A hot moment is one of those classroom situations where you can feel the temperature shift. Someone makes a comment that lands wrong. Discussion gets charged. A student reacts—verbally or visibly—and suddenly the room isn’t about the lesson anymore. It’s about safety, power, and whether
Not one. Not two. Eleven. That’s how many times my fellow panelists and I touted our university’s low faculty–student ratios during a recent session for prospective students. But how could we resist? Each time we invoked those magic numbers, parents smiled (“My child will be
The flipped classroom has become something of a buzzword in higher education, often praised as a silver bullet for engagement and learning. Walk through any teaching conference, and you’ll find sessions promising that simply moving content delivery online will transform your courses. But having experimented
How should we respond when students complain about their professors—aka our colleagues?
As he reflected on his upcoming 60th birthday, Rob LaZebnik, a writer for The Simpsons, saw his worst fear coming true: He was becoming boring. Rather than embracing the challenge and growth that comes from novel experiences, he found himself settling into the comfort of
Like many professors, I am just trying to keep my head above water when it comes to teaching and AI. A survey conducted in August 2024 of college faculty globally showed that 35 percent viewed AI as a challenge and 65 percent viewed it as
In January, Mary Ruskell (a high school senior) wrote about her experiences with generative AI for CNN. She writes eloquently about the existential questions she is facing as this technology makes it increasingly difficult to distinguish between reality and fiction. Generative AI has made mistrust
Ask any group of faculty whether they include critical thinking on their course learning objectives, and nearly every person will say that they do. This is not just because faculty were handed down a mandate or made to hew to some university policy. My many
Recently, a student sent me a political news article with the comment “Things are falling apart.” I didn’t reply right away, because I sensed they were looking for reassurance—and deep down, I felt that no matter what I said, they wouldn’t believe me. It’s hard
I’ve taught a course in statistics for psychological research for almost 40 years. No student becomes a psych major because they get to take statistics, but it is a commonly required course for the major because it is fundamental to understanding and conducting research. Taking
