Filter & Sort
Life imitates absurdity
Many times, I've chuckled at Congressman Earl Blumenauer's 2009 invocation: "Let's have a moment of silence for all those Americans who are stuck in traffic on their way to the gym to ride the stationary bicycle."
Motherhood After Tenure: 'Professor Mommy'
One of the most pleasurable parts of my new administrative position is ordering new books on teaching and faculty development for our center’s library. I’ve given up my earlier naïve attempt to read each one before shelving it. However, Rachel Connelly and Kristen Ghodsee’s Professor Mommy was a book I couldn’t put down: a smart, readable description of the hurdles facing women who have children while in graduate school or on the tenure track.
The Immersion Method -- I
Adam Kotsko writes that intensive, small-group discussion of great works of literature still offers uniquely valuable paths to teaching and learning.
The Immersion Method -- II
Virgil W. Brower writes that courses based on intense discussions of great works of literature need not be limited to elite institutions.
The Problem With EdX
Since it started last fall, I’ve heard the 36-week experimental #change11 course referred to – half tongue-in-cheek – as “the Mother of All MOOCs.” Back when the course started in September, it seemed like a reasonable description. #change11 was designed and run by Massive Open Online Course pioneers George Siemens, Stephen Downes, and Dave Cormier, and had 36 separate facilitators lined up to cover everything from soup to nuts in the grand scheme of instructional technologies and 21st century learning.
How Should Your University Respond to edX?
The first thing we should all do is encourage discussion about edX. This is big, important,and exciting news. Faculty get excited about ideas, and the edX announcement contained some great ones.
Delegating to the Proprietaries
This is one of those “thinking out loud” posts, as opposed to some sort of fully thought out proposal. Constructive feedback is very, very welcome.
Resisting the Robo-Assignment
Last week I felt depressed about how many automated approaches to producing and grading writing were coming on the market and I ended my gloomy thoughts with an exhortation. Think about your assignments that ask students to find sources and write about them. What are you hoping students will learn? Are they learning it? Is there a way to make the whole process less mechanical? I got an email suggesting that it would be useful if I actually tried to answer that question myself. Fair enough. I'll give it a shot.