This blog post is part of a series around the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Each post will dive into one of the goals and how we as educators can strive to embed these into our own courses. It is in the author’s opinion that any course or class can connect with one of the…
This blog post is part of a series around the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Each post will dive into one of the goals and how we as educators can strive to embed these into our own courses. It is in the author’s opinion that any course or class can connect with one of the…
When you suspect academic misconduct in your course, it’s common to feel frustrated. Some educators feel insulted or angry. Some blame themselves. Some people have a mix of all of this. Regardless, if you suspect a student has engaged in academic misconduct it is important to talk to them about it. The points below are…
Technology and education go together like strawberries and cream, or peanut butter and jelly, and in this time of remote instruction, teaching and learning are both enabled by and reliant on technology. In order for us to be successful in an online teaching and learning environment, there are eight principles that USask instructors should consider important when using technologies for teaching and learning. The eight…
In the last two decades we’ve learned a lot about feedback. We know Our Learning Charter tells us that as educators, we’ve agreed to “Provide prompt and constructive feedback for students on their learning progress at regular intervals throughout the course.” What does that actually mean, and why does it matter? What do we know…
Assessment practice is shifting away from comparing students to each other, or grade derived professor’s experiences and preferences. Increasing, it is focused on comparing students to a clear learning outcome or goal for the assessment that everyone in the class knows in advance. The process of clearly articulating that goal and what we consider good…
In higher education, we have our students do all the hardest learning by themselves. As academics, our greatest strength is expertise, but we routinely select passive instructional strategies that have our students mostly listening to lectures in our classes and doing their learning later. Choosing passive listening robs us of the opportunity to provide the…
This post is one of a 3 part series on the concept of alignment of what you want students to learn, how you plan to teach them, and what you will assess them on. Sometimes called constructive alignment, it has three parts: Your learning outcomes Your instructional approach or learning strategies Your assessments This post…
by Merle Massie, Coordinator, Undergraduate Research Initiative We tend to think of university as a place to soak up knowledge, to learn stuff, to end up with a ‘brain full of smartness,’ as one twelve-year old boy once explained. Yet the new University of Saskatchewan Learning Charter promises, and expects, more. While content knowledge is…
This post is the third post in a series of the “Charter Chats” related to our new charter. The others are linked on the bottom of this page. The chats are informal introductions to a charter educator commitment or commitments. They explain what that commitment means for educators, and suggests one or two implications for teaching…