke, and Wendy Berenback.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access!

UVM has administered the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) every three years since 2005, but the survey and its data have not previously been shared in faculty-to-faculty conversations about teaching practices. We at the CTL feel that student responses could prove useful for guiding programming to support faculty development. The role of this session is to introduce faculty to the survey and most recent set of findings in order to gather initial impressions of the data and its potential uses for faculty. Please join us at one of these sessions to learn more about NSSE and give us your thoughts!

Facilitated by Laura Almstead, Eva Cosoroaba, Mary Burke, and Wendy Berenback.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access!

Perusall is a collaborative annotation tool that integrates with Blackboard (meaning no separate login is needed). Students can engage with a variety of course materials (readings, videos, podcasts, websites, student-generated documents)—in whole-class or in small groups—to collectively react, question, and discuss.

Perusall has been shown to increase pre-class reading significantly (greater than 90% of students consistently complete readings in classes using this tool). The software generates a “confusion report” for instructors, highlighting areas of the content that may warrant deeper in-class discussion, as well as an instructor-facing analytics report that enables auto-grading of assignments. This workshop will blend an overview, hands-on experience with the software, and guidance for use.

Facilitated by Jen Garrett-Ostermiller, CTL Educational Developer & Allison Anacker, CTL Faculty Associate.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access!

It can be difficult to make static documents, such as syllabi, feel motivating, collaborative, and developmental for students. “Interactive” syllabi can transform the way you not only share information with students but build relationships with them, using a simple survey.

Typically, information is pushed out to students (“read the syllabus,” “read the assignment instructions”). We sometimes do a quick check for knowledge (a syllabus quiz or a discussion for clarifying assignment instruction questions), but even these efforts can feel patronizing (“did you read the syllabus carefully?”) or underutilized (an occasional clarification question on a discussion). Interactive syllabi turn a previously transactional document into a guided conversation between the instructor and each individual student, using warm, cruelty-free, and inviting language. During the workshop, we’ll explore several options, both thematically and technologically, for using an interactive syllabus, including starting from a template to reduce your workload.

Facilitated by Jen Garrett-Ostermiller, CTL Educational Developer.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access!

During this workshop we discuss the value of articulating a personal teaching philosophy and important elements to include in your statement.

Facilitated by Holly Buckland Parker.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

Join Graduate Program Coordinator, Holly Buckland Parker and CTL Faculty Associate, Lizzy Pope to discuss how things are going for you this semester. We will invite you engage in some reflective practices as a group. We will structure our time to discuss and brainstorm useful ways to continue to manage research time, grading, and teaching this semester.

Facilitated by Holly Buckland Parker and Lizzy Pope.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access!

Join Graduate Program Coordinator, Holly Buckland Parker and CTL Faculty Associate, Lizzy Pope to discuss how things are going for you this semester. We will invite you engage in some reflective practices as a group. We will structure our time to discuss and brainstorm useful ways to continue to manage research time, grading, and teaching this semester.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access!

Creating Wicked Assignments and Exams

In this last session, we’ll design assignments that will help students develop the skills they need to take on wicked problems and showcase their knowledge, problem-solving abilities, and outside-the-box thinking. We’ll look at several assignment examples provided by Paul Hanstedt and consider how they might or might not work for us.

Read an overview of the series and download the book on which the series is based, Creating Wicked Students : Designing Courses for a Complex World, by Paul Hanstedt (2018).

Co-facilitated by Eva Cosoroaba and Kelly Becker, CTL Faculty Associates

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

Designing Wicked Course Objectives

During this session, we’ll take a closer look at our course learning objectives and consider them through the wicked framework. What does a student need to be able to do by the end of our courses so that they are ready to tackle the complex problems in our fields? How can we identify learning objectives that are both assessable and supportive of their development as independent thinkers?

Read an overview of the series and download the book on which the series is based, Creating Wicked Students : Designing Courses for a Complex World, by Paul Hanstedt (2018).

Co-facilitated by Eva Cosoroaba and Kelly Becker, CTL Faculty Associates

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

Identifying Wicked Problems for Wicked Students

During this session, we’ll identify some of the wicked problems in our fields, those problems that are too large for one individual to solve and that require our students to think unconventionally. We’ll reflect on how we can foster the skills our students need to solve wicked problems, specifically, how we can shift a course’s purpose from sharing a body of knowledge, to creating opportunities for students to actively build and apply skills to solve the wicked problems in their fields.

Read an overview of the series and download the book on which the series is based, Creating Wicked Students : Designing Courses for a Complex World, by Paul Hanstedt (2018).

Co-facilitated by Eva Cosoroaba and Kelly Becker, CTL Faculty Associates

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

Motivating today’s students to actively engage in learning activities proves challenging for most faculty. Very often Gen Z students do not respond as did students in the past to extrinsic motivators such as bonus quizzes and extra credit assignments. However, as James Raffini presents in 150 Ways to Increase Intrinsic Motivation in the Classroom, when the psychoacademic needs of students are met in creative ways, student motivation soars.  This workshop will engage faculty in a discussion about addressing student needs for autonomy, competence, relatedness, self-esteem, and enjoyment in order to significantly increase student motivation.

This workshop will be facilitated by Dr. Saundra McGuire, author of Teach Students How to Learn. Dr. McGuire, Director Emerita of Louisiana State University’s Center for Academic Success, is a chemist and educator who has presented around the world on the science of learning. She has a particular interest in supporting underrepresented students in math and STEM fields, but her work on metacognition and motivation has applications in every field.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

Students come to college with widely varying academic skills, approaches to learning, and motivation levels. Faculty often lament that students are focused on achieving high grades, but are not willing to invest much time or effort in learning. This session will focus on the importance of helping students acquire simple, but effective, learning strategies based on cognitive science principles. We will engage in interactive reflection activities that will allow attendees to experience strategies that can significantly improve student success by transforming students’ attitudes about the meaning of learning.

This workshop will be facilitated by Dr. Saundra McGuire, author of Teach Students How to Learn. Dr. McGuire, Director Emerita of Louisiana State University’s Center for Academic Success, is a chemist and educator who has presented around the world on the science of learning. She has a particular interest in supporting underrepresented students in math and STEM fields, but her work on metacognition and motivation has applications in every field.

This workshop is part of the Kroepsch-Maurice Faculty Development and Lecture Series.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting. If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

All STEM students who are admitted to the institution have the ability to succeed in STEM courses. However, most do not have effective learning strategies and resort to memorizing information just before tests.

This interactive workshop will introduce faculty to cognitive science research-based learning strategies that will help all students experience meaningful, transferable learning.

The session will focus on ways to teach STEM students simple yet powerful learning strategies to ensure success in STEM courses.

This workshop will be facilitated by Dr. Saundra McGuire, author of Teach Students How to Learn. Dr. McGuire, Director Emerita of Louisiana State University’s Center for Academic Success, is a chemist and educator who has presented around the world on the science of learning. She has a particular interest in supporting underrepresented students in math and STEM fields, but her work on metacognition and motivation has applications in every field.

This workshop is part of the Kroepsch-Maurice Faculty Development and Lecture Series.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

This pandemic has impacted our lives, our work, and our classrooms. As we start a new semester, it can be helpful to reflect on experiences and lessons we’ve learned from past semesters. Come join us for a roundtable discussion with student services staff from across the University to discuss issues impacting our students and to think about ways to make this semester manageable and sustainable for ourselves and our students. Individual faculty and student services staff often connect over specific cases, but we rarely have the opportunity to converse more generally and to share experiences and insights. This roundtable discussion will be facilitated by a CTL faculty associate and will feature members of student services staff from several different colleges. All faculty and staff are invited to join us.

Roundtable participants: Mary C. Burke, CTL faculty associate, Senior Lecturer (CAS) Matt Manz, Director of Undergraduate Student Services (CEMS) Whitney N. Northrop, Associate Director of Student Services (CALS) Katie Tyler, Student Service Coordinator (CAS) Meghan “MJ” Jaird, Director of Student Services and Retention (CESS) Meghan Young, Associate Director of Student Services & Retention, Academic Advisor (CESS)

Join Graduate Program Coordinator, Holly Buckland Parker and CTL Faculty Associate, Lizzy Pope to share ideas from your lessons learned during the past 2020 and 2021 semesters. We envision using these lessons to create thoughtful, reflective practices for the Spring 2022 semester. We will structure our time to discuss and brainstorm useful ways to manage research time, grading, and teaching this Spring.

Facilitated by Holly Buckland Parker and Lizzy Pope.

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access!

How has the experience of moving all or most instruction online—and then back in person—affected the ways you think about testing and exams?

In this session, we’ll explore ways that online testing can play a role in in-person classes—and the ways that pandemic experiences have led some instructors to re-conceive their approaches to testing.

Facilitated by CTL Faculty Associates, Laura Almstead, Allison Anacker, Eva Cosoroaba, and Laura Marthaler

During this workshop, you’ll have an opportunity to clarify questions and refine your knowledge of Screencast-O-Matic for producing effective videos for your students. We can review any step along the way from planning to recording to editing to sharing.

Pre-work is required for this workshop:
Prior to the workshop, please complete the tasks outlined here. Then, bring your Screencast-O-Matic questions to this live session.

Facilitated by Inés Berrizbeitia, CTL Faculty Development Specialist

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting. If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access.

Yellowdig is an alternative to Blackboard’s discussion board tool. In form and substance, it works much like social media platforms, supporting text and video posts as well as allowing participants to use likes or emojis to react to posts and comments. It provides flexible ways for the class community to interact.

In this session, you will learn about Yellowdig’s features and Blackboard integration (e.g., no additional logging in and participation data transfer to the Grade Center, if desired). Participants will leave the workshop able to decide whether Yellowdig or Blackboard best serves their course goals.

Facilitated by Susanmarie Harrington, Writing in the Disciplines, and Holly Buckland Parker, Center for Teaching and Learning

You will receive a Microsoft Teams calendar invitation the afternoon prior to your event explaining how to join and participate in the meeting.  If you click “accept,” it will populate on your Teams calendar for easy access!