Making feedback worth your while

To be helpful, feedback should focus on helping students to improve their work, not on evaluating them. And it should connect back to expectations that were clear from the start.

Still radical after 100 years: John Dewey

Dewey was not just concerned with adapting education to meet the moment of the Industrial Revolution, but in realizing the democratic ideals of the United States.

Protest Pedagogy

Despite being suspended and banned from campus or even denied their degrees in some cases, the students in those encampments got a better education than many of their classmates, in the ways that matter.

Testing without the torture: what is formative assessment?

Formative assessment is dialogic in nature, a conversation where student and instructor communicate back and forth about beliefs, strategies, expectations, and judgments. Both the student and the instructor get feedback that will help them do better.

Who am I teaching? Ideas for the first day of class

It's important for instructors to get to know the learners in the room, because the learners' prior knowledge and goals play a huge role in determining what they'll learn, and how much they'll learn, and how quickly. Everyone in the room will learn a lot more if the class becomes a community.

Graphic content: using mind mapping in class

In my mind, there are three great ways to use mind maps in the classroom: 1) mastering a lot of new information in an intro class; 2) going beyond rote learning; or 3) planning an essay, paper, project, or complex assignment, especially in a group

Teaching first-generation college students

When I delved into scholarship on supporting first-gen college students, I thought about Marius and the Roman "new man" trope. They turned a potential deficit into an asset, and a core aspect of their identity.

Joining the world's nerdiest conversation: learning to read (and write) academic papers

By teaching students to pick apart and become conscious of the structures and conventions of scholarly writing, we can help them to absorb those conventions and replicate them.

Making online courses more accessible with Universal Design for Learning

UDL can and should include using tech accessibility tools, but also goes much further. At the end of the day, UDL is about getting rid of artificial barriers so that everyone can get on with the business of learning.

What does it mean to be "student-centered"? Or, how is Latin like horseback riding?

When I first heard the term "student-centered teaching," I recognized it as an apt description of what I had been doing instinctively. In general, it means shifting your focus from the content you're teaching to what your students are learning.

Quickfire challenges in the classroom (or, ideas for breakout rooms)

I think the "Quickfire" is a framework that we can apply to teaching, particularly to active learning in the form of group work, including online breakout rooms. It's something we can do in every class, and we can mix it up to keep it interesting.

When dialogue goes off the rails

As professors and facilitators of discussion, we urgently need more training on what to do when discussion goes off the rails, because it does not feel good to let students down.

Gimme a break: active learning breaks in lecture courses

Embrace taking breaks during your lectures, even just for a minute or two, and even at the end of the semester when you're exhausted. It's not laziness, it's cognitive science!

graduate education

Sharing the Wealth: what is an "asset-based" approach to teaching?

It's worth reflecting on what assets you bring to the table as a learner, too, as you think about how to make the most of the assets others bring to your classrooms.

course planning

The Tyranny of Learning Objectives

Civic Engagement in the Classroom, part 2

Missed Part I? Read it here. 3. Create community in your classroom I only taught for a few months during the pandemic. It was one of the hardest challenges I’d faced in teaching—like laying railroad tracks while the train was moving—and I know I wasn’t the

Civic Engagement in the Classroom, part 1

After 8 years of teaching Latin, Greek, Roman civilization, and other topics in the classical world, I’ve moved on to work as a curriculum designer and faculty development facilitator for a small nonprofit, The Citizens Campaign. I’m on a team of former practitioners of government and politics who

Civic Engagement Beyond the Ballot

A lot is going to change, both in politics and in higher education, in 2021. At The Citizens Campaign, we have undertaken a groundbreaking new initiative to meet the fierce urgency of 21st century crises, by giving citizens — especially people of color and economically disadvantaged urban communities — the tools they

Metamorphoses 15: myths and history

A blog about teaching Ovid’s Metamorphoses in a classical mythology course

Metamorphoses 14: Circe

A blog about teaching Ovid’s Metamorphoses in a classical mythology course

Metamorphoses 13: A courtroom drama

A blog about teaching Ovid’s Metamorphoses in a classical mythology course

Metamorphoses 12: Invulnerability

The Iliad doesn’t tell the whole story of the Trojan War. It tells the story of “The Wrath of Achilles” nine years into that war, and ends…

Metamorphoses 11: Shape-shifters

I guess I wasn’t at my sharpest this week — blame it on the pandemic — because I didn’t really think about the importance of the presence…

Metamorphoses 10: Orpheus the Misogynist

A blog about teaching Ovid’s Metamorphoses in a classical mythology course