Many USask classrooms have been designed with one thing in mind – successful transmission of information from the faculty member to the students. Even as technologies changed over time, that model did not – we just added screens, data projectors for our slideshows, and cameras and microphones to capture a lecture. Current theories of learning…
It’s been a while since I wrote a conversational blog post – in a pre-pandemic world, more of our content on this site was first-person and took the tone of a friendly colleague. In the pandemic context, our blog quickly became a knowledge base to help you get the help you needed, when you needed…
In a COIL project, an instructor from the University of Saskatchewan (USask) works with a partner instructor at another institution teaching a similar course and class size. Together, the instructors design a course-based project or experience of approximately one month for their students to collaborate upon. They might also develop other shared activities to do…
How do you engage with students? How do students see themselves in the content of your course? How are students expected to engage with each other? Here are some strategies compiled from the University of Michigan with permission. Which ones do you do already? Which ones might you try? Instructor Student Interactions Learn and…
Dr Lucy R. Hinnie Postdoctoral Fellow Lucy is a postdoctoral fellow in the department of English and completed her PhD at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. In her work, she looks at written text through the frame of intersectionality, interrogating the accepted ‘canon’ of white male scholars and looking to find relevance to every student,…
Jocelyn Peltier-Huntley, M. Sc., P. Eng. Lecturer, College of Engineering Jocelyn is a professional mechanical engineer. Her research is around understanding the gender gap in the Canadian mining industry. At a personal level, she wants to see positive change happen to move towards equity within our society. As an instructor of engineering design and communications,…
Self-reflection Step 1: Know my position and privilege. Who am I as a teacher? (This idea isn’t new, check out this article from 1958: Teacher, Know Thyself) Step 2: Does the way I design my course plan for access and diversity? Step 3: Do I want to “add-on”, “infuse”, or “transform” my course through internationalization?…
You now know that you have pretty decent intercultural teaching capacities. You have continued to develop an awareness of your own identity and are modelling perspective-taking. Students in your course have the opportunity to interact with different worldviews because you know that makes them smarter. You actively create opportunities to build relationships between ‘others’ and…
Once we develop the capacity for intercultural competence, we can start to infuse the associated skills into our teaching practice. This can take many forms but all the elements connect to the group of knowledge and skills we associate with facilitation. Pedogogy is the study of leading learners and facilitators make a process easier. So,…
Intercultural teaching capacity is the ability to engage and support learners through difference in learning activities. Instructors who have intercultural capacity are able to bridge difference in the classroom and foster meaningful relationships with and among students. This is also called intercultural competency, but we like to think of it as a continual process instead…