For semesters, terms and courses that end and then begin again—if only they would end sooner and begin later.
For students (sometimes not very many) who come to class prepared and ready to learn.
For students (sometimes too many) who don’t come prepared and don’t care about learning. From them we learn humility and [...]

Students not doing the reading or other assigned homework—I’ve already done more than several blog posts on the topic and lots of articles in the newsletter. Hopefully all the “coverage” has offered grist for your thinking and new strategies worth trying. Despite all the previous “coverage,” I’m still finding there is more to be shared [...]

This may not be the best time of the semester to bring this up: Some students are already getting on your nerves? Nonetheless, I thought you might be interested in a typology that identifies the different ways students nag their professors. Usually we think of nagging as something children do to parents or spouses do [...]

Have you ever constructed your own student rating form? If you haven’t, you ought to consider doing it. First, the reasons why: It’s a chance to get student feedback on those aspects of instruction that matter most to you and that reflect the activities and learning opportunities in which your students participate. Most end-of-course rating [...]

Here’s an interesting book: Academic Cultures: Professional Preparation and the Teaching Life. It isn’t one every faculty member should read even though the point is relevant to all academics.
The book, edited by Sean P. Murphy and just published (by the Modern Language Association and available online at www.mla.org) is a collection of essay by liberal [...]

I attended the recent ISETL Conference (International Society for Exploring Teaching and Learning). The conference is definitely worth attending. Of course, we do have a vested interest in your attendance at The Teaching Professor Conference, but even more important than that, is getting you to recognize the value of attending a teaching-learning conference. They offer [...]

I’m picking up where I left off with the previous blog entry. I’m still thinking about the evidence for active learning—those pedagogical practices that engage and involve students in learning processes directly. I’ve also been thinking about the faculty predilection (not at all universal but still reasonably widespread) to bad mouth educational research, or less [...]