Centre for
Teaching and Learning
Faculty Orientation 2015
http://tla-committee.commons.yale-nus.edu.sg/august-workshop/
Bryan E. Penprase
Professor of Science, Yale-NUS College
Director, Centre for Teaching and Learning
Bryan.penprase@yale-nus.edu.sg
Nancy W. Gleason
Lecturer of Social Sciences, Yale-NUS College
Head of Study (Acting), Global Affairs
Associate Director, Centre for Teaching and Learning
Nancy.Gleason@yale-nus.edu.sg
Agenda for Humanities
Part 1 - The Yale NUS Centre for Teaching and Learning
Bryan Penprase 10 minutes
• Overview of the new Centre
• Some of the Questions we hope to address at the Center
• Upcoming Events, Programs and Attractions
Part 2 - Course Design and Assessment
Nancy Gleason, 30 minutes
• Completing New Course Forms
• Running impactful discussion sections
• Getting Started in the classroom – 5 basic teaching tips
Part 3 - Active Learning and Classroom Management
Bryan Penprase, 30 minutes)Applying learning taxonomies
Centre for Teaching & Learning
The Yale-NUS College Centre for Teaching and Learning
(CTL) seeks to foster excellence in teaching, technology
application and course design within the Yale-NUS College
community and promote discussions and collaborations
amongst the faculty in these areas.
CTL Service & Programming
• Consultations: course design; effective office hours; crafting
assessments; managing students; advising techniques; teaching
culturally diverse students; technology and teaching options; and
more
• Open Hours on Thursday 10am to 12noon: Peer Rooms on main
level of the Library learning space
• Monthly Social Teaching Events to be advertised
• Wine cheese receptions, lunches and teas
• August 13th Teaching Talk
• John Kelly, Professor of Anthropology, University of Chicago
“Emotions of First Year Teaching”
• Faculty Teaching Workshops – November 30th, December
1st, 2nd 12pm – 5pm @ Yale-NUS
• New CTL website will be launched
Consultation Office Hours
• Thursdays 10am – 12noon: open door teaching and
course design assistance available
• Email Bryan or Nancy if you would like an appointment
outside of this time frame – we’ll be glad to meet you
• Bryan.penprase@yale-nus.edu.sg
• Nancy.Gleason@yale-nus.edu.sg
• Teaching@yale-nus.edu.sg
Topics the Centre will
address
• Best practice in design and assessment of
interdisciplinary courses
• Incorporating active learning into larger lectures
• Integrating experiential and international work into
undergraduate classes
• Training teams of faculty to work well together
• Integrating technology into our classrooms, yielding
global classrooms
• Best practice in effective assessment of student learning
outcomes and attitudes
Additional resource CDTL
• Center for Development of Teaching and Learning @ NUS
• http://www.cdtl.nus.edu.sg
Course Design
and Assessment
Nancy W. Gleason
Course Design
• What strategies have you deployed for course design in
the past?
• What has worked best and what elements need
improvement?
• What things would you like to learn how to do going
forward?
Course Design & Assessment
Course Design & Assessment
Learning Outcomes
• Analyzing: discern patters; organize parts; recognize
hidden meanings; identify components, simplify complex
information; metacognition.
• United learning outcome verbs: analyze, calculate,
categorize, compare, contrast, correlate, deconstruct,
detect, differentiate, discriminate, distinguish, examine,
explain, interpret, organize, quantify, research, scrutinize,
separate, sequence, subdivide, survey, test, translate.
• Some possible assessment tools: Class debate, roleplay simulation, oral presentation, written assignment,
etc.
Humanities Learning Outcomes
• Humanities provide the terms of art and
philosophy that are irreplaceable for us to
articulate description of the world
• Education in the humanities provides
capacity to describe experience of the world
and provoke evaluation of the world
• It also seek to harness art’s capacity to help
us imagine transformation of the world
• How do we assess that?
AACU Value Rubrics
Integration of Learning Outcomes
Canvas & Assessment
Canvas and Assessment
Questions
Facilitating
Discussion in the
Classroom
Designing discussion sessions around the learning
outcomes and assessment criteria you have created
Seminars
What are
some of the
victories or
challenges
you have
faced in your
discussion
sections?
Discussion techniques assist
with following objectives
• Students learn to think in terms of the subject matter
• Students learn to evaluate the logic of and evidence for
their own and others’ positions
• Give students opportunities to formulate applications of
principles
• Develop motivation for further learning
• Helps students articulate what they have learned
• Get prompt feedback on student understanding or
misunderstanding
Discussion Sessions
• How do you typically prepare for and start a
discussion session?
• What are the differences between the
disciplines within the humanities?
Starting Discussions
• Common experience
• Controversy
• Starting discussions with questions
(give them TIME to answer!)
• Interpretation questions: “How does the idea of ___ apply to
___?”
• Connective and causal effect questions
• Comparative questions
• Evaluative questions – “Which of two theories better
accounts for the data?”
• Critical questions
Barriers to Discussion
• Student habits of passivity
• Failure to see the value of discussion
• Fear of criticism or of looking stupid
• Push toward agreement or solution before alternative
points of view have been considered
• Feeling that the task is to find the answer the instructor
wants rather than to explore and evaluate possibilities
Solutions to participation
challenges
• Create an expectation of participation up front and
continually remind students of value of participation
• Ask students to take a moment to write out their own
answers to a question – can ask a reserved student
“what did you write”
• Share questions for seminar in advance so that students
have time to prepare answers/think
• Use Canvas discussion forum to encourage shy students
Solutions to participation challenges
Examples of Exercises:
• Buzz groups exercise/ Think, Pair, Share: See See
chapter 5 of Teaching Tips handout
• The inner circle or fishbowl exercise: half class
discusses while other half observes, then switch
• Circle of Voices Activity: See Brookfield and Preskill’s
Discussion as a way of Teaching (1999)
Movement Exercise
• Pose multiple choice or true/false questions to students
• Ask students to physically move to different parts of the
room to reflect their responses.
• Then, while there, ask students to pair up (or get into
small groups) to discuss responses
• Small groups then report-back to the larger class
Student Lead Role
Student as Seminar Moderator
Effective Discussion Sessions
• Communicate to students the importance of discussion
to their success in the course as a whole, repeatedly
• Clarify expectations of the discussion at the outset – be
respectful of perspectives etc
• Keep the discussion focused: brief interim summaries of
what has been discussed are helpful
Effective Discussion Sessions
• Bring closure to the discussion when done: “Are there any
final comments before we pull these ideas together?”
• Summary cab demonstrate how the discussion progressed
• End by acknowledging insightful comments from students
• Assign students responsibility for summarizing the major
points on course discussion board – can use Canvas
Collaborations function for this
5 Basic Tips for First Time Teachers
1. Tell the students WHY they are doing what they are doing
2. Stagger your grading so that students know where they
stand early on and so that you are not grading everything
at the end of the semester
3. Organize a break from routine for you and the students
during the semester, ie. movie, guest speaker, field trip,
visit from Library etc
4. Collaborate with YNC resource centres: Centre for
Teaching and Learning, the library, ERT team and the
writing centre
5. Vice Rectors can help with challenging students and
should be notified if a student is struggling/disruptive
Questions?
Thank you
Centre for Teaching and Learning
Yale-NUS College
August 2015
Teaching@yale-nus.edu.sg