higher education assignment toolkit

• Study skills
• Academic integrity
• Skills for study
• Research skills
• Self-management skills
• Referencing and plagiarism This link opens in a new window
• Assignment toolkit
• Welcome to the library This link opens in a new window
• International students This link opens in a new window
• Live events This link opens in a new window
• Recorded webinars

• Study skills checklist Use this study skills checklist to assess how confident you are when it comes to key academic and self-management skills.

Use this toolkit to help you complete the different stages of the assignment process. It provides information on which study skills to develop, academic offences to avoid, links to resources, and the support available in the library.

Individual assessments should be entirely your own work. You are not permitted to work with other students on the same assignment.

Understanding the assignment brief

You need to understand what you are being asked to do before you can research or write an assignment.

• Is there an assignment brief, learning outcomes or additional guidance?
• What type of assignment is it? Is it an essay, report, problem question?
• Highlight key words, terms, and concepts.  This will help you identify the topic and area you need to focus on.

As you pull the assignment question apart, write down the different strands to explore, along with any keywords and areas that you are not familiar with. Think about what your initial response to the question would be.

Skills to develop:

• critical thinking
• time management
• organisation
• Approach or instruction words
• Critical thinking
• Skills for study: Critical thinking
• Skills for study: Time management
• Writing Development guides and webinars

Preliminary reading

You will need to do some preliminary reading around the topic. Look at your online reading list and the notes you have taken as you will have covered the main theme in your lectures and seminars.

• Do an initial search on the library website for books and articles that will help you gain a deeper understanding of the topic.
• Make notes on the key elements and identify keywords and phrases to help you research.
• Continue to think about how you are going to answer the question.
• Start to make a basic plan consisting of the main points.
• note-making
• Reading at university
• Note-taking
• Skills for study: Reading and note-making

The first two steps will give you a deeper understanding of the topic, and ideas on what to focus on to answer the different strands to the question. Using the list of keywords and phrases collated when breaking down your assignment question and during your preliminary reading, you can begin to find evidence to support your ideas and themes.

The best place to start your research is the advanced search on the library website . The library website provides access to a large collection of books, ebooks and journal articles that are not freely available on the internet, and you can be confident when searching that all literature found is a good academic source. To get the best from your search:

• Develop a search strategy by writing down a list of keywords and phrases you can use in your research.
• Expand your list by considering alternatives.
• Start your research by typing one or two keywords into either the main search box or the Advanced Search on the library website.
• Add additional keywords to reduce the number of documents retrieved.
• note-taking
• Developing a search strategy
• Finding information: an introduction to the advanced search of the library website
• Webinar: Finding information
• Skills for study: Research principles
• Find your Subject

Planning and writing

When you have found and read a variety of literature you can begin to think about what themes you are going to discuss. Create your assignment structure (introduction, main body and conclusion) and plan what you are going to discuss in the main body, which ideas/themes you are going to include and what order they should appear in. Try to ensure that the main body flows by introducing themes in a logical order. The text in the body of the essay should be broken down into paragraphs, with each paragraph covering one main point. Consider the evidence you are going to use to support your main points. A detailed plan will make it easier to start the actual writing. You don’t always have to start with the introduction. You may find it easier to focus on the ideas/themes in the main body before writing the introduction and conclusion.

• academic writing
• Skills for study: Writing skills
• Introductions and conclusions
• Apostrophes

Referencing

Referencing is important in academic writing and an essential part of any of your assessments. It:

• allows you to acknowledge your sources
• gives academic credibility to your work
• demonstrates your knowledge of a subject area
• prevents accusations of plagiarism.

You should always reference a source when:

• direct quoting
• summarising a theory
• discussing someone else's opinion
• using case studies
• using statistics or visual data
• but not when stating your own opinion, observation or experience.

Don’t underestimate how long referencing takes. Ensure you have all the information and a basic understanding of the required format. Provide a reference every time you include information that is not your own. Failure to do this is plagiarism, an academic offence. Check your references against the examples given in the relevant referencing handbook. Click here for more information on referencing.

• referencing
• proof-reading
• Our referencing guides and help with referencing
• Quoting and paraphrasing
• Time management

Editing and proof-reading

It is important to edit and proof-read both the main part of your assignment and your references. The university does not provide a proof-reading service, but you can get support with how to edit and proof-read your work. As you are proof-reading, ask yourself:

• Have I met the assignment brief and learning outcomes?
• Is my writing clear and in a logical order?
• How to edit and proof-read
• << Previous: Referencing and plagiarism
• Next: Welcome to the library >>
• Last Updated: Sep 6, 2024 10:17 AM
• URL: https://guides.library.lincoln.ac.uk/learningdevelopment
• Admin login
• ICT Support Desk
• Policy Statement
• www.lincoln.ac.uk
• Accessibility
• Privacy & Disclaimer

LibAnswers: CLaSS

What help can i get with my assignment.

The CLaSS team have produced a number of resources to help you in the planning, research and writing of your assignment.

The Higher Education Assignment Toolkit is a good place to start. This 6 stage guide covers understanding the assignment and getting started; finding and managing information; making reading more manageable; planning the structure of your assignment; writing your assignment and drafting, editing and proofreading. 

If you are having trouble with the structure of your assignment, try one of the templates from the Reports, reflective essays and presentations powerpoint.

If your assignment is a report, the below video may be helpful:

Alternatively, if your assignment is a essay try the video below:

There are also a number of Focus on Guides that may help with this area, for example the Focus on Writing Reports , Focus on Essay Writing and the more general Focus on Writing guides.

If you are still having trouble, why not  book a one-to-one tutorial .

Links & Files

• Reports, Essays and Presentations templates (ppt)
• HEAT Toolkit
• Writing Reports (video)
• Structuring your essay (video)
• Focus on writing reports
• Focus on Essay Writing
• Focus on Writing
• Book a one-to-one tutorial
• Assignment drop in
• Academic Writing
• Criticality
• Last Updated 19 Mar, 2020
• Answered By Caroline King

FAQ Actions

• Share on Facebook

Comments (0)

Welcome to the class faqs..

You can type in your question in the search bar above. You can also browse the topics above to find what you are looking for. Use the filter options in the top right-hand corner to select topics and groups of FAQs.

The complete list can be accessed by clicking on the 'Answers' link

University Library

• University Library Home
• Washington and Lee University Research Guides

Information Literacy Teaching Toolkit

• Research Assignment Design
• Information Literacy Toolkit
• Information Literacy
• Videos & Tutorials

Designing Effective Research Assignments

• Designing a Research Assignment
• Designing an Information Literacy Curriculum

Below are questions to ask yourself when designing an assignment that promotes information literacy and critical thinking skills.

• What will students learn as a result of completing this assignment?
• What are the information literacy student learning outcomes?
• What are the writing or presentation outcomes?
• What are the discipline-specific outcomes?
• Are these goals clear to students?
• Does our library have these resources? Are they freely and easily available elsewhere?
• Is there a link to the library (or other needed resources) in the assignment and/or syllabus?
• Is there a link to any related student services (peer tutoring, technology help desk, etc.) in the assignment and/or syllabus?
• Does this model a process students can repeat in the future? Is that clear to students?
• Is there space for students to reflect on what they are doing, which strategies are working and which aren’t?
• Does this provide enough time for students to be successful?
• Does it provide time for you to give feedback to students, and for students to revise and/or integrate that feedback into their next piece of work?
• Do you have grading criteria or a rubric to help you score student work? Is this available to students?
• Might you ask past students if you can use their work as a sample, or can you create your own?
• How will students access the sample(s)? Hand out in class, provide in Moodle, etc.?

Source: Greenfield Community College Library.  “Information Literacy Toolkit for Faculty.”  gcc.mass.edu, Greenfield Community College. Accessed 1 Jan. 2021.

Scaffolding and reinforcing information literacy skills and concepts throughout your courses and program, will allow students to develop and master their skill set. Below are a number of questions to think about while creating course and program materials. 

• Is it clear to students how these skills connect to continued study and/or real life?
• What do they already know? Can you assume, or do you need to find out?
• Which information literacy skills do you need to teach, in addition to your course content?
• What can a librarian help teach?
• What needs to be done during class time (for face-to-face classes)?
• What can be done outside of class, as homework?
• What supports does the library already have available (i.e. Moodle plug-ins, videos, handouts, etc.)?
• If you want a librarian to teach, where does that fit in the course schedule?
• If not, what needs to change? Course content, the research assignment, or both?

Greenfield Community College Library.  “Information Literacy Toolkit for Faculty.”  gcc.mass.edu, Greenfield Community College. Accessed 1 Jan. 2021.

Ideas and Examples

• Classic Examples of Research Assignments
• Ideas for Research-related Assignments

Assignments below are linked to documents. Please feel to download and edit for your classroom or context and to remix assignments. A librarian would be happy to tailor a version of an assignment or scaffold research skills into your class.

Example of a short assignment that asks students to think critically about two news sources.

Example of an annotated bibliography assignment that asks students to think critically about their sources.

Example of a research paper abstract assignment that asks students to closely evaluate their topics and sources needed.

Example of an assignment that asks students to brainstorm and evaluate research questions.

Example of an assignment that asks to compare and evaluate various sources.

Example of an assignment that asks students to critically approach source use and paraphrasing.

Example of an assignment that asks students to detail the research process by recording search strategies and resources located.

Example of an assignment that asks students to choose and refine a research topic.

Example of an assignment that asks students to think critically about sources.

Example of an assignment that asks students to crucially evaluate their research topic by evalauting sources.

There are any number of library-related assignments that can be incorporated into a course. Here are a few examples that can be adapted to most subjects (assignments may be repeated across categories).

Critical Evaluations & Comparisons

• Locate a popular magazine article, then find a scholarly article on the same subject. Compare the two articles for content, style, bias, audience, etc.
• Analyze the content, style, and audience of three journals in a given discipline.
• Choose an autobiography of someone related to the course content. Find secondary sources which deal with an idea or event described in the autobiography. Compare and contrast the sources.
• Evaluate a website based on specific criteria.
• Determine the adequacy of a psychological test based on the literature about the test. Then develop a test battery designed for a particular clinical (or other) situation, by using published tests and the literature about them.
• To develop the ability to evaluate sources, students prepare a written criticism of the literature on a particular issue by finding book reviews, by searching citation indexes to see who is quoting the context of the scholarship in a particular field.
• Students use bibliographies, guides to the literature and the Internet to find primary sources on an issue or historical period. They can contrast the treatment in the primary sources with the treatment in secondary sources including their textbook.
• Write a newspaper story describing an event--political, social, cultural, whatever suits the objectives-based on their research. The assignment can be limited to one or two articles, or it can be more extensive. This is a good exercise in critical reading and in summarizing. The assignment gains interest if several people research the same event in different sources and compare the newspaper stories that result.
• Contrast journal articles or editorials from recent publications reflecting conservative and liberal tendencies.
• Write a review of a musical performance. Include reference not only to the performance attended, but to reviews of the composition's premiere, if possible. Place the composition in a historical context using timetables, general histories and memoirs when available, using this information to gain insight into its current presentation.

Fact-Finding Research

• Read an editorial and find facts to support it.
• In biology or health classes, assign each student a 'diagnosis' (can range from jock itch to Parkinson's Disease). Have them act as responsible patients by investigating both the diagnosis and the prescribed treatment. Results presented in a two-page paper should cover: a description of the condition and its symptoms; its etiology; its prognosis; the effectiveness of the prescribed treatment, its side effects and contradictions, along with the evidence; and, finally, a comparison of the relative effectiveness of alternate treatments. This can also be accompanied by oral or visual presentations, slideshow, poster session, etc.
• Students follow a piece of legislation through Congress. This exercise is designed primarily to help them understand the process of government. However it could also be used in something like a 'critical issues' course to follow the politics of a particular issue. (What groups are lobbying for or against a piece of legislation? How does campaign financing affect the final decision? etc.).
• Similar to the above, have students follow a particular foreign policy situation as it develops. Who are the organizations involved? What is the history of the issue? What are the ideological conflicts?
• Nominate someone or a group for the Nobel Peace Prize. Learn about the prize, the jury, etc. Justify the nominations.
• Write an exam on one area; answer some or all of the questions (depending on professor's preference). Turn in an annotated bibliography of source material, and rationale for questions.

Career-Based Research

• Assemble background information on a company or organization in preparation for a hypothetical interview. For those continuing in academia, research prospective colleagues' and professors' backgrounds, publications, current research, etc.
• Ask each student to describe a career they envision themselves in and then research the career choice. What are the leading companies in that area? Why? (If they choose something generic like secretarial or sales, what is the best company in their county of residence to work for? Why?) Choose a company and find out what its employment policies are-flex time, family leave, stock options. If the company is traded publicly, what is its net worth? What is the outlook for this occupation? Expected starting salary? How do the outlook and salaries vary by geography?

Personal Research

• Locate primary sources from the date of your birth. You may use one type type of material only once, i.e., one newspaper headline of a major event, one quotation, one biography, one census figure, one top musical number, one campus event, etc. Use a minimum of six different sources. Write a short annotation of each source and include the complete bibliographic citation.

Historical Research (for any subject)

• Select a scholar/researcher in a field of study and explore that person's career and ideas. Besides locating biographical information, students prepare a bibliography of writings and analyze the reaction of the scholarly community to the researcher's work.
• Pick a topic and research it in literature from the 60s and 70s. Then research the same topic in the literature of the 80s and 90s. Compare and contrast the topic in a bibliographic essay.
• Write a biographical sketch of a famous person. Use biographical dictionaries, popular press and scholarly sources, and books to find information about the person.
• Everyone becomes an historical figure for a day. Students research the person, time-period, culture, etc. They give an oral presentation in class and answer questions.
• Similar to the above, students adopt a persona and write letters or journal entries that person might have written. The level of research required to complete the assignment can range from minimal to a depth appropriate for advanced classes.
• News conferences offer good opportunities to add depth to research and thus might work particularly well with advanced students. A verbatim transcript of an analytical description of a news conference can serve as a format for simulated interviews with well known people of any period. What questions would contemporaries have asked? What questions would we now, with hindsight, want to ask? How would contemporary answers have differed from those that might be given today? Here students have an opportunity to take a rigorous, analytical approach, both in terms of the questions to be asked and the information contained in the answers.

Biographical Research

(annotated) bibliography variations.

• Prepare an annotated bibliography of books, journal articles, and other sources on a topic. Include evaluative annotations.
• Create a Web page on a narrow topic relevant to the course. Include meta sites, e-journals, discussion lists, and organizations.
• Update an existing bibliography or review of the literature.
• Compile an anthology of readings by one person or on one topic. Include an introduction with biographical information about the authors, and the rationale for including the works [justify with reviews or critical materials].
• Choose a topic of interest and search it on the Internet. Cross reference all search engines and find all websites which discuss the topic. Like a research paper, students will have to narrow and broaden accordingly. The student will then produce an annotated bibliography on the topic, based solely on internet references.
• Create an anthology. The model for this format is the annotated book of readings with which most students are familiar. In this case, however, rather than being given the anthology, they are asked to compile it themselves. The assignment can limit the acceptable content to scholarly articles written within the last ten years, or it can be broadened to include chapters or excerpts from monographs and significant older materials. Students should be asked to write an introduction to the anthology that would display an overall understanding of the subject. In addition, each item should be described, and an explanation given as to why it is included. The assignment could also require a bibliography of items considered for inclusion as well as copies of the items selected. In any subject course in which students would benefit from finding and reading a variety of scholarly, such an assignment would guarantee that they use their library skills to locate the articles, their critical reading skills to make the selections, and a variety of writing skills to produce the introduction, the summaries, and the explanations.

Literature Review Variations

• Each student in the class is given responsibility for dealing with a part of the subject of the course. He or she is then asked to 1) find out what the major reference sources on the subject are; 2) find out "who's doing what where" in the field; 3) list three major unresolved questions about the subject; 4) prepare a 15 minute oral presentation to introduce this aspect of the subject to the class.
• Conduct the research for a paper except for writing the final draft. At various times students are required to turn in 1) their choice of topic; 2) an annotated bibliography; 3) an outline; 4) a thesis statement; 5) an introduction and a conclusion.
• Write a grant proposal addressed to a specific funding agency; include supporting literature review, budget, etc. Have class peer groups review. (Best proposal could be submitted for funding of summer research).

Collins Memorial Library.  “Ideas for Library-Related Assignments.”  Pugetsound.edu, University of Puget Sound. Accessed 1 Jan. 2021.

• << Previous: Teaching Resources
• Next: Videos & Tutorials >>
• Last Updated: Sep 11, 2024 10:20 AM
• URL: https://libguides.wlu.edu/infolit

Breadcrumbs Section. Click here to navigate to respective pages.

Teaching Academic Writing

DOI link for Teaching Academic Writing

Get Citation

Student academic writing is at the heart of teaching and learning in higher education. Students are assessed largely by what they write, and need to learn both general academic conventions as well as disciplinary writing requirements in order to be successful in higher education. Teaching Academic Writing is a 'toolkit' designed to help higher education lecturers and tutors teach writing to their students. Containing a range of diverse teaching strategies, the book offers both practical activities to help students develop their writing abilities and guidelines to help lecturers and tutors think in more depth about the assessment tasks they set and the feedback they give to students. The authors explore a wide variety of text types, from essays and reflective diaries to research projects and laboratory reports. The book draws on recent research in the fields of academic literacy, second language learning, and linguistics. It is grounded in recent developments such as the increasing diversity of the student body, the use of the Internet, electronic tuition, and issues related to distance learning in an era of increasing globalisation. Written by experienced teachers of writing, language, and linguistics, Teaching Academic Writing will be of interest to anyone involved in teaching academic writing in higher education.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter 1 | 18  pages, issues in academic writing in higher education m a ry jane cur ry and theresa m . lillis, chapter 2 | 26  pages, approaches to teaching writing m a ry jane cur ry and ann hewings, chapter 3 | 28  pages, writing for different disciplines c a ro line coffin and ann hewings, chapter 4 | 28  pages, planning the assessment of student writing sha ro n goodman and j oa n s wa n n, chapter 5 | 29  pages, giving feedback on student writing theresa m . lillis and j oa n s wa n n, chapter 6 | 28  pages, academic writing in an electronic environment c a ro line coffin and sha ro n goodman.

• Privacy Policy
• Terms & Conditions
• Cookie Policy
• Taylor & Francis Online
• Taylor & Francis Group
• Students/Researchers
• Librarians/Institutions

Connect with us

Registered in England & Wales No. 3099067 5 Howick Place | London | SW1P 1WG © 2024 Informa UK Limited

Open Educational Resources

• OER Overview
• Training Resources
• Finding, Using, and Creating OERs
• Providers [Updated]
• Pros and Cons
• Considerations for Using OERs
• Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in OER [Updated]
• UMGC OER Quality Guide
• UMGC OER Quality Guide Q&A
• Twelve Irrefutable OER Truths
• 31-Day OER Challenge
• 31-Day Creative Commons Challenge
• Open eBooks by Discipline

Guidelines for Designing Online Courses

Developing outcomes, outcome alignment, what are open educational resources (oers), oer research, pre-vetting oers, what is accessibility and why is it important, attribution.

• Creative Commons and Copyright
• Choosing a CC License
• Mixing Different CC Licensed Resources
• Writing Attributions

Are you involved in designing online courses for your educational institution? This resource includes best practices in applying learning design principles, searching for learning resources, identifying digital rights requirements, and ensuring accessibility compliance in the classroom.

Developing measurable learning outcomes is the first step of effective learning design. Through the process of backward design, a design team will first determine outcomes and then use the outcomes to determine everything else in a course: the assessments to generate, the activities to engage in, and the resources to provide. Finally, the learning outcomes are the basis to build the rubrics to accurately evaluate learning. 

Here are some additional details to highlight the essential components of backward design. 

Competency vs. Content 

Many of us come from an educational background where the retention of information was the most frequently assessed skill, if not the most valued. Memorizing course content was key; knowing the material was paramount. However, current assessment models lean more heavily on a wider range of skills, especially competencies that require critical thinking and problem-solving skills. 

You may think of this as a distinction between competency-oriented outcomes and content-based outcomes. 

Outcomes should focus on competencies rather than content. Developing competency-oriented outcomes also focuses on the learner, providing opportunities to actively demonstrate and apply the learning. 

Bloom's Taxonomy 

Bloom's taxonomy is a useful standard when crafting learning outcomes. Bloom's taxonomy hierarchically maps verbs according to the complexity of skill required by the action described. 

For example, some verbs such as "define" or "identify" rank as lower-order competencies, whereas verbs like "analyze" or "interpret" are considered higher-order competencies. 

Vanderbilt University Center for Teaching .is available under a  Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International  license. UMGC has modified this work and it is available under the original license. 

In practical terms, this means that outcomes should not become a list of course concepts. Ideally, we want outcomes that increase in complexity as the learner goes from learning about a concept to recognizing it at work in an example, to applying it in an original way, or even to creating something new using the principles of the concept. 

This progression of learning, moving from lower-order competencies to higher-order competencies, can be seen in this example: 

Define concept X  

Explain using concept X  

Analyze using concept X 

Evaluate using concept X 

Consider the following weekly outcomes. Note how the competencies increase in complexity. 

The outcomes start from low-level "define" (be able to know the concepts; the concepts were not named specifically) to higher-level "explain" (separate parts of a comic to label their relationship), "analyze" (to assess a visual art style along a hierarchical system), and "evaluate" (argue meaning of an artistic choice). 

Every week could use this same pattern applied to that week's topic, or it can spread out the complexity over several weeks. You could ask a learner to define a concept one week, explain or analyze it the next week, and evaluate it in the third week. This would support the concept of scaffolding and the student's progression toward meeting learning outcomes at the analysis, evaluation, and creation levels. 

Tips for Developing Better Outcomes 

When developing learning outcomes, remember to make sure they are specific, measurable, and achievable, as well as to use active verbs that clearly indicate expectations for student performance. Here are additional tips to consider. 

Evaluating Learning Outcomes 

Take a moment to review some examples of learning outcomes and consider how you would improve them. Remember to use Bloom's action verbs and to increase the level of complexity, whether your course is organized by week, project, or other layout. 

Quiz: Multiple Choice 

To assess your learning, complete the following quiz questions. 

Question 1 

Which best describes the rationale for applying the backward design approach when designing and developing online courses? 

The backward design approach focuses on student learning and clearly identifies what the student should know after completing a course. 

The backward design approach ensures the learning outcomes or competencies are the focus of learning, followed by the intentional alignment of all assessments, activities, and course materials to support the achievement of the competencies. 

The backward design approach is best applied to course design and serves as a blueprint for all the course content. 

Answer: Option 2. 

Question 2 

In Bloom's taxonomy, what levels are considered higher-order cognitive skills? 

understand, apply, and evaluate 

evaluate, create, and apply 

analyze, evaluate, and create 

Answer: Option 3. 

Question 3 

Which learning outcome measures the highest level of skill in Bloom's taxonomy? 

Identify the issue, question, or problem for a research paper. 

Develop a training needs analysis report to include performance gaps and an action plan to prioritize recommendations. 

Describe the three main principles of universal design for learning. 

Apply malware analysis techniques to reduce security risks and avoid malicious software attacks. 

Links to Resources 

Bloom's Taxonomy     

References 

Quality Matters (QM) Program. (n.d.). Specific review standards from the QM higher education rubric, sixth edition.  https://www.qualitymatters.org/sites/default/files/PDFs/  StandardsfromtheQMHigherEducationRubric.pdf 

Wiggins, G., & McTighe, J. (1998). What is backward design? Understanding by design, 7-19. 

Now that you have identified measurable learning outcomes, you can then begin working on developing how to assess student learning and identifying what resources and activities will prepare students for these assessments. 

When reviewing your course, there are two basic guidelines for outcome alignment: 

All activities and resources in a unit of instruction must align with at least one of the outcomes. 

All outcomes must align with at least one resource or activity and be measured by at least one assessment. 

These guidelines are based on instructional best practices to ensure all learning outcomes are supported with relevant materials and activities and are also assessed in the course.   

Alignment Process for Resources 

When you are working with an existing course, you will be identifying the current resources within the course and selecting which ones are needed in order to successfully complete the course goals and learning outcomes. Let's review some questions to help guide you on this process. 

Question 1: Do we need this resource? 

For each resource or piece of content (text/video/interactive component): 

If the content does not align with any of the weekly outcomes or is redundant, then it is best to remove it to support optimal learning. 

It is also important to avoid having content aligned to weekly outcomes from prior weeks. If the learner has already demonstrated a competency in Week 1, then there should be no reason for the learner to have to read more content related to that competency in Week 5. 

That being said, perhaps the content will be assessed on a higher level in a later week, in which case a revised version of the competency might reappear on a higher level later. Or perhaps the outcome in Week 1 itself needs to be moved to Week 5. 

Question 2: Do we need all of this resource? 

Furthermore, for each resource, you also want to: 

This is especially true for textbooks and long readings. If there are sections of chapters that you do not think are necessary, identify them for removal. It is essential to provide only relevant resources not only for student learning but also to streamline course development processes.  Keep in mind: Just because every resource aligns with an outcome, that does not mean that we have necessarily covered every outcome. This leads us to… 

Question 3: Do all outcomes have resources? 

Finally, for each weekly outcome: 

Keeping Track of Resources 

To assist in the alignment process, you may find it helpful to insert tables in your working document. The table will help you quickly survey resources and determine: 

if any materials are not in alignment 

if every weekly or project outcome is accounted for among the resources. 

To assess your learning, complete the following quiz questions. 

What is a recommended approach when a resource is relevant to the learning outcomes, but you determine it is too long for students to complete and potentially retain? 

Remove the resource and contact the research team to search for a new one. 

Select the sections that you identify as essential to include and work with the learning designers to process the request. 

Retain the resource and explain to students’ which sections they should focus on but also encourage them to complete all sections. 

To support students' understanding of the importance of learning outcomes, which approach best aligns with the course organizational guidelines? 

Include guidance to students on how the learning outcomes are aligned to the assignments, activities and resources, as well as your teaching approach. 

Provide guidance in key locations including the course introduction, weekly overviews, and descriptions of each activity and resource. 

Explain how the outcomes, assignments, and content are connected in the course narrative and discussions. 

All of the above. 

Answer: Option 4. 

When learning outcomes are misaligned, how might this affect students? 

Students may be spending time on learning resources that are not relevant to the assignments. 

Students may lose confidence in their ability to manage and demonstrate their learning effectively. 

Students may focus more on how to obtain a high grade on assignments rather than focusing on what they need to learn and confidently apply in new situations. 

Biggs, J. (2014). Constructive alignment in university teaching. HERDSA Review of higher education, 1(5), 5-22 

Open educational resources (OERs) are free digitized materials offered to educators, students, and self-learners under a Creative Commons (or other "open") license that allows users to copy, use, adapt, and redistribute for educational and research purposes. Works that are in the public domain also fall into the category of OERs and are free to use by the public. 

The following video provides an overview of what OERs are and how they are different from textbooks and other closed resources. The  video  highlights how educators can use OERs in their classrooms and describes the impacts on students. Take a moment to view and listen. 

An Introduction to Open Educational Resources  by Abbey Elder from YouTube is available under a  Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International  license. UMGC has modified this work and it is available under the original license. 

The 5Rs of OERs 

To encourage educators to embrace the openness of OERs, a framework known as the 5Rs that was popularized by David Wiley of Lumen Learning defines the rights of open content and provides guidance on how to use these resources. These rights are maintained by open licensing organizations such as Creative Commons, and they enable creators to publicly claim how their work can be used. 

Brief History of OERs 

When OERs were introduced to the education world in 2002, skeptics questioned whether an open resource model would work. Faculty, college administrators, and others were concerned whether OERs could match the quality and authority of textbooks and supplemental materials published by the established textbook providers. 

In the following years, as more organizations and institutions started open publishing programs, and Creative Commons began its licensing platform to certify and kick-start the open licensed model, some educators still questioned whether OERs could live up to their promise as free or low-cost replacements for traditional textbooks. 

Today, the evidence is mounting that OERs can have a positive impact on the educational system, from K-12 through postgraduate programs. These impacts are both financial and performative. 

Why Use OERs? 

Initially, many educators, academic leaders, students, policy makers, and others advocated for the use of OERs in higher education because of the cost savings for students and families that open resources offered. The expense of traditional textbooks and supplementary materials continued to rise throughout the 1990s and 2000s, costing students on average $1,240 per school year, according to The College Board (2019). 

Research showed that many students took fewer classes in order to afford their textbooks or did not purchase some textbooks at all, hoping to keep up by borrowing other students' materials or purchasing used editions. In a survey of 21,000 students in 2018, 64.2 percent of responders indicated that they did not purchase a required textbook for a class due to price, and another 42.8 percent said that they took fewer classes due to the high cost of textbooks and other learning materials (Florida Virtual Campus, 2018). 

Many faculty and college administrators began to view the textbook dilemma as an accessibility issue, in which low-income and underserved students were increasingly at a disadvantage with their better-off peers, who could afford the textbooks more easily. OERs were seen as an effective way to ensure that all students, regardless of economic status, had the resources they needed.  

Benefits of OERs Beyond Cost Savings 

As OERs became increasingly available during the 2000s and have continued to expand worldwide, higher education institutions began to adopt OERs into their courses--even offering "zero textbook" classes. With the growth in OERs, educators realized that the benefits went beyond saving money for students. 

Educators began adapting OERs for their purposes, creating original course content that involved and engaged students in ways that textbook reading and practice did not. In the process, teachers began to assess the materials and learning outcomes of their courses in a more deliberate manner because they now had the freedom to adapt, modify, and correlate those resources in a more targeted way. 

The following reflect some of the reasons for transitioning to OERs: 

To encourage faculty members to use and develop course materials that can be tailored and thus better aligned with the learning outcomes of their classes 

To guarantee that course materials are as relevant and up-to-date as possible, especially for programs where changes in technology, methods, and tools are more rapid than what traditional textbooks can address 

To seek out and use materials that engage students in a multidimensional way 

To embed learning resources in courses that offer diverse perspectives 

To provide course materials and instruction that each student requires to achieve the competencies to succeed  

To ensure that students, regardless of income status, have access to the course materials necessary for success 

To make the cost of education more affordable 

Review and Reflect 

To reinforce your learning, take a moment to answer the following questions. 

What are the key characteristics of OERs? 

Answer: OERs are educational materials that are openly licensed to enable users to retain, reuse, revise, remix, and redistribute. 

What is one of the ways you can identify whether educational materials are OERs? 

Answer: OERs include an open license, such as a Creative Commons license, that permits their use with no or limited restrictions. 

College Board. (2019). Average estimated undergraduate budgets, 2018-19. https://trends.collegeboard.org/college-pricing/figures-tables/average-estimated-undergraduate- budgets-2018-19 

Florida Virtual Campus, Office of Distance Learning & Student Services. (2018, December 20). 2018 student textbook and course materials survey. https://dlss.flvc.org/documents/210036/1314923/2018+Student+Textbook+and+Course+Materials+Survey+-+Executive+Summary.pdf/3c0970b0-ea4b-9407-7119-0477f7290a8b 

Griffiths, R., Gardner, S., Lundh, P., Shear, L., Ball, A., Mislevy, J., Wang, S., … Staisloff, R. (2018). Participant experiences and financial impacts: Findings from year 2 of Achieving the Dream's OER degree initiative. Menlo Park, CA: SRI International. 

How to Search for OERs 

There are recommended sources and practical steps to follow when searching for OERs. The resources must be "openly licensed" and free of any copyright restrictions in order to include in your courses. 

Using Google Advanced Search 

Your search strategies can vary depending on the subject matter and the specificity of the desired material. As a general rule, results may decrease as your searches become more specialized. One of the ways to refine your searches for openly licensed resources is to use  Google Advanced Search . 

Recommended OER Repositories 

Since Google may not find everything you need, here are some recommended sites to explore different types of OERs. 

To search and retrieve content from the leading OER repositories, you can use keyword searching; however, it is recommended to use the site's browse feature. The resources in these repositories may not have tagged the assets by your specific keyword search, but the collection will most likely be organized by subject. 

Best Practices for Pre-Vetting OERs 

After completing your initial research, you may have a number of OERs that are relevant to your course and align with the learning outcomes. The next step is to pre-vet these resources to make sure that they meet your institution’s requirements with respect to open licensing, ADA compliance, and OER quality objectives. 

This section is designed to provide you with practical steps to follow when executing this pre-vetting process. While there are additional accessibility compliance requirements, the focus here is on reviewing your OERs to ensure the following: 

The OERs are openly licensed (i.e., are published under a Creative Commons license) or are in the public domain. 

All of the third-party content in the resource is openly licensed. 

Let's look at these factors one at a time. 

Are Your OERs Available Under a Creative Commons (CC) License? 

There are six types of CC licenses that are important to know when identifying usable OERs, and all the licenses require attribution. Most OERs clearly display the CC license symbol or license text (with a link to the specific license deed) on the first page of the resource. However, it is not unusual to have to search for the license in the document or web page if the license is not prominently displayed. 

Before reviewing some examples of how to find the CC license within a resource, take a moment to review the six types of CC licenses. The order of the licenses starts with the most open, progressing to less open and the last two with ND (no derivatives) considered as not open. 

Types of CC licenses 

  You can view this video clip for a summary of the range of Creative Commons licensing from most open to most restrictive. 

Creative Commons Kiwi  by Creative Commons Aotearoa New Zealand is available under a  Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 New Zealand license . UMGC has modified this work and it is available under the original license. 

Policy on No Derivatives 

The "ND" (or no derivatives) restriction in a CC license simply means that the resource must be used "as is" with no modifications and must be redistributed in its entirety, as originally published. 

This restriction may not be viable for some since modifications may be needed to the OER to fully comply with ADA accessibility requirements. Also, you will need to remove third-party content that is not openly licensed. These types of changes are not permitted with OERs published under an ND CC license. 

What About Public Domain Resources? 

Typically, public domain, or PD, resources are materials published by the US government and/or one of its departments or agencies (such as the US Department of Justice or the Environmental Protection Agency). Other PD resources include works that were once under copyright but whose copyright protection has lapsed and are now in the public domain. 

An example of a public domain resource is a report from the Department of Education,  Reimagining the Role of Technology in Higher Education . You can find the licensing and permissions information on page 3 of the report. 

OERs and Third-Party Content 

Perhaps one of the trickiest issues when vetting OERs deals with third-party content included in a resource that has a viable CC license. Many OERs include third-party content--images, videos, tables, and other graphic elements--that is copyrighted/closed and used with the permission of the rights holder. 

When you are pre-vetting an OER for DR compliance, you will need to evaluate the resource carefully to identify if any content such as an image includes a copyright symbol or notice, or the words "used with permission" or "courtesy of." Some may include a date and name of the copyright owner. Any materials that are copyrighted with all rights reserved cannot be shared without the copyright holder's permission. 

Pre-Vetting to Full DR Review 

At this stage, you are pre-vetting the OERs to make sure that they meet the baseline criteria discussed above. You can then perform a more extensive vetting of the resources to ensure that each one is licensed under Creative Commons, that all closed/copyrighted third-party content has been removed from the resource, and that each OER fully complies with ADA accessibility standards. 

If you created educational content and wanted to publish it under an open license, which CC license would you choose that requires that the work is attributed to you but would not have any other restrictions? 

CC BY 

CC BY-NC 

CC BY-NC-SA 

CC BY-SA 

Answer: Option 1: CC BY: A license to use the content without any restrictions. As with all CC licenses, attribution is required. 

Select the best explanation of an open license that you might share with your colleagues and students. 

Open licenses enable creators to share their work freely with others who may then reuse, revise, improve upon, or create new work based on the original work. Creative Commons (CC) licenses are the legal tools that make the 5Rs possible. 

Open licenses are the same as public domain, allowing free access to the materials and do not require attribution. 

Open licenses are reserved for educational materials that can be shared and used for teaching and learning purposes only. 

Answer: Option 1. Open licenses enable creators to share their work freely with others who may then reuse, revise, improve upon, or create new work based on the original work. Creative Commons (CC) licenses are the legal tools that make the 5Rs possible. 

US Department of Education, Office of Educational Technology. (2017). Reimagining the role of technology in higher education: A supplement to the National Education Technology Plan. 

In an educational setting, ensuring accessibility means removing barriers from physical spaces and instructional materials to enable all students equal access, including individuals with hearing and vision impairments, as well as physical and cognitive disabilities. When you explore these accessibility requirements in more detail, there are two definitions to keep in mind. 

With advances in technology and the global reliance on the internet, the concept of accessibility has expanded to include digital content, which requires specific technology-based solutions to address what is known as digital accessibility. 

Individuals with disabilities may use assistive technologies such as screen readers and modified keyboards to help them access and navigate digital content. Some examples of digital accessibility features and tools include: 

videos with captions and transcripts for users with hearing impairments 

images with alternative text (alt text) for users with visual impairments 

screen readers to convert on-screen information into speech for users with visual impairments 

keyboard navigation on websites for users with physical impairments 

Accessibility Laws and Standards 

As higher education increasingly expands its digital content and tools for students and faculty, it is critical to adhere to federal and state laws and industry standards to ensure all learners can benefit from these opportunities. Digital accessibility also enhances the overall user experience and contributes to a universal design that benefits all students and staff members. 

The primary laws and standards that apply to digital accessibility, and are especially important for educational institutions, include the following: 

Why Is Accessibility Important? 

There are many reasons why accessibility is important to all individuals, not only to protect their civil rights but also to enhance their quality of life. Designing for accessibility using universal design principles benefits all students regardless of their ability. For example, providing closed captions for videos support students who are deaf or hard-of-hearing, and also supports diverse learning styles and nonnative language speakers. Here is a  video  on accessibility. 

Portland Community College/UMGC  is available under a  Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported  license. UMGC has modified this work and it is available under the original license. 

Accessibility in Higher Education 

In this section, we will focus on accessibility in the higher education sector and highlight essential aspects of an institution’s mission and overall approach to supporting student success. 

With the rapid pace of technology advancements and the expanding global economy, the number of students seeking higher education, including students with disabilities, has increased in recent years. To serve this diverse student population, higher education institutions must provide inclusive learning environments with comprehensive accessibility policies and procedures, as well as the technology infrastructure to continually enhance their digital accessibility. 

Accessibility for all students is supported in the following ways: 

Inclusive education: As an inclusive education provider, it is important to provide all content in a format that is accessible for everyone who attends, works in, or is interested in getting information about their institution. 

Mission and core values: Ensuring accessibility is an integral part of an educational institution’s mission as well as its teaching and learning philosophy. 

Equitable learning community: Accessibility ensures that everyone is treated fairly and creates an environment suitable for learning. It also enriches the student population, providing different backgrounds, perspectives, and talents. 

Legal requirements: Accessibility is the law. Public colleges and universities that fail to resolve issues of equal access face penalties and fines, as well as loss of federal funding and accreditation. 

To reinforce your learning, answer the following reflective questions. 

The terms "accessibility" and "digital accessibility" address different aspects of describing equitable access to educational opportunities. How would you describe these terms and highlight the differences? 

Answer: The concept of accessibility has its roots in the earliest efforts to protect individuals' civil rights by providing accommodations for physical accessibility to public places. To address evolving technology advancement, digital accessibility focuses on the standards to ensure equitable access to web-based content. 

While the increase in online learning in higher education has expanded opportunities for diverse learners, it also brings challenges to ensuring the digital content is accessible by all learners. To address accessibility, two US laws were passed that prohibit discrimination of individuals with disabilities and govern how universities provide their educational programs. 

Identify the two specific laws and reflect on how they are different, especially with regards to digital accessibility. 

Answer: The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is broader in scope, protecting an individual's civil rights in all areas of public life, while Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act is more specific to technology accessibility to ensure it can be used effectively by those with disabilities. 

Center on Technology and Disability. (2016, October). Digital accessibility toolkit: What education leaders need to know.  http://www.ctdinstitute.org/sites/default/files/file_attachments/  AccessibilityToolkit-508_FINAL_100616.pdf 

National Science Foundation, National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics, National Survey of College Graduates, 2017. 

US Department of Education, Office of Civil Rights. (n.d.). Resolution agreement: CR Compliance Review No. 11-11-6002. https://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/docs/ investigations/11116002-b.html 

US Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics. (2016). Postsecondary education. In Digest of Education Statistics, 2015 (2016-014). https://nces.ed.gov/ programs/digest/d15/ch_3.asp 

Web Accessibility Initiative. (2016, May). Accessibility, usability, and inclusion: Related aspects of a web for all.  https://www.w3.org/WAI/intro/usable  

• OER Toolkit PDF version of the guide

This work is licensed under a  Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International  license. © 2020, UM GC .  

• << Previous: Open eBooks by Discipline
• Next: Creative Commons >>
• Last Updated: Aug 30, 2024 3:36 PM
• URL: https://libguides.umgc.edu/oer

• Schools & departments

Introducing reflection as an assignment

Using reflective assignments can be a great way of synthesising learning and challenging the status quo. This page outlines some of the things to keep in mind when posing reflective assignments.

In higher education or professional develop initiatives it is very common to have some sort of assignment. These are typically written but can also take other forms. This page will go through the main considerations for posing reflective assignments.

The main points covered are:

• finding and communicating the purpose of your assignment
• being clear both to yourself and to reflector what you want in the assignment
• the difference between ‘reflection’ and ‘evidence of reflection’
• choosing your criteria
• providing students support and spending time practicing can be valuable as most students are new to reflection.

Back to alignment – find the purpose of the assignment and communicate it

It should be clear to participants or students what the purpose of the assignment is. Why are you asking them to do this particular assignment? You will have had to think about the value of it.

This value can be described in the guidelines of the reflective assignment where you communicate how it will help reflectors either evidence their learning or obtain learning outcomes. From the guidelines it should be clear to students what the value of completing and doing well on the assignment is.

Be clear what you are asking

When posing a reflective assignment it is very important that you know from the beginning exactly what you are asking. Reflective writing/responses can typically take on two distinct forms:

• reflection,
• evidence of reflection.

The distinction between the two is vital when deciding the type of assignment you want to pose. These are outlined below.

Reflection - the actual process of examining thoughts

If you want to see the detailed aspects of reflectors’ thought processes, and want to follow each step in their reasoning, concerns, and learnings, ask the reflectors to submit their actual reflections.

The benefits is that you ensure that reflectors go through the process themselves and you can directly assess the quality. As this is the actual process we want the reflectors to complete, asking for raw reflections is the easiest way to ensure or get evidence that the process is happening.

One challenge when posing this kind of assignment is that some people might find it too personal to share this intimate process – it can become self-disclosure. A personal reflective account can be uncomfortable to show to anyone, and even more so to someone who is in a position of authority.

Evidence of reflection

In contrast, ‘evidence of reflection’ is documenting the effects of reflection, but does not require documenting the process explicitly.

Hence, rather than writing the thoughts and feelings of a situation, the reflector will state the context and what learning they found in the experience. In the purest form, there is no need to document any challenging or self-disclosing feelings. It is more akin to describing the effects of a reflection and rationally, in contrast to emotionally, explaining why the learning is valuable.

The benefit of this is that reflectors are less likely to feel that they are self-disclosing. However, when we are looking at evidence of reflection rather than reflection itself, it is more difficult to assess the reflectors ability to actually reflect. Therefore, good evidence of reflection is when learning is explicitly stated and it is highlighted how the learning will be used in the future.

It is important to be aware that there is a risk, albeit minimal, that a reflector can produce good evidence of reflection, without having done any reflection. For example, a reflector may write that they learned to start assignments earlier and will do so in the future, without actually having engaged with reflection at all – they might just guess that ‘starting assignments earlier’ is a possible conclusion you want to see.

Most assignments are a balance of ‘reflection’ and ‘evidence of reflection’

In reality, very few assignments will be a either pure ‘reflection’ or ‘evidence of reflection’. The goal for you is to find the right balance. Once you know what you want, you should be clear to reflectors about what being successful in the assignment looks like.

The easiest way to demonstrate what good looks like is to provide the reflectors with clear guidelines and examples of the type of reflections you are looking for. You can either write examples yourself or have a look through the Reflectors’ Toolkit, where each of the models have at least one example. You will likely find an example there that can be helpful for you.

List of tools for reflection (in Reflectors’ Toolkit) (LINK)

Reflection is just like any other assignment – avoid vagueness

The need for clear assignment directions is essential in all areas of higher education, however having the discussion specifically for reflection is important. This is because when posing a reflective assignment it can feel easy to consider reflection as ‘special’ and separate from common ‘good academic practice’ and therefore that it does not require the same levels of direction as a general assignment. Reflection should be considered on equal terms with general academic practice and will often require more support as many reflectors are new to the concept.

One reason vague reflection assignments are easy to pose is that they do not seem to restrict the reflectors’ freedom about how to reflect. In contrast, if we provide them with clear requirements and directions it might seem that we do restrict reflection. There is an element of truth in that. If we require as written assignment using a specific model of reflection, we do take some freedom away from the reflectors, at least in how they present their reflections to us. In practice, they can easily produce a private reflection and restructure it according to your question and requirements.

If we do not give the reflectors the structure they need, one challenge is that a high proportion of them might produce reflections not meeting our ideas of sufficient or good.

Posing a reflective assignment saying ‘Reflect on your development and learning in the course in 1000 words’ might seem like a fair question to ask. But compare that to asking them to ‘write an academic essay about the concepts you learned in this course in 1000 words’ and it should be clear why guidelines are important. It is easy to imagine how students would struggle to prioritise and produce an essay with relevant content from the vague essay prompt. This is similar for a vaguely posed reflective assignment without accompanying clear guidelines. How are the reflectors going to guess what we expect from them?

Most people are new to structured reflection

In higher education, most people have an idea of what an essay is supposed to look like because we are taught essay writing from an early age in school. In contrast, most people have never done structured reflection before university, and then are not likely to be thoroughly instructed in how to do or present it. It follows that if we are vague in our instructions we may receive assignments of very varying qualities.

Thus, to be fair to the reflectors and to us as facilitators, be clear and have clear guidelines available. You can ask very broad reflective questions, but you should be ready to support the reflectors and both your criteria and rubrics (if you chose to assess) should be extremely robust.

Providing training/introductions to students is useful

As most people are new to reflection starting in university, when you introduce reflection it can helpful to: provide a thorough written guide of what reflection is, provide people with resources (for example the Reflectors’ Toolkit), and/or spend time in person introducing reflectors to structured reflection and what you expect from reflections.

Find your criteria and your rubric

Once you have a clear assignment, it is important you think about what you want to measure it against, i.e. the criteria. This discussion is also highlighted in the ‘Assessing reflection’ section of the Facilitators’ Toolkit with specific criteria as suggestions.

Moreover, if you decide to use summative assessment for the assignments, you will need to have a clear rubric (criteria broken down into levels of performance). It is good practice to publish both the criteria and rubric to the reflectors prior to assessing them.

To see at what point criteria and rubrics become essential, see ‘Should I assess?’

Assessing reflection (within the Facilitators’ Toolkit)

Should I assess? (within the Facilitators’ Toolkit)

Back to 'How do I introduce reflection?'

• Skip to primary navigation
• Skip to main content
• Skip to footer

Teaching in Higher Ed

How to Create a Digital Teaching Toolkit

With jeremy caplan.

| June 17, 2021 | X Facebook LinkedIn Email

Play in new window | Download | Transcript

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | RSS | How do I listen to a podcast?

Jeremy Caplan on episode 366 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast.

Quotes from the episode

Sometimes the tool isn’t the most important thing. -Jeremy Caplan

The really important thing is that we are engaging people. -Jeremy Caplan

Sometimes an investment in trying a new tool can open up some advantages. -Jeremy Caplan

Resources Mentioned

• Jeremy Caplan's Wonder Tools newsletter
• Pitch | Collaborative presentation software for modern teams
• Presentation Maker | From Basic to Beautiful in Minutes with Beautiful.ai
• Projector — Create to captivate
• Slido – Audience Interaction Made Easy
• Recommended Zoom Settings – YouTube
• Photos – Google Photos
• Send to Dropbox | Email + Dropbox
• Conversations in the cloud
• SpeakPipe – receive voice messages from your audience directly on your website.
• Flipgrid | Empower Every Voice
• Google Jamboard
• Padlet: You are beautiful
• An Online Visual Collaboration Platform for Teamwork | Miro
• FigJam is an online whiteboard for teams to explore ideas together
• The Digital Gallery Walk: Collaboration on their feet – Ditch That Textbook
• Amuse-bouche

ARE YOU ENJOYING THE SHOW?

On this episode.

Jeremy Caplan

I'm Director of Teaching and Learning at CUNY's Newmark Graduate School of Journalism in New York City. I teach classes, workshops and now webinars on entrepreneurial and digital journalism. I love learning new ways to learn, teach, or create new things. And I love finding new ways to help teachers and journalists. Wonder is what drives me. I share what I love by teaching and writing. I grew up in Boston with a violin in one hand and a catcher's mitt on the other. I was an admirer of both Heifetz and the Chicago Cubs. During my time at Princeton I served during the winter as concertmaster for the International Symphony Orchestra in Jerusalem. I moved to New York to work for The Paris Review, Yahoo! Internet Life, and then Newsweek. After writing for Time for Kids I worked at Time Magazine where I contributed articles about Google, Apple and Yahoo. In addition to tech and business topics, I wrote about trends ranging from carrotmobs and cereal cafes to mini-lit and life-hacking. Here are more of my Time Magazine stories. I was a Ford Fellow in Entrepreneurial Journalism at the Poynter Institute, a Wiegers Fellow at Columbia Business School, where I completed my MBA, and a Knight-Bagehot Fellow at the Columbia Journalism School, where I earned an M.S. in Journalism. I live in New York City with my wife and two daughters.

• Bonni Stachowiak

Bonni Stachowiak is the producer and host of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast, which has been airing weekly since June of 2014. Bonni is the Dean of Teaching and Learning at Vanguard University of Southern California. She’s also a full Professor of Business and Management. She’s been teaching in-person, blended, and online courses throughout her entire career in higher education. Bonni and her husband, Dave, are parents to two curious kids, who regularly shape their perspectives on teaching and learning.

RECOMMENDATIONS

Journalism through Learning Design Starter Toolkit

The Iliad (Graphic Novel)

Jerry Craft Graphic Novels

Smile: Raina Telgemeier (Graphic Novel)*

Park Bench (Graphic Novel)*

Alone (Graphic Novel)

GET CONNECTED

Join over 4,000 educators.

Receive a free Educational Technology Essentials Guide and weekly update.

Related Episodes

with Mike Truong

with Autumm Caines

with James Lang

with Chris Gilliard

  .

[00:00:00] Bonni Stachowiak: Today on episode number 366 of the Teaching in Higher Ed Podcast, Jeremy Caplan tells us how to create a digital teaching toolkit.

[00:00:14] Production Credit: Produced by Innovate Learning, maximizing human potential.

[00:00:22] Bonni: Welcome to this episode of Teaching in Higher Ed . I’m Bonni Stachowiak, and this is the space where we explore the art and science of being more effective at facilitating learning. We also share ways to improve our productivity approaches, so we can have more peace in our lives and be even more present for our students.

I’m so excited to have today’s guest joining me, his name is Jeremy Caplan. He’s the Director of Teaching and Learning at CUNY’s Newmark Journalism School. He’s a reader, learner, and questioner, journalist and educator, teacher and writer, dad of two girls, violinist, and chamber music lover. He teaches graduate courses, leads workshops, and helps journalists develop new ventures. Jeremy, today’s guest, was introduced to me through Geoff Decker at ACUE, the Association of College and University Educators.

They were part of knowing each other through an educational experience as you’ll hear about. I wanted to share my gratitude with ACUE for sending me guests and for our partnership for all these years. ACUE’s courses and community site feature many of teaching and learning staff experts, faculty developers, and practitioners to show evidence-based teaching practices. For all these years, ACUE has connected me with great guests for the show. I’m thankful for the introduction to today’s guest.

Jeremy, welcome to Teaching in Higher Ed .

[00:02:03] Jeremy Caplan: Hello. Great to be here.

[00:02:05] Bonni: I’m glad that we get this opportunity to have a second conversation today or actually, this might even be a third. The first time you’re coming on the show and I’m excited for us to get an opportunity to learn from you today. You’re going to be sharing with us how to craft a custom toolkit that has different kinds of digital teaching tools.

Before you do that, would you talk about four ways that you group these tools together in terms of thinking about the affordances of them and how we might go about using types of digital teaching tools?

[00:02:39] Jeremy: Sure, absolutely. We often want to show things to our students and that it might be slides, it might be information, so show is the first part. We definitely want to ask things of our students. We want to engage with them and interact with them, learn from them. Asking is the second key part of the toolkit. Gathering is another key element, not just asking questions but gathering actual materials with students. Then finally, co-creating. We want to co-create as a collective group new information, new ideas, new projects.

Those are the four key elements; showing, asking, gathering, and co-creating.

[00:03:18] Bonni: For each of these categories, we’re going to talk a little bit about what they’re good at doing for us and maybe some either limitations of the tools or approach or just limitations that you find many of us have as we’re attempting to make use of them and really be able to leverage those. When we talk about show when we think about using digital tools for presenting, what do you think of as some of the affordances of the tools in this space?

[00:03:47] Jeremy: Well, one nice thing is that we can convey things in multiple ways. Students are hearing us either live in person or over a Zoom session. They’re also potentially seeing our facial expressions. When we use slides, we can add other elements. We can add GIFs. We can add visuals. We can add large text. We can add charts or graphics.

For different kinds of learners or to highlight different aspects of what we’re teaching, it’s really great to be able to show things visually in a way that connects with the teaching message and the learning outcomes for that session.

[00:04:21] Bonni: When you think about the challenges that many of us have when we attempt to use tools that fall under the show category we’re trying to present in this visual way that you described, what are a couple of the challenges that we tend to run into?

[00:04:37] Jeremy: We’ve all probably been, at some point in our careers, in some PowerPoint training session where there’s tons of bullet points, things are hard to see or just lots of text on the screen that’s complicated and confusing or unrelated to the core message and we want to avoid that. We want to present students with clear, simple information, ideas, concepts, frameworks, and visuals. We want to find tools that allow us to do that simply and to not have to devote many, many hours to preparation on that just on the visual side because, as teachers, we have so much other work to be doing.

We want to make use of tools that are both easy to use for us and also render really, really nicely and enjoyably for our learners.

[00:05:27] Bonni: What has been your experience with regard to either perceived or real need to have my notes with me? I find there’s just this constant rustle between, “Wait, I need a lot of stuff on my slides. I need those bullet points. If I don’t have those bullet points, I might forget something,” or “If I don’t have those, I’m going to lose my place or I won’t remember things.” What’s been your experience with that? Do you categorize that as a real need? Then, therefore, how do you resolve it or do you categorize that as a perceived need?

I realize any time you give someone dichotomous choices, there’s probably 40 other options that you might think about in terms of this whole domain.

[00:06:08] Jeremy: I think there are packers and then there are spacers. The packers like to pack a lot into slides and spacers like to put one core message and a big visual. I think people have different personality styles and different meanings, and different needs. By the way, I think that approach also applies to how we structure our lessons, our lesson plans. Some people pack in a hundred different points in a lesson and try to move really quickly through a lot of stuff to be exciting and inspiring.

Other people will space things out and there just three core messages for today. Both of those have value at different times and both of them are inclinations that different teachers have. I think it’s important to identify what works for you, what’s your gem, what flows for you as a teacher and then to secondarily make sure that that’s in accordance with what will resonates with students. In general, I think the spacing approach for visuals on a slide tends to be a little bit more manageable for students because it doesn’t ask them to read a lot on the screen at the same time.

It allows you to focus on one point at a time which is one of the nice things about slides is it allows you to move sequentially through ideas or concepts or information and to take as much time as you need to on a given point. I tend to prefer not to use the slide as my own notes or to remind me because I want it to be really the visual that comes across the students that we’re all focusing on. Then I can use other supporting elements to help me remember whether it’s a post-it or a note by my desk or whether it’s slide notes that’s within the tool that I’m using.

[00:07:49] Bonni: What I’m hearing so much from what you said is just thinking about the purpose of it. The purpose of this category of tools is to show things to learners, not to yourself. [laughs] If what you need to do is show something to yourself, there’s other ways like you mentioned, the note space that’s in all of the presentation tools I’m familiar with or having something even printed out. I’ll often print out a slide deck with nine slides on a page. Then that way, if anything were to happen technologically, I have a backup plan.

Then I also find them better with transitions. I see that next slide that’s coming which, again, many of the presentation tools will provide that for you in some type of a presenter view. I find I’m better if I’m moving around the room, I’m not locked to my laptop and then I can be looking at where’s my next transition. Sometimes I’ll even build in blank slides that, for me, are my little reminder of, “Okay, this is your transition,” and just mixing things up that way can be really helpful. All right. What is a show tool that you want to share with us that we might consider building into our toolbox?

[00:08:57] Jeremy: Sure. The first one I’ll mention and I read about this on my Wonder Tools newsletter, it’s called pitch.com. For now, it’s completely free for anyone to use including teachers. It just makes slides look beautiful. If you’re familiar with Google Slides, it’s web-based in the same way. Unlike Google Slides which has a more PowerPoint-like interface and a little bit more traditional bullet points-style design, pitch.com is made to really be elegant, enjoyable to look at, easy to work with from the editing perspective, and flexible.

You can use it to put a couple of images on the screen at a time, to put a couple of bullet points if you really want to. Whatever you put, the templates that pitch.com provides you with makes sure that it’s going to look really professional, really clean, really polished, really engaging for students. It allows you to collaborate with colleagues if you enjoy doing that. It allows you to present in a variety of different ways if you’re presenting online or in person. It works well for all of those teaching scenarios. I really am enjoying that as a pretty new presentation tool.

I have some others that are good for other circumstances. If you are somebody who teaches Science or Math or other technical subjects engineering, and you use a lot of numbers or graphics or charts in your presentations, there’s a wonderful tool called beautiful.ai. It has an amazing array of templates that are pre-made that are really elegant for any kind of data, any kind of visual, any kind of chart or graphic that you might use. You can simply select one and replace the data, update it with your appropriate information.

One thing that’s really amazing and unique about that tool is, it’ll adapt to the number or size of information you have, so if you have two bullet points, the webpage will essentially reflow to show those elegantly. If you have on one particular slide, a couple more points to make, it’ll resize the font, It’ll reflow the text in a way that naturally just works. A lot of people, when they end up editing slides, they end up spending a lot of time moving things around, changing font size. That’s actually where a lot of the time gets spent on creating presentations, for some people it’s on those minutiae.

Beautiful.ai takes that work out of your time spent and makes it a lot more efficient. One other one I’ll mention, which is also free at the moment it’s called Projector. This is also a new one this past year, and it’s a little bit hipper and cooler. If you’re someone who likes that hip, avant-garde style, or fresh graphics, and you like to embed a lot of GIFs or even videos into your slides, images, stickers, Projector is a easy way to do that. You don’t have to hunt around the web for your images and videos and GIFs. It’s all included in the Projector interface.

You can just drag and drop things into your slides. Again, like pitch.com, it has beautiful templates. You don’t have to redesign something from scratch. You basically just pick a template that resonates with you, replace the text, add a couple of images, and you’re good to go. Students really respond to the strong visuals, I find. It feels fresh, it’s easy to create it’s fast and it makes a strong impression when you’re teaching, which allows you to focus on the core message, which is what you’re trying to focus on the teaching and learning topics.

[00:12:21] Bonni: When we talked about show, we talked about presenting, we talked about some of the things it lets us do and also some of the hindrances. One hindrances we didn’t mention is that that’s often where some of us stop. We’ve got three more categories of tools to look at that can really help make learning a lot more engaging. What can you tell us about ask?

[00:12:42] Jeremy: Well, one of the most important things that teachers can do in my view is to start with the bang, start with engagement. We don’t want to start just by talking at students for a lengthy period of time, because that’s easiest way to get them disengaged as many of us know. We want to ask something and we to ask quickly, easily, and rate from the start of a session in many cases, and often at the end of the session, as well as we’re concluding and synthesizing.

Sometimes we also want to use ask as a quick intermediary step in the middle of a lesson to re-engage people, and also to see where people are at in terms of how they’re feeling about a topic, what their opinion is, what their view, what their experiences, what their personal experiences, how it connects to their lives, all of these kinds of things. We can ask them to draw out students and really re-engage them. Engage them and then re-engage them because we want to continually cultivate their attention as James Lang talks about, we want to re-cultivate their attention throughout.

We can use tools like Slido, which is one I love. It’s a simple polling tool, and you can use this in a live teaching situation in person or in a remote situation in place of the typical Zoom polls, which are only multiple choice. What Slido allows you to do is create a word cloud poll, for example. I often will ask students, “How are you feeling today? What’s one word that describes how you’re feeling at the moment.” That’s a nice way to give them a chance to check in with themselves and to check in with each other.

We get a quick word cloud that shows that, hey, a lot of people are feeling some anxiety today, or a lot of people are feeling excited about this new topic, or a lot of people are curious. That’s a nice starter, I find. Other times we’ll ask an open text question. What’s your experience with this topic that we’re talking about? What’s the biggest question that’s on your mind? What are you curious about today, or what’s one thing you hope to learn? Any kind of open-ended question works well with Slido.

One of the advantages of these kinds of tools, as opposed to using just the Zoom chat or whatever built-in chat that some people may use, is that this can be anonymous. Students may not feel comfortable saying out loud that they have a certain feeling or that they have a certain opinion, but with these polling tools, you can allow them that freedom of anonymity. You can still moderate, if you’re concerned about inappropriate things, you can still do some moderation if you need to, but I haven’t found that to be a big concern.

Slido is a great tool for that and even has ranking polls, so if you want to ask students, which of these three issues do you think is the most important cause of this issue that happened, or which is most important to you, or you can have them rank things. You can even use it for a game. It has a Kahoot-like function, which is a quiz, a game that they can win. You can use Slido in multiple different ways. One of the things I love about it is that you can just improvise as you go if you need to.

You can plan it in advance, but I often will use the Chrome browser and just type in poll.new, P-O-L-L.new, and it will launch and open up a Slido poll immediately. I can quickly type in the question if I have something that comes up in the class that I want to ask about, and then I can show the results by sharing screen, which allows everyone to see what the results are in a nice, beautifully presented way. They also, once they’ve answered the question can see the results on their own screen.

It’s really a nice way to get everyone on the same page, get people engaged in the topic, get them thinking about the topic in advance of discussing it or after discussing it to warm up the room at the beginning of the session, and then to synthesize things at the end of the session.

[00:16:09] Bonni: When we think about the downsides or some of the friction points of ask tools, or really actually I think this probably refers to all of the rest of the categories of tools is that now you are engaging people. There are increasingly tools that will integrate and be baked into synchronous web tools like Zoom or like Teams, but we’re not really there yet. Most of these are still– I don’t know what word you’re used to hearing for this Jeremy, but I was thinking like a second window. That can sometimes be, “Hey, pick up your cell phone if you’ve got a second device there or open up a new browser.”

I found that the friction went down once the whole world seemed like it started hopping on the Teams and Zooms of this world, WebEx, what have you, but it’s still present. How do you advise us the smoothest most seamless way to get around these friction points anytime you introduce a new second screen or second device, what’s your guidance to us?

[00:17:17] Jeremy: I think that’s a really important point. You want to make it as easy as possible for students and students have different levels, just like we all do on the tech familiarity. A few thoughts, first, the nice thing about it, as you said, when you’re on Zoom or on Meter or any other platform, Teams, you can just paste a link into the chat. That’s very simple that students just click the link and then the poll question pops up. There’s no complex things to install, nothing to download, nothing to register for, they just literally click the link.

I find that that’s very easy in a remote setting. Second thing is that, I do think it’s helpful the first time you use something to just give a quick walkthrough, there’s three steps to this, click the link, fill in your answer, and then hit submit. Even though that may seem obvious, for a student, if they’re encountering it for the first time it might be helpful. They may not realize they have to click submit, for example. I do just walk them through very, very quickly what that step is. The third point I’d make is that in many cases, we’re working with students on an ongoing basis.

There might be a little bit of the first time you use something say, “Hey, this is Slido, this is a poll tool, you just click the link and answer the question and then hit submit, and then we can see the shared results.” Once you’ve done it the first time, the second time I find students are just like, “Oh yeah, of course, we’ve done that.” It’s very familiar and it’s very comfortable. It might be a little investment upfront, but as long as you explain how it works.

I also like to explain why we’re doing it, and this is something I think we sometimes lose sight of that we teach and we do all these things, or we use certain tools and sometimes it’s not clear to students, “Why are you doing that? Why aren’t you just using the Zoom poll? Why are we doing polling at all?” I like to say to them, “Look, I want to hear what you have to say, I’m curious your thoughts about this. I think this might help us set up the next topic we’re going to talk about.” I even give them the meta-conversation about learning and pedagogy and what we’ve learned about the science of learning.

I’ll tell them if you predict what you think the most likely cause is, you’re actually going to be more receptive and more able to learn what the actual cause is than if we hadn’t even discussed it beforehand. Or if you synthesize this information now and put it in your own words at the end of the session, research shows your recall is going to be better. You’re going to have an easier time down the road, and you’re going to be able to use this information more comfortably. I’ll try to give them a little bit of that explanation of how the tool works and why we’re doing this and why this is a good approach that we’ve chosen.

Then I find they’re like, “Oh, okay, that makes sense”. They’re more likely to be on board with it. One last point in this area, sometimes the tool isn’t really the most important thing and in many cases. If you’re in person and you want to use an index card to do an ask, or you want to use a– you want to show a big piece of paper or a big sign or a big post-it on the wall instead of using a digital tech tool to show something like, I think all of those are great. It’s just a question of, in what context are we in and what’s the simplest way to achieve our objective and the most enjoyable one?

If it’s a matter of handing out an index card or even using the chat. If somebody doesn’t want to use a digital polling tool, they just want to use the chat, you can do that as well because I think the really important thing is that we’re engaging people and we’re not talking at them and we’re really working with them and interacting. Whatever’s the easiest way is often the best way, but I do think that sometimes an investment in trying a new tool can really open up some nice advantages like the ones we’re talking about today.

[00:20:34] Bonni: What I also am hearing in what you shared is that sometimes the added complexity is going to be worth it in the long run. We’ll get through that friction together such that it really does just become completely normal. We’ve all collectively built a new set of skills in and a new set of norms. I like your idea of definitely saying the why is, “Why are we doing this? We’re also going to be using this tool or a series of tools that all work in similar ways.” You just talked about those steps, Jeremy. Those steps are the same for practically any tool I can think of in terms of that second screen or the second device.

I’m going to be putting a link in the show notes to a video from Teddy Svoronos at Harvard. He makes a really short but very detailed video for his students of how he recommends that they set up their Zoom because there’s some default settings in there that he wants them to be familiar with and even some different views that you can create. He’ll talk about, “There’s going to be really two main ways I’m going to teach. Sometimes, you’ll just hear me talking, and then sometimes I’ll be working with the whiteboard, and here’s what I suggest.” It’s so concise.

I’m making it longer than I even need to. It’s so concise, but a really good way of laying down that foundation. What can you tell us about the kinds of ways that having tools that help us gather can benefit us?

[00:22:01] Jeremy: Some of these tools will be useful in live sessions. Some of them are useful in between classes as well. Some of them you can use in either. Some examples of tools that I use for gathering include Google Photos, which is a really simple one and basically it allows you to create a shared album that all students can add to. They can add images or videos. It’s very familiar to people because they use Google tools often and they have it on their phone and/or their desktop. It works well. It’s fast. It has no storage limit. It’s completely free to use.

You can give students a link to that shared Google Photos album. Once you’ve made it publicly editable or editable by the group, as you choose, they can then add their materials to it. Then, the second step is they can then comment on each other’s contributions. Depending on what kind of class you’re doing, the images that you’re using might be very different, but you can always have this kind of interaction where people are commenting on each other’s images and creating a collaborative album really by gathering all this information.

Another one that I find useful is sendtodropbox.com. This is a tool and there are others like it where you can basically have people send something into a shared dropbox, and then you can either have only access to it yourself if you’re just gathering things from students and then showing them selections, or you can make the access shared. One other additional way to do this is to do this through multimedia like through audio. You can use something like Google Voice, which allows anyone to create a free– It’s basically a digital phone number, but it’s the same as a regular phone number in the sense that anyone can dial it and then leave a voice message.

You can have your students record any message on that and gather their input on something, and then you can embed those into a webpage or into a learning management system. It’s a nice way to gather people’s different voices on that subject much like you might use VoiceThread or even something like Flipgrid. Both of those can be used in this way too, to gather student voices. One last one that I’ll mention is called SpeakPipe. This is if you have a webpage or an LMS where you want to have students record an audio message and gather their ideas.

Typically between sessions, gather their input or thoughts like an audio discussion board almost, or a video discussion board in the case of Flipgrid to again, gather different voices and have people contribute their own thoughts in their own words in their own way.

[00:24:20] Bonni: What challenges do you see people having when they start to use gather tools?

[00:24:26] Jeremy: There are some people who are using unusual devices. My daughters are in Zoom School, they’re five and eight at the moment. They have classmates who are on every known device you could imagine. Some students are on a Chromebook, some are on an iPad, some are on an Android tablet and some are even on a Kindle tablet, for example. That means that not everyone has the same interface when they’re trying to share something, whether it’s a file or a photo, or a video.

Fortunately, some of these like Google Voice just requires access to a phone number. Anyone who can call anything can call a Google Voice number and leave a voice message as part of this activity. Some of them get around that complexity a little bit. For other ones, there might be a little bit of figuring out the time that that’s required at the beginning to figure out, for example, how to upload something to a shared Google Photos album if you haven’t used that before. Some people prefer to use a public tool like Pinterest for this kind of thing too.

Pinterest allows you to create public shared pages or editable pages that are editable by a group like your students. That can be another alternative for that as well if it’s easier for someone.

[00:25:37] Bonni: I think so often about the friction of it. One of the nice things that you’ve described here is that there’s such little friction for many of them, but whenever we think about the lowered friction, that means lowered friction for anyone, not necessarily just our students. I always want to caution people that you wouldn’t want to put out on Twitter, for example, the link to your Google Photos album where anyone could put stuff up there if it wasn’t protected in some way. Keeping those links that are really, really open and allow someone to contribute without having to log in or being logged in, is going to be important not to put those in public spaces.

I don’t know if you have any other warnings like that for us.

[00:26:17] Jeremy: I think a lot of times these can be– You can invite people individually, so you don’t have to necessarily make the link totally public depending on the particular tool in that case. I agree that in some cases we want to make sure not to make the link available in public spaces just as you wouldn’t put your private phone number on a public Craigslist page or something. We want to be careful about that as well.

[00:26:42] Bonni: What can co-create tools allow us to do?

[00:26:47] Jeremy: This is where we can really make exciting things together as a group. This can be in a live session, in person, or online, or it can be something we do collaboratively over the course of a week, in between classes, or over the course of a semester. The tool that some people might be familiar with, which is a great starter for this, is Google Jamboard. It allows you to basically have a digital whiteboard that you share and people can add simple things like post-its and little comments and little drawings.

Then once you’ve mastered that, or if you want something more than that, there’s a whole range of really nice tools that allow you to do a little bit more co-creation. One of them that’s commonly used by teachers is Padlet which people may be familiar with and allows you to create multiple different vertical columns that allow people to organize and share and create information or images in different categories. Some newer ones include Miro and Mural, these are a little bit fancier whiteboards that allow you to create really intricate collective creations.

Whether it’s a framework that you’ve given your class and asking them each to fill in a certain section of it with images or diagrams or text or things that they find online. You can use it in a very simple way. A lot of people see it and get overwhelmed by a tool like Miro or Mural. By the way, both of those have free educator plans to start out with. A lot of people get overwhelmed because they are powerful professional tools. Actually, they have wonderful onboarding exercises and examples, and templates. As long as you can devote about 15 to 20 minutes to getting yourself set up, you can actually get started really easily.

I would encourage people to start with something very simple for the students to do, so there’s some very simple icebreaker activities just so that students can get familiar with the toolset on those tools for the first time because there are a bunch of different tools to choose from. The first glance can be a little bit overwhelming for students. It’s good to have a very simple exercise. Actually, both Miro and Mural come with preset templates, for example, for icebreakers. You can just pull up one of those and just practice with the students for a few minutes to show them how they’re going to co-create something on the board for something that you’ve planned.

A brand new one that’s just joined that’s even easier, which I really love, is called FigJam. If people are familiar with Figma, which is a super popular new design tool. FigJam is a free, open whiteboard, digital whiteboard that anyone can now use. It’s even simpler than Miro or Mural, and yet it’s really powerful for creating things together and collaboratively thinking about a topic and it’s fun. I think our teaching should really be fun. Our learning should be fun. It should be effective. It should be engaging of course, but it should also be fun.

These tools really allow us to have a little fun, be a little playful, and occasionally you can add a sticker or a little funny GIF or graphic. That enhances learning. It makes learning more effective and engaging. It just enhances the experience. That’s part of the co-creation process as well.

[00:30:01] Bonni: What have you found that people might run into as far as challenges go when trying to use these co-create tools?

[00:30:09] Jeremy: I run a program called the Journalism Creators Program at the Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY in the City University of New York. We do have some students who are coming in from various parts of the world for remote sessions and including places where there’s really low bandwidth or there’s complicated connectivity issues. We have occasionally had a couple of issues with people trying to use something like Miro collaboratively, collectively at the same time. In some cases that low bandwidth makes it difficult to take advantage of all the features of that kind of tool.

If you are dealing with low bandwidth situations or students who don’t have access to a relatively modern laptop, that kind of a tool might be a bit of a challenge for them. In which case you might try a simpler one like Google Jamboard, or even go back to even simpler tools. Again, if need be, have them use paper and be drawing something on paper and showing it in front of their camera, or if you’re in a remote situation or just using paper and pen in a live classroom. I think the important thing is people are creating together. They’re building together. They’re doing something engaging interactive and fun.

I’ve resorted to using tinfoil and toothpicks and clay and whatever the materials are, whether they’re digital or not will depend on the context. Just judging by what your students can do and what works for them, you can really do as exciting a newer thing as you’d like, or return to something traditional and effective as well.

[00:31:50] Bonni: One of the challenges that I have found in these spaces are actually two ends of a continuum. One challenge is students or learners not understanding that to leave the other stuff there. So sometimes you’ll have people that will delete everything that’s there, because they’re not accustomed to that. Multiple people will be working on this and it’s one of those things I have at least once forgot to explain, like, “No, you’re not starting with a blank sheet of paper. It’s not just your sheet of paper, but it’s something that multiple people will be contributing to.”

That’s been one end of that spectrum. Then on the other end is a real hesitancy to then change or modify anything. When you’re doing collaborative writing, part of that is understanding what your roles are going to be. If you’re an editor, we need to get to some space where we trust each other enough to let that person edit versus that, oh no, I have to leave their original exactly like it looked when I came across it and then somehow try to morph around it. I found an overarching guidance that helps us to set norms and also to identify and establish what those roles are going to be.

Sometimes I think it’s when you do a lot of collaborative work, you’re just so used to that. You just hop right on, off you go, and not recognizing that we’re taking our identities into these spaces and to be sensitive about what that means if you change somebody’s work without talking about it in advance. That doesn’t mean that you had a bad idea or a bad writer. These are some of the more collaborative people-oriented skill sets that I find myself needing to think about in addition to using the tool for whatever it is we’re trying to accomplish on the discipline-specific learning. If that makes any sense. Have you ran into this as well?

[00:33:41] Jeremy: Yes. I think that’s an important point. I think the first step is walking people through the instructions, as you said, making it really clear. Here are three things to keep in mind it’s okay to make a mistake. You can play around it’s important to respect other people’s work and, and to draw on your own space, et cetera. Setting up some instructions. The second thing I’ve found helpful is having a little experimental time. In other contexts, when we get a chance to try something a little bit before we might get to an amuse-bouche in a restaurant or something, to taste something or a sample at a Trader Joe’s or something.

I think giving people a little bit of a mess page, I call it a mess page or a scratch page where the first time we’re using something, they can just play around and try out the different tools and it’s okay to be messy or make a mistake or even erase something because they’ll realize how it works. Then when we’re trying to really create something for the exercise or activity where we’re past that scratch phase and we’re ready to go. The third thing that I think is helpful in this regard is having separate spaces to some extent. You use Jamboard, for example, you can have each group or each student have a separate little area that’s their own.

If you have Google Slides, I often have students, co-create a Google slide deck. They’re each working on a different slide and I’ll usually take a minute or two beforehand to just label the slides with their names or even just 1 through 20 or whatever number of students you have. Then they’re each on their own slide, for example, and you can do this with pretty much any of these digital whiteboard tools where you have– For example, with Mural or Miro, you can copy and paste an area essentially that is designated for each student so that they’re not working on top of each other digitally.

They each have their own designated work area and the same applies. even if you’re using a Google doc. Google Docs can be fine. There’s simple collaborative tools and you can designate a space for each group or each student to work in. Then there’s less risk of students typing on top of each other or deleting things. One thing I do encourage them to do though is when we’re doing these exercises is to take time. We usually set aside some time for students to look at each other’s work because there is also a risk that students just do their own thing and they’re not really noticing what else is going on.

We want to take a time just like elementary school students do a gallery walk. They walk around the room and see what everyone else put up around the walls. We do a digital gallery walk where we say, look at what everyone else created, and then most of these tools have commenting functions. You can drop-a comment and say, “Oh, that was really interesting. I wonder what you meant by this,” or, “I really liked that you mentioned that it connects to something that I was working on as well.” You get some additional interaction in that next phase after the initial creation.

[00:36:34] Bonni: I love doing that too and asking people to say, what do you notice the themes are or patterns, or what ones stood out as completely surprising or unique in some way and being able to see those connections can be so powerful and it’s almost a new lens that we can put onto our learning. That can be so powerful.

[00:36:53] Jeremy: It’s really fun and it’s something that can happen live in the session again, or it can be something you continue afterward as part of the ongoing thread of the class, and even with a tool like Padlet it allows that kind of commenting. Most of these tools really can work well, too, and to continue the discussion after class. The discussion after class or between classes, it doesn’t have to be on a “discussion board”. It can really be done in a creative way through some of these collaborative tools.

[00:37:24] Bonni: before Jeremy and I get to the recommendations segment, I wanted to thank today’s sponsor and that is SaneBox. SaneBox is one of those services that I’ve been subscribing to and so has Dave for so long that I almost forget how e-mail works without it. What SaneBox does is it helps take all of the stuff that pops up with equal importance in our inbox and sorts it with a lot of really smart thinking, the algorithm that it uses to sort things into things that might be less important puts them in other folders, such as SaneLater or Sane Newsletters, lots of ways to get things out of our inbox that are likely to be less important.

If it ever gets that wrong, which I still scratch my head because it really doesn’t with me but if on occasion I want to take something and retrain SaneBox, all I have to do is, for example, I could drag an e-mail from that SaneLater folder into my inbox and SaneBox just magically remembers, “Oh, next time she gets that same e-mail, she wants it to show up in her inbox instead of in the SaneLater,” and of course, vice versa works as well. Very easy to retrain it. I hardly ever have to do that, but if I ever do, it’s a really easy process,.

It makes it so much easier for me to manage my e-mail and to make sure that I’m not overloaded with a bunch of messages that all get treated the same when they really shouldn’t be in terms of priority. If you head on over to sanebox.com/tihe as in Teaching in Higher Ed, you can get a free trial and take advantage of a $25 credit toward a SaneBox subscription. Again, head on over to sanebox.com/tihe, and thanks once again to SaneBox for sponsoring today’s episode. This is the point in the show where we each get to share our recommendations.

I have one that actually relates back to you, and that is, I want to recommend that people go check out this notion page that you have for an event that we both got to be a part of. That is a link to Journalism Through the Learning Design Starter Toolkit. I’ll put a link to that in the show notes, but it is the same four categories of tools and many of the same tools that you just mentioned. Even though it’s in a journalism context, I found it so helpful just in any context to want to do these four functions. I just encourage people to go over and check that out as a way of extending the learning from today’s episode.

I’m going to pass it over to you, Jeremy, for your recommendations.

[00:39:59] Jeremy: Sure. I have a few final digital tools that we didn’t mention. I’ll just mention really quickly in passing. Then I’ll give you my personal recommendation. A few tools that are really, really fun and great I think for people to explore, if you haven’t, one is GooseChase. This is for scavenger hunts. You can use them with the class. You can use them for an orientation session. It’s super fun. It’s a digital scavenger hunt. I love using it with students to get them to know each other and to just have an onboarding fun experience. It’s a blast.

Another that I want to recommend highly if people aren’t aware of Pathwright. It’s a wonderful new way to think about learning paths online, creating learning paths. We’re all familiar I’m sure with learning management systems the big famous ones like Canvas and Blackboard, but there’s a whole other approach, which is to focus on creating a path for learning which Pathwright has created. It’s a small startup from South Carolina and not many people know about it in my experience and in the big world of higher education.

I found it to be one of the most elegant ways to create learning paths for people in different kinds of courses. If people are looking for alternatives to the traditional LMS solution, I highly encourage people to check it out. We’ve used it for our programs and I find it to be really, really great. The other big recommendation I’ll offer it has nothing to do with any of these tools. I write about these tools all the time for Wonder Tools which is my newsletter wondertools.substack.com. When I’m not thinking about tools or writing about tools, I love reading as I’m sure many people listening do as well, but sometimes I’m ready for something a little bit lighter or lighter on the eyes.

I’ve been super into graphic novels since the pandemic began in particular. I want to recommend a couple of really great ones. Gareth Heinz has really wonderful graphic novel versions of The Iliad and Odyssey and it’s terrific. Jerry Craft has a couple of really great graphic novels that are actually technically aimed at YA, young adult audiences, but I find them to be great. One’s called the New Kid . People might be familiar with Raina Telgemeier who’s another author who writes in that vein who wrote a book called Smile and there are a series of those graphic novels.

Then there’s just a great array of classic novels that are in graphic novel form. A Handmaid’s Tale is one I read recently. Oliver Twist , The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde, A Wrinkle in Time . All of these have really nice, relatively new graphic novel versions. If you’re looking to read but want something that’s nice on the eye, that’s my recommendation for today. Then if you’re looking for something really a little bit higher brow in the graphic novel realm, there’s a guy named Christophe Chabouté, a French graphic novelist who did a beautiful version of Moby Dick , which is just gorgeous and wonderful and has a few others, one called Park Bench , one called Alone .

Then one based on the classic Jack London story To Build a Fire , which is just fantastic. He’s a really wonderful graphic novelist that I recommend people check out.

[00:43:22] Bonni: Well, you definitely have not left us with nothing to play with after [laughs] today’s episode, nothing to check out. I am excited about checking out so many of the tools that you mentioned in the main part of the episode and following that up with the things that you recommended. Jeremy, thank you for being a guest today on Teaching in Higher Ed .

[00:43:40] Jeremy: It’s been a total pleasure, Bonni. I love your podcast. You do great work. I’m so excited to be in this community of educators who are working in this really, really exciting field.

[00:43:54] Bonni: I’m so grateful to Jeremy Caplan for joining me for today’s episode of Teaching in Higher Ed, I was energized by our conversation and then have all these things I want to check out and hope you do too. If you’d like to see the show notes for today’s episode, it’s probably already in your podcast player, you can probably swipe over depending on what app you’re using, but if you want to access it more directly, head on over to teachinginhighered.com/366, as in episode 366. You can also subscribe to the weekly Teaching in Higher Ed update.

These show notes will show up in your inbox, along with some other goodies, like other recommendations, some quotable words, and other things I think you’ll enjoy. Head over to teachinginhighered.com/subscribe if you’d like to subscribe to the Teaching in Higher Ed update. I’ll see you next time on Teaching in Higher Ed .

[00:44:55] [END OF AUDIO]

The transcript of this episode has been made possible through a financial contribution by the Association of College and University Educators (ACUE). ACUE is on a mission to ensure student success through quality instruction. In partnership with institutions of higher education nationwide, ACUE supports and credentials faculty members in the use of evidence-based teaching practices that drive student engagement, retention, and learning. 

Teaching in Higher Ed transcripts are created using a combination of an automated transcription service and human beings. This text likely will not represent the precise, word-for-word conversation that was had. The accuracy of the transcripts will vary. The authoritative record of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcasts is contained in the audio file.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

• Weekly Update
• Recommendations
• EdTech Essentials Guide
• The Productive Online Professor
• How to Listen to Podcasts

Subscribe to Podcast

• Speaking + Workshops
• Podcast FAQs
• Lilly Conferences Partnership
• Get in Touch
• Support the Podcast
• Sponsorship
• Privacy Policy

An unexpected error occurred. Please try again.

Thank you for signing up

Global Earth Challenge Citizen Science Application

• Higher Education Toolkit

This resource was developed by EARTHDAY.ORG™ staff and George Mason University faculty to seamlessly embed the Global Earth Challenge citizen science app into higher education curriculum and campus activities. Explore below how you can incorporate citizen science into your syllabus, your club, society, or campus community.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

I. instructions, ii. opportunities for global earth challenge integration.

• Student & Faculty Opportunities
• Student Affairs & Student Life
• General Operations

III. EDUCATOR RESOURCES

• More about Global Earth Challenge
• Sample Syllabus Language for Educators

IV. LESSON PLANS

• Plastic Pollution
• Insect Decline
• Air Quality

DOWNLOAD Global EARTH CHALLENGE

Be a part of the solution and build community within your institution while adding to data sets around the globe.

EARTHDAY.ORG™ (EDO), in partnership with George Mason University’s (GMU) Office of Sustainability , is encouraging universities around the world to incorporate EDO’s Global Earth Challenge program into their curriculum and campus experience. Whether you’re a student, a faculty member, a staff member, or parent/legal guardian Global Earth Challenge is for you! Global Earth Challenge is an international citizen scientist initiative designed to collect data for air quality, plastic pollution, and insects using the respective widgets. It is an open data citizen science database that has interoperability between citizen science data sets on six Earth Challenge research questions .

Due to COVID-19, students are limited in both their academic pursuits and their options to participate in environmental conservation.

In response to the global pandemic, schools, camps and many other typical comforts are drastically different. We want to support educators and parents around the world in supplying high-quality, reliable education materials to keep students engaged, safe and learning.

We are encouraging students to focus on the air, plastics and insects widgets if done so safely.  We are not encouraging anyone to use any facets of the application, or go outside,  if it is not safe to do so.

Participants can download the Global Earth Challenge application from Apple’s App Store or from Google’s Play Store . You can download Global Earth Challenge wherever you’re connected to the Internet and it’s recommended you download it with your smartphone. If you’re particularly data-conscious, you can download Global Earth Challenge via Wi-Fi.  Once downloaded, Global Earth Challenge can be used anywhere. The app includes an introduction to the project, and we encourage you to read the introductory slides. Additionally, each widget (air quality, plastics, and insects) contains instructions, definitions, and supplementary materials to help guide users through the process. There are also hub sites for each of the widgets to learn more about the ways data collected with Global Earth Challenge is being used to create change for people and the planet as well as other ways to get involved with the research topic.

Global Earth Challenge is different from other citizen science programs in that the data collection is just the beginning.

Our goal is that each participant also learns from the data, questions the importance of the data, and applies the data to create real-world solutions. Through suggested calls to action, sample habits, and opportunities to engage with policy, we hope that participants not only learn about local environmental issues, but become inspired to take action to address those issues and improve their community’s resilience and well-being. 

The three widgets we want to focus on for this semester are the air quality, plastic pollution, and insects widgets.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Air Quality Widget

• Submit photos of your local air quality and track how air quality varies locally. 
• Take individual action and advocate for improving your local air quality.

Insect Widget

• Upload and submit a photos of insects in your area.
• Interact with the Bee campaign to help scientists track pollinator decline around the world.
• Get involved in insect population recovery around the world through individual and civic action.

Plastic Pollution Widget

• Record sightings of litter and help scientists track litter back to the source!
• Work in a group in cleanup mode to conduct and register cleanup efforts near you.
• Check out ways you can help decrease the presence of plastic in your environments.

STUDENTS & FACULTY

Mobilizeu partners.

If your institution is already participating in EDN’s Mobilize U, encourage those members to become citizen scientists with Global Earth Challenge!

Individual Students

Are you interested in creating change for people and the planet? Global Earth Challenge is a perfect opportunity for you to learn while you make a difference!

Research Centers

Are there research centers that focus on sustainability, environmentalism, climate, or the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals? If so, then integrating Global Earth Challenge will be an excellent fit!

Individual Faculty

Faculty are encouraged to include Global Earth Challenge as part of their syllabus - either as a regular assignment or as an extra credit assignment. We have already drafted language that can be used, see “Global Earth Challenge Resources for Faculty/Instructors/Teachers” and “Tips/Tricks.”

University 100 Courses (or similar)

Sustainability is an important topic to today’s students and Global Earth Challenge provides your institution with an excellent opportunity to demonstrate to new students that their institution cares about people and the planet! Global Earth Challenge could be actively promoted by the instructor(s) or integrated into the curriculum as a supplemental assignment or extra credit.

Honors Program or Honors College

Global Earth Challenge provides students with an excellent opportunity to engage in experiential learning, data collection, and reporting as a citizen scientist which could be incorporated into required co-curricular learning, additional research projects, service learning, etc.

Faculty Senate

If you’re a faculty member and you plan to, or have, added/integrated Global Earth Challenge into your curriculum, tell your colleagues about it and encourage them to do the same.

Office of the Provost

If you’re the Provost of your institution, encourage your faculty members to promote and/or integrate Global Earth Challenge into their curriculum. If you’re not the Provost, you can chat with your Provost and encourage them to share information about Global Earth Challenge with faculty at your institution.

Student Affairs & Student Life

Orientation.

Global Earth Challenge could be used as an orientation activity for students since students can engage with the app completely virtually and also collect and report data on their own time.

Community Service

If your institution provides students with opportunities to engage in community service and/or requires students to complete a certain number of community service hours, encourage students to download the Global Earth Challenge app and log the number of hours spent collecting citizen-science data which could then count as community service hours!

Student Government

• Student government members are elected and respected student leaders of the campus community who could use their position to model the adoption and use of Global Earth Challenge while encouraging their fellow students to do the same.
• If the elected members of student government are required to complete a certain number of community service hours, a specific project, etc. then the faculty/staff advisor for student government could integrate Global Earth Challenge into this requirement.

Graduate Student Senate/Association

• Far too often, graduate students feel left out or forgotten as members of the campus community. Global Earth Challenge presents an excellent opportunity to encourage graduate student participation and engagement with an institutional initiative.
• Graduate students (through their senate or relevant association) could further demonstrate their leadership by adopting and using Global Earth Challenge while encouraging others to do the same. Since many graduate students are actively engaged in research, Global Earth Challenge, with its emphasis on citizen-science and using data to drive decisions for people and the planet, is an excellent fit.
• Graduate students can talk with their faculty advisor(s) about opportunities to integrate Global Earth Challenge into their research or coursework or may even be interested in becoming more involved on the research review team for Global Earth Challenge.

Registered Student Organizations (RSOs)

RSOs are well known for hosting fun, exciting, and educational events for their members and the campus community. RSOs could encourage their members to adopt and use Global Earth Challenge while also hosting virtual events for the campus community to participate in.

Residence Hall Association (RHA) or similar

RHA primarily focuses on the on-campus living experience for students and often hosts programs, events, and activities for the campus community. RHA could encourage its members to adopt and use Global Earth Challenge while also hosting virtual events for the campus community to participate in.

“Green” or Sustainable Student Groups

If your institution already has student groups that are well known for their engagement with “green,” sustainability, climate, or environmental issues then they’re excellent groups to promote Global Earth Challenge to. If they’re required to complete a specific number of community service hours, they could use their participation in Global Earth Challenge to count towards or supplement their service hours.

General operations

Housing and residence life.

Global Earth Challenge is an excellent opportunity for Resident Assistants, Peer Mentors, Community Directors, Residence Directors, etc. to incorporate the app into their programming and events. Staff members in Housing & Residence Life could integrate Global Earth Challenge into their Residential Curriculum, Experiential Learning Model, or other programming/learning model.

Career Services

Although participation in Global Earth Challenge is not an internship per say it provides participants with a unique feature for their resume and application materials - participation in a global, citizen science initiative!

• addressing stormwater issues you could encourage them to adopt the use of the Global Earth Challenge app and report on “plastics.”
• addressing landscaping/campus grounds you could encourage them to adopt the use of the Global Earth Challenge app and report on “plastics.”
• addressing recycling/waste issues you could encourage them to adopt the use of the Global Earth Challenge app and report on “plastics.”

Office of Sustainability(or similar)

This is a great initiative to encourage members of your campus community to participate in, as it clearly demonstrates how local issues are intertwined with global issues. Furthermore, it provides participants with an opportunity to contribute to a database of information used by scientists all over the world to inform and address climate-related issues and challenges.

Environmental Health & Safety / Risk Management

This department might be particularly interested in participating given the focus of their work.

Human Resources

Institutions could invite their employees (whether student employees, faculty, or staff) to participate in Global Earth Challenge, especially if the institution is adopting or promoting participation for their students. This is a great way to help employees feel connected to the institution while building a positive culture of engagement, learning, and positive impact!

Community Relations or Engagement

Institutions could invite their community partners to participate in Global Earth Challenge, especially if the institution is adopting or promoting participation for their students, faculty, and staff. This is a great way for an institution to strengthen its relationship with community members and key stakeholders.

Development and Corporate Engagement

Institutions could encourage their corporate partners, sponsors, and key stakeholders to adopt or promote participation of the Global Earth Challenge app. This is a great way for corporate partners and key stakeholders to demonstrate that they are committed to sustainability as well as the key issues that matter to the institution.

Alumni Relations or Engagement

Institutions could invite their alumni to participate in Global Earth Challenge, especially if the institution is adopting or promoting participation for their students, faculty, and staff. This is a great way for an institution to remain connected with their alumni while also making a positive difference!

BE A PART OF THE SCIENCE

Download the Global Earth Challenge app .

Global Earth Challenge – A Citizen’s Science Initiative

• Research Questions: learn more about the research questions driving Global Earth Challenge and the citizen science data collection.
• Research Community : learn more about the process that went into developing Global Earth Challenge as well as the research teams all over the world engaged with and supporting Global Earth Challenge. 

Air Pollution Video

For use with Earth School and EDO’s partnership with UNEP. We were featured on the citizen science day- Quest 26

Climate Civics Tookit

This toolkit is designed for educators, parents or motivated students who want to explore ways to learn more about the local impacts of climate change and what it means to be an active participant in community civic action. This resource is very flexible to best suit your needs: the activities can be done all together or spread out over time for year-round climate exploration.

Global Earth Challenge Instructional Videos

Videos outlining use of the app and important features.

Earth Challenge Citizen Science Cloud

Database containing all citizen science data collected with the Global Earth Challenge app for researchers to search, visualize, and download data and for participants to browse.

Sample Syllabus Language

Extra credit.

• *If you don’t have access to a smartphone or your smartphone does not function with the Global Earth Challenge application, please let me know [contact information for instructor] so a comparable opportunity for extra credit can be offered.

Regular Credit Assignment

• *If you don’t have access to a smartphone or your smartphone does not function with the Global Earth Challenge application, please let me know [contact information for instructor] so a comparable assignment can be offered.

Tips & Tricks

• If a student doesn’t have a smartphone or their smartphone isn’t compatible with the Global Earth Challenge application:
• You can have the student use AirNow to “collect” air quality data through the use of the website. The student can input their US zip code and receive detailed information about the current air quality for that location. For proof of their participation, the student can take screenshots of the air quality report provided by AirNow which can be submitted via email or online learning portal (such as BlackBoard) or included in a reflection paper, essay, PowerPoint, or similar assignment.
• From their website: “AirNow is a partnership of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), National Park Service, NASA, Centers for Disease Control, and tribal, state, and local air quality agencies.”
• For the “regular credit” assignment, there are many different opportunities for assignments students could complete. Here are a few examples:

“You’re required to create a creative work (video recording, spoken word performance, dramatic rendering, painting, collage, etc. - the only limit is your imagination!) that is reflective of your experience participating in Global Earth Challenge and also explores how citizen-science initiatives are a force for positive change for people and the planet.”

PLASTIC POLLUTION

Discover more about the global plastic pollution problem and use lesson plans that center around this topic while integrating Global Earth Challenge as an interactive resource.

INSECT DECLINE

Learn about the ecosystem services insects provide and use our activities and resources to help educate students on the most pressing threats insects face.

AIR QUALITY

Develop an understanding of the causes of bad air quality, how it affects people and our environments and learn what scientists are doing to combat these issues.

This resource was created by EARTHDAY.ORG in partnership with George Mason University's Office of Sustainability and developed by Benjamin Auger, Terra Pascarosa, Tracey Ritchie, and Katie Wood.

This toolkit was last updated November 2020.

Hi, It seems you are visiting us from India, would you like to visit our India pages?

Yes please No thank you

ST. PETERSBURG TRUTH, RACIAL HEALING  AND TRANSFORMATION CENTER

Acknowledge the truth .

Build Community 

Transform Society

The St. Petersburg TRHT—formerly known as the St. Petersburg/Pinellas Higher Education for Racial Equity (SPHERE)—is an officially recognized Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation campus center of the American Association Colleges and Universities . Our Center is a collaboration between Stetson University College of Law , Eckerd College and community organizations in Pinellas County, Florida.

The St. Petersburg TRHT empowers students and community members to take leadership in dismantling systemic racism and false notions of racial hierarchy. We collaborate with organizations, government entities, and higher education institutions in Pinellas County to advance programming, advocacy, and services that enhance racial equity. Through our Racial Justice Fellowship Program, Community Conversations, and National Day of Racial Healing, we strive to make St. Petersburg a more just and equitable place to live and work.

To dismantle existing racial hierarchies and inspire a narrative change to highlight our shared humanity while building strong relationships in our communities.

This video explores the connections between law and racial justice, and the St. Petersburg TRHT Racial Justice Fellows’ legislative advocacy efforts.

HIGHER EDUCATION PARTNERSHIP ANNOUNCES SECOND CLASS OF RACIAL JUSTICE STUDENT FELLOWS

GROUP OF FLORIDA COLLEGES, UNIVERSITIES COME TOGETHER TO ADDRESS RACIAL INJUSTICE

USF ST. PETE TEAMS UP WITH LOCAL LEADERS TO ADDRESS RACIAL INEQUITIES

Community Conversations 

Racial Justice Fellows

One-year funded fellowship

Curriculum focused on local race equity history

Open to full-time Pinellas County higher education students

Local summer internships

TRHT Framework

Building relationships through community conversations

Narrative change through arts, culture, and media

National Day of Racial Healing 

Get Involved

Become a Donor/Sponsor

Apply to become a Student Fellow

Serve as an Equity Organization

Serve as an Equity Practioner

Serve as a Faculty Partner

In the News

St. Pete art event celebrates National Day of Racial Healing

St. Pete-based universities, including USF, team up for racial equity consortium

Racial justice program at USF gives students tools to advocate for equity

USF students learn to impact changes for racial justice

Students to support local racial justice efforts in St. Petersburg Higher Education Consortium fellowship

Racial equity consortium launches fellowship program for St. Pete campus students, Pinellas County institutions

Higher learning consortium to focus on Truth and Racial Healing

Higher education institutions in Pinellas County unite for racial justice

What are  Community Conversations?

Community Conversations offer people from diverse backgrounds the opportunity to connect through storytelling, fostering a sense of shared humanity. These safe and brave spaces encourage participants to recognize commonalities, paving the way for dismantling biased belief systems. The structured, co-facilitated methodology of Community Conversations guides participants on a path toward embracing full humanity.

Community Conversations are:

Interactive experiences fostering trust, connection, and relationship building

Designed for diverse participants—everyone is welcome

Flexible in duration, from 90 minutes to four hours

Available in-person or virtually

Open only to registered attendees

Limited to 28 to 30 participants

Suitable for departments, committees, organizations, and leadership teams

Not recorded or mandated

Schools' Visits: Study skills

• What you can expect from your visit
• How to use the Library
• Free online resources
• Study skills

Higher Education Assignment Toolkit

• The HEAT toolkit

Everything you need to know about approaching an academic assignment, from understanding the assignment title to your final proof read.

Academic writing

• Guides to Academic Writing

Links to guides on many topics related to writing, including grammar, proofreading and being critical.

Reading skills

• Guides to Finding Information and Reading

How to get started on finding and managing information and how to read with a purpose.

Effective study

• Guides to effective study

How to manage your time and how to make good notes.

• << Previous: Free online resources
• Last Updated: Jun 11, 2024 9:52 AM
• URL: https://library.dmu.ac.uk/schoolvisits