-
Identifying Plagiarism
Preventing academic misconduct is always better than policing it. But, sometimes you notice a problem and wonder if the work you are marking was really created by or fully authored by the student who submitted it. It is your responsibility, according to the academic misconduct regulations to follow up judiciously with your concerns. Educator judgment It is important to keep an educator’s mindset. As the instructor, you are the most likely to be able to identify academic misconduct. This is because you are most closely connected to: the student and the course, the purpose of the assessment, and the instructions given to students about acceptable and unacceptable processes. It is…
-
Identifying ChatGPT Text-based Plagiarism
General plagiarism identification advice applies to ChatGPT text-based plagiarism, too. Read this post for more on possible plagiarism flags. You may have heard about detection tools but they are not reliable, recommended or approved for use. Read this post for more on current limits of these tools. Read this article about how ChatGPT can be prompted to beat the detection tools Read this post for more on how our academic misconduct regulations may apply. ChatGPT is less about accuracy and more about generating responses indistinguishable, linguistically, to what humans would produce. This means much of what ChatGPT produces seems like work we would attribute to our students. There are some…
-
Things to Tell New USask Students about Final Exams
There are many unstated or rarely stated norms and practices associated with the final exam setting. New students need to learn the ropes. This is especially important for students who are: writing their first university exams because they are new to university study (like first year students), new to USask (like transfer students), new to Canadian higher education (like international students), and/or returning to USask after only a COVID-based experience of remote exams. It’s a good idea to reduce uncertainty and to avert distress during exams. What can you do? Tell students what to expect and explain what is expected of them in the conditions for the final exam. Double…
-
Sing Me Your Song
I recently attended a KISS concert where the familiar tunes triggered a nostalgic trip to my teenage years. I realized that I had grown older with two of the performers, and that very moment of realization had impacted me more than I had bargained for. As the music played, I found myself captivated by the diverse crowd that had also aged alongside the band and many had brought younger versions of themselves to indulge in the shared nostalgia. My party, spanning three generations from my late grandmother’s brother to my eldest daughter, shared in this representation. The two hours of non-stop music reconnected me to stories of a younger me;…
-
Poll Everywhere: PowerPoint Add-in Update
We’re happy to share that Poll Everywhere recently released an update to the PowerPoint Add-in. After local testing, the update was installed across campus on November 13. This update solves a significant barrier to using Poll Everywhere on our classroom PCs. Prior to this update, it was common for the Poll Everywhere log in button in PowerPoint to be unresponsive (i.e., instructors would click Log in and oftentimes nothing would happen). This issue was very frustrating for instructors getting their slideshow and other media ready in the rapid 10 minutes between classes. After this update, the Log in button responds immediately. Once logged in, you’re ready to run Poll Everywhere…
-
To Be What the World Needs, We Need to Bring the World Into the Classroom
Summary: Bring global perspectives into your classroom! Learn how integrating diverse viewpoints can enrich learning and prepare students for a connected world. Date of publishing: November 14, 2023 The global lockdown of 2020 showed us that learning doesn’t require desks and a lectern. If the activities could be done in isolation (listening, reading, answering test questions), then why should students opt into classroom learning? Yet, there is immense value in gathering and interacting with each other. Thus, what we choose to do in these classroom spaces matters. Educators can contextualize their disciplines and helps students make meaning of their developing knowledge and skills by bringing external thoughts, processes, and contexts…
-
Reflective Journaling: How Instructor Feedback Helps Students Improve
Summary: Enhance student growth with instructor feedback in reflective journaling. Learn how targeted comments can improve student writing and critical thinking skills. Date of publishing: October 31, 2023 Journaling is like capturing a series of snapshots of changing knowledge and skills. Reflective journaling is a lens through which students can examine their own progress, capturing moments of insight and understanding of their own learning. With continuous feedback from instructors, these journals bring clarity and refinement to the student experience. We’re reflecting with Dr. Kathy Walker from the department of Political Studies to see how students develop and process their understanding in Political Studies 222 and 422. Throughout the term, students…
-
Adding Experiential Learning to an Introductory Course
Summary: Boost engagement and learning by integrating experiential activities into introductory courses. Learn how practical experiences enhance academic understanding. Date of publishing: October 31, 2023 It can feel overwhelming to add experiential learning to large classes, particularly at the first and second year level of undergraduate learning. For Dr. Bob Patrick from the Department of Geography and Planning, the new USask experiential learning cycle helped him revamp a 200-level course project into an authentic learning experience with opportunities for reflection and feedback. Dr. Patrick’s course is about measuring sustainable development in cities. With a class size of 60 students, he decided to make this learning adventure more engaging by making…
-
How to Talk with Students About Suspected Academic Misconduct
Faculty and instructors follow up with suspected academic misconduct and when we do, we show we care about students and their learning the validity of the assessment the fairness of grades for all students in the course. When we don’t follow up, there are risks for students. If students are not made aware of their errors that constitute academic misconduct, they may make the same errors again. If students are aware of their academic misconduct, but there are no consequences, they may risk it again. If other students see that academic misconduct goes unaddressed, they can lose confidence in the fairness of the assessments. Talking to an individual student…
-
Writing Learning Outcomes using Generative AI
We know that learning outcomes are essential for orienting students, articulating them can be an arduous process. Where does one even begin? Thankfully, this is one area where Generative AI’s capabilities to support teaching really deliver. Using a text-producing AI tool such as the USask created tool ALDA (AI Learning Design Assistant), insert as many details about your course and the desired output as possible. Here is a sample prompt that you might submit to AI to produce course-level learning outcomes: Please create 6 learning outcomes that consider the following parameters. This is a university course at the [ordinal] year level of a [discipline] program. The course title is: “[Course…