David Albrecht, associate professor of Accounting and Management Information Systems, presented last week on “Why All Professors Should Blog.” He provided examples and led discussion about:
Why you should blog,
What you should blog about, and
How to get started.
A blog post he wrote a few months ago nicely summarizes his main arguments.
Now it’s your turn… if you have a blog and are a BGSU faculty member, leave your URL and name in the comments below. If you are thinking about a blog, what are you waiting for? As David mentioned, blogging “is like adding Miracle Grow to your research“!
This presentation, “Disruptive Technologies or New Pedagogical Possibilities” by Grainne Conole was delivered at the Eduserv Foundation Symposium 2008, in London, England. In this video, Conole discusses how Web 2.0 has changing our learning and teaching paradigms. She discusses how we need to develop new models to understand the relationship between pedagogy and technology.
In order to understand the pedagogical implications of Web 2.0 tools, she explores three case studies: Learning Design, Openlearn and SocialLearn.
To read a related article by Grainne Conole please click here.
After watching this video, do you think we must develop new pedagogies that involve Web 2.0 tools?
This past weekend our Interact at the Center blog (originally started on Blogger) just passed 10,000 visitors. Our blog started out in 2006 and less than three years later we are proud to say that our “blogging” has been successful. We make efforts to publish interesting and helpful postings and we appreciate everyone who has taken the time to read what we have had to say. Thank you! Please continue to visit, comment on our blog, or leave suggestions for future posts.
To instructors, who have received an extensive formal education, knowing exactly what a test is asking may come easy. For some students, though, the ability to know exactly what they should do when words like “analyze” or “discuss” on exam can be vague and even foreign. Teachingprofessor.com, one of our favorite websites, recently published a list that all instructors could use a reference to help their students. Here is a list of what they call “test” verbs that you may want to share with students in your syllabus or exam preparation documents:
Analyze—break something down into parts, such as a theory into its components or a process into its stages or an event into its causes.
Assess/Criticize/Evaluate—determine or judge the degree to which something meets or fails to meet certain criteria.
Compare/Contrast—identify important similarities and/or differences between two or more elements in order to reveal something significant about them.
Define/Identify—give the key characteristics by which a concept, thing, or event can be understood.
Describe—give the characteristics by which an object, action, process, person or concept can be recognized and visualized.
Discuss—debate, argue, and evaluate the various sides of an issue
Explain/Justify—give the basic principles or reasons for something; make it intelligible.
Interpret/Explain—say what the author of a quotation or statement means.
Illustrate—Use a concrete example to explain or clarify the essential attributes of a problem or concept.
Reference: Nilson, L. B. Teaching at Its Best: A Research-Based Resource for College Instructors. 2nd ed. Bolton, Mass. Anker, 2003. [now available from Jossey-Bass]
While the Internet has opened us to a world of information and sources, it can also cause problems in our classrooms. The Internet has provided our students with a wealth of websites that will sell, barter and even give away research papers, English papers and essays. How do you combat this in our classes?
In a recent article in T.H.E. Journal titled “e-cheating: Combating a 21st Century Challenge,” Kim McMurtry provides us with a list of 8 suggestions to combat this type of plagiarism:
Take time to explain and discuss your academic honesty policy
Design writing assignments with specific goals and instructions
Know what’s available online before assigning a paper
Give students enough time to do an assignment
Require oral presentations of student papers or have students submit a letter of
transferal to you, explaining briefly their thesis statement, research process, etc
Have students submit essays electronically
When you suspect e-cheating, use a free full-text search engine like AltaVista or
Digital Integrity
Consider subscribing to a plagiarism search service, like Plagiarism.org or
Would you like to be discuss over 37 thousand topics concerning higher education with more than 22 thousand people around the world? Do you have a strong opinion about some practice in the classroom that you want to share with someone?
The Chronicle for Higher Education has a discussion forum where you can peruse more than 790 thousand posts that concern just about any imaginable topic of higher education. Faculty can go into forums about everything from taking attendance with an iPhone, on up to reforms that would better prepare students for college. The dozens of articles that the Chronicle posts are always being discussed there.
Please visit the forum and see what kind of discussion you get involved in.
Just last week an article by Andrea L. Foster was published in The Chronicle of Higher Education. The article has been generating plenty of traffic and just as much discussion. If you wonder why the article may be attracting so many readers, please read the first two paragraphs of her article (below) and what she writes about the overhauled Higher Education Act that recently was overwhelmingly approved by Congress.
“Tucked away in a 1,200-page bill now in Congress is a small paragraph that could lead distance-education institutions to require spy cameras in their students’ homes.
It sounds Orwellian, but the paragraph — part of legislation renewing the Higher Education Act — is all but assured of becoming law by the fall. No one in Congress objects to it.“
Many instructors and students may not realize the impact this act may have on them. We would like to hear what some people say. Please read Foster’s article or get some more facts on the Higher Education Act and give us a comment on what you read.
Would you like to be able to read what people all over the world are saying in the realm of higher education about an array of interesting topics? If this is something you would like, then you should read what a huge network of professionals share almost everyday on Tomorrow’s Professor.
This is a collaborative effort by Stanford University and M.I.T., which shares advice, experiences, research and blog postings from all over the world. Tomorrow’s Professor has a sharing network of over 25,000 people, at more than 600 institutions, in 108 countries. People can find articles that concern topics ranging from “Avoiding scientific misconduct” to “How to Get the Most Out of Scientific Conferences.” In their blog you can find postings concerning a variety of topics, like “Adaptive Learning” and “Academic Advising in the New Global Century.”
Please see their Listserv and blog with the links below:
Today the BG News published an article about different blogs around campus. The article features information and insight about blogs run by the Center, a campus department, and some professors.
Reporter, Angie Burdge describes how blogging systems will have, “a new way for professors and students to communicate.”
The link to the article is below and should be accessible to anyone.
Nicholas Carr recently wrote an article for the Atlantic Monthly about what he believes the Internet is doing to people’s brains. Carr’s, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” asks the question over whether people are relying far too much on the Internet for instant access to information, and changing the ways we think and altering “our understanding of the world.”
Below are two short reactions to Carr’s popular article.
Reaction #1
Nicholas Carr may ask the question, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?”, but his clear answer is that it certainly isn’t helping us think critically or deeply. Carr draws some comparisons to other technological advances in history, including writing and the printing press, fairly noting that although certain prominent thinkers of the time were certain we would see detrimental results in society’s collective cognition, the opposite is generally true. Carr is obviously skeptical of a positive affect of technology on the brain and learning. He raises good questions that amount to a consideration of how much “concentration and contemplation” actually occurs with an increase in technology and the future outcome of this change in learning. Whether you are concerned or celebratory of the change technology has made in learning, addressing the philosophical issues of “What is important to learn?” and “How can we best learn it?” will remain at the forefront and Carr gives us such an opportunity to reflect. Reaction #2 “So, yes, you should be skeptical of my skepticism,” is what Carr offers as a disclaimer after he essentially writes about the negative affects the Internet has on how people think and read. He proposes anecdotal evidence to support his assertion that the Internet is somehow controlling what people read, how they read, their reading and comprehension habits and, ultimately, how people think. He makes a formidable attempt to show how the giants of the Internet, like Google, have a predetermined plan to alter the web surfers intelligence. His argument is not the greatest defense of his overarching thesis, but he does ask a worthy question. It would be interesting to see what academic studies would say about how the Internet has morphed people’s minds.
Promote an institution-wide dialogue among faculty, staff and graduate students with an interest in teaching and learning - with or without technology.
Welcome to
INTERACT AT THE CENTER!
The Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) @ BGSU looks forward to your engaging comments on issues related to teaching and learning.
If you would like to be a part of the "Interact Community," simply click on the ADD COMMENT link at the bottom of a posting and share your thoughts, experiences, or both.
If you have any suggestions for future discussions, please email ctl@bgsu.edu
David Albrecht, associate professor of Accounting and Management Information Systems, presented last week on “Why All Professors Should Blog.” He provided examples and led discussion about: 
This presentation, “Disruptive Technologies or New Pedagogical Possibilities” by Grainne Conole was delivered at the 
