Student Learning

What Makes Teaching Hard?

There are a myriad of answers to this seemingly simple question. Grading probably comes to mind for many faculty, but there is certainly more to the challenge of teaching than that. Some teachers blame students they deem ill-prepared, unmotivated, ungrateful, uncooperative, and entitled. Others might

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Teaching Self-Regulated Learning: Two Methods

Back when I was an undergraduate, students were thought to drop out of college because either they failed to take it seriously or couldn’t handle the academic rigor. But now higher education recognizes that many students fail due to lack of self-regulated learning skills. These

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Let’s Get Real: Does Using AI Aid Learning?

Barely a day goes by without the latest invitation to a seminar on artificial intelligence or some handwaving about how AI could end the world as we know it. AI has already changed the world. Google searches incorporate AI. Most websites you interact with use

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Establishing Class Norms That Promote Learning

In 1936, psychologist Muzafer Sherif reported a landmark study on the creation of social norms. Sherif made use of an optical illusion called the autokinetic effect. When people view a stationary pinpoint of light in a dark environment, they will perceive the light to move

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Teaching Students How to Study

College students prefer to use suboptimal learning strategies when they study (e.g., Rinella & Putnam, 2022), which can undermine their academic performance. That is especially true for first-year students, who have no experience studying for college-level classes. For these students, a poor academic performance may

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Modeling Metacognition: Setting the Tone on the First Day

A vital part of preparing to teach is considering what will most benefit the students we encounter. To be successful across a variety of domains, students need instruction on how to engage in critical thinking, synthesize and evaluate information, and self-evaluate their own learning and

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The Teaching Professor Conference 2024

June 7-9, 2024 • New Orleans

Connect with Fellow Educators at The Teaching Professor Conference!