Past Events

Drop-In Sessions: Integrating Generative AI in Assessment Design

These sessions offer instructors a chance to rethink the design of their course assignments with consideration of the possibilities and constraints of generative artificial intelligence. Sessions will offer the opportunity to work collaboratively with your colleagues, as well as with the Educational Development team who will facilitate the session. Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Pedagogical Development & Scholarship, will be available to answer questions related to policy, privacy, and syllabi.

This is meant to be a hands-on support session where you can get feedback on rethinking your course assessment or syllabus. You will get the most out of the session if you come with an assessment you are eager to rethink.

Five drop-in sessions will be offered. There will be both online and on campus sessions.

Session Dates:

Tuesday, August 29th from 9-11am (Online via Zoom)
Wednesday, August 30th from 1-3pm (On campus in MN3230 - CDRS Large Collaborative Space)
Tuesday, September 19th from 11am-1pm (On campus in MN3230 - CDRS Large Collaborative Space)
Wednesday, September 20th from 1-3pm (On campus in MN3230 - CDRS Large Collaborative Space)
Thursday, September 21st from 11am-1pm (Online via Zoom)

Artificial Intelligence and Teaching Lunch & Learn

Thursday, March 23, 2023 from 12:00 - 1:00pm in CDRS Large Collaborative Space (MN3230)

Faculty Contributors:

Chris Eaton, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Institute for the Study of University Pedagogy

Andreas Park, Professor, Department of Management

Lisa Zhang, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Mathematical and Computational Sciences

This session will bring together instructors from different disciplines to share some of the teaching strategies they are trying or are planning to try in the context of generative artificial intelligence. The focus of the talks will be on idea sharing, not on advice or best practices given how quickly the capabilities of generative artificial intelligence are shifting. This session will offer an opportunity for instructors to share ideas and discuss implications of artificial intelligence for teaching and learning.

Preparing a Teaching Dossier

Tuesday, March 21, 2023 from 12:00 - 2:00pm in MN5128

Facilitated by: Dianne Ashbourne, Senior Educational Developer, RGASC

At the University of Toronto, teaching dossiers must be submitted as part of the review process for tenure review or continuing status review. This session will provide an overview of the content and structure of an effective teaching dossier, focusing on dossiers prepared for a review process, and with an emphasis on how to align this document with divisional and institutional expectations. Session participants will review the distinctive qualities of a teaching dossier, and will develop a plan for assembling and strengthening their own dossiers. They will also be led through the first steps of composing a Statement of Teaching Philosophy.

Meaningful Student Portfolios (online)

Friday, February 3, 2023from 2:00 - 3:00pm

Facilitated by: Rob Huang, Educational Developer, Instructional Practices and Student Engagement, RGASC and Amanda Brijmohan, Educational Developer, Assessment and Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, RGASC

Student portfolios are a well-known tool for assessment, but often fall short of their potential. This session will focus on the pedagogical reasons why student portfolios are important for rethinking assessment and for students to use in their future careers. In addition, this session will feature instructors who've successfully implemented portfolios and practical tips on making portfolios a meaningful part of your course.

Rubrics – Ask Me Anything (AMA) Session (online)

Co-sponsored by UTM Library & Instructional Technologies and RGASC

Tuesday, February 14, 2023 from 12:00 - 1:00pm

Have questions about rubrics? Want to discuss how to use rubrics to make assessment expectations more transparent for students or to improve grading consistency for the teaching team? Join us for a Drop-In Session to discuss the rubric development process with members of the RGASC Educational Developer team and learn how to implement Quercus rubrics with the UTM Library & Instructional Technologies team to streamline grading workflows. All questions are welcome!

Supporting ADHD Learners Facilitated by Karen Costa (online)

Thursday, February 23, 2023 from 1:00 - 2:30pm

Guest Speaker: Karen Costa, Faculty Development Facilitator

In this session, Karen Costa will present a strengths-based, challenge-aware model of working with and supporting ADHD learners. The workshop includes Karen's awareness of the experiences of living with ADHD, discussion of neurodiversity model, and practical strategies based on current/evolving research on ADHD.

Using Peer Assessments to Support Student Learning (online)

Co-sponsored by UTM Library & Instructional Technologies and RGASC

Thursday, March 9, 2023 from 12:00 - 1:00pm

Peer review requires learners to provide comments on the quality of peer work or receive comments on their work. Incorporating peer review into courses activities can support student learning in a number of powerful ways. Engaging in peer review activities has been shown to improve students’ skills in evaluative judgement (Nicol, Thomson, and Breslin, 2014; Tai, Ajjawi, Boud, Dawson, and Panadero, 2018) and in self-regulated learning (Nicol & Macfarlane-Dick, 2006). As well, student performance has been shown to improve after students provide feedback on peer work (Cho and Cho, 2011).

This session will explore the pedagogical foundations of peer assessment, as well as how peer assessment activities can be designed to support student learning. In this session, we will discuss peer review tools integrated into Quercus that are currently available to you and will highlight their affordances and limitations when you set up online peer assessment activities.

Beyond The Reading List: Pedagogies of Belonging

September 21, 2022 from 12:00 - 1:00 pm (via Zoom)

Faciltated by Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Universal Design for Learning & Accessible Pedagogies, and Amanda Brijmohan, Educational Developer, Assessment and Scholarship of Teaching and Learning

In this session, participants will have the opportunity to reflect on ways to support 2SLGBTQ+ learners through inclusive pedagogy that takes into account pronoun use, assessment examples, and word choice. We will also discuss conducting scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) research that is more inclusive of demographics. Participants will leave the session with strategies to support belonging in educational spaces for 2SLGBTQ+ learners.

Instructor Meet + Mingle with UTM Educational Developers

Wednesday, September, 28, 2022 from 1:00 - 2:00pm on the MN 5th Floor North Terrace

The UTM Educational Development team supports instructors create the best possible learning experience for students. We offer confidential, individual consultations and formative teaching observations intended to support reflective practice. We welcome you to come meet the team and chat with us about how we can support your teaching this year. Light refreshments will be served.

Tips for Preparing a Teaching Development & Innovation Grant Proposal and Idea Sharing Roundtable

Tuesday, October 4, 2022 from 12:00 – 1:30pm in MN 5128

Facilitated by Amanda Brijmohan, Educational Developer, Assessment and Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, and Dianne Ashbourne, Senior Educational Developer

The UTM Teaching Development and Innovation Grant (TDI) aims to enhance teaching and learning in existing courses at UTM. It supports the implementation and assessment of innovated practice in undergraduate courses at UTM. In this workshop we will provide an overview of the application process and will discuss the selection criteria for the grant. Please bring your project ideas! There will be lots of time to ask questions. The session will conclude with an idea sharing roundtable aimed at supporting collaboration. Lunch will be provided.

UDL Basics and Guidelines

Friday, October 28, 2022 from 11:30am – 1:00pm (via Zoom)

Facilitated by Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Universal Design for Learning & Accessible Pedagogies & Rob Huang, Educational Developer, Instructional Practices and Student Engagement

Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is a framework that supports inclusive and accessible pedagogy through an emphasis of multiple means of engagement, representation, and action & expression. This workshop will provide a beginner’s overview of the framework and guidelines for those new to UDL. Examples of UDL in practice in courses will also be provided. The workshop will give participants the opportunity to revisit and revise an assessment from their course keeping the UDL framework in mind, and to reflect on inclusive activities that could support assessment.

Lightning Talks: Rethinking Assessment

Wednesday, November 9, 2022 from 12:00 – 1:00pm in MN 5128

Speakers: List of speakers will be posted in October

In this session, UTM instructors and educational developers will share different perspectives on assessment. From upgrading to decolonizing assessment practice, this series of lightning talks offers an opportunity to exchange ideas about assessment and consider new strategies. The session will consist of six 5-minute talks with an opportunity to ask questions after each presentation. Lunch will be provided.

Reflective Teaching

Tuesday, December 6, 2022 from 11:30am – 1pm in MN 5128

Facilitated by Dianne Ashbourne, Senior Educational Developer

Reflective teaching happens when instructors take time to examine their pedagogical choices and evaluate their teaching practice. Establishing reflective teaching as a continual practice supports effective teaching and can make the process of creating and updating your teaching dossier less daunting. This session will share ideas for integrating reflective teaching and will provide opportunities to reflect on the term, both individually and with colleagues. Lunch will be provided.

TLC Term-End Lunch

Monday, December 12, 2022 from 12 – 2pm in MN 1190

We haven’t had many opportunities to gather as a community over the last three years, so to celebrate the approaching winter break and the end of year the TLC is hosting an end of term lunch. There is no agenda – this lunch is just meant to offer opportunity for colleagues to reconnect. We know that chatting with colleagues can help us process experiences in the classroom, put things into perspective, and that colleagues are often important sources of encouragement. Please join us for lunch and an opportunity to chat with colleagues about your teaching experiences over this past year. You are welcome to drop by any time between 12pm and 2pm.

Summer Camp for Instructors (online)

July 19^th, 20^th, and 21^st from 9:00am - 12:00pm

Join us for summer camp! This year's summer camp will be three daily facilitated synchronous sessions from 9am-12pm EDT where we will discuss pedagogy, strategies, activities, and assessments for the courses you are teaching. You will also have opportunities to meet colleagues and workshop ideas.

A Celebration of Teaching Excellence at UTM (online)

Monday, May 9th 2022 from 10:00am - 12:00pm (BBQ lunch hosted in-person from 12:00pm - 1:00pm in the CCT Courtyard)

Please join us for a celebration of teaching excellence. We will be hearing from recent UTM and provincial teaching award recipients, followed by a panel discussion about teaching and learning at UTM. We’ll be celebrating the teaching and scholarly achievements of Mairi Cowan, Nicole Laliberté, Vivienne Luk, Will Huggon, Julianna Chianelli, and Sherry Fukuzawa.

Term-End Reflection (in-person)

Monday, May 9th 2022 from 1:00pm - 2:00pm (BBQ lunch hosted from 12:00pm - 1:00pm in the CCT Courtyard)

Facilitated by Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate, and Director, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, and Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology; Ann Gagné, Educational Developer (Universal Design for Learning), Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, Institute for the Study of University Pedagogy ; and Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, Institute for the Study of University Pedagogy

Connect with your colleagues to reflect on this past year in an interactive, collaborative session. This session will provide an opportunity to share pedagogical strategies that worked well and to ask your colleagues for suggestions to address challenges that you encountered during the term.

Spotlight on Teaching in the Arts and Humanities (online)

Wednesday, January 26^thfrom 2:00pm - 3:00pm

This event provides an opportunity for instructors to share teaching strategies and resources with colleagues who share their disciplinary context. It is also an opportunity for instructors from other disciplinary contexts to gather new ideas. The session will consist of four 10-15 minute presentations with an opportunity to ask questions after each presentation.

Contributors:

Kate Maddalena, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Institute of Communication, Culture, Information & Technology

Encouraging Students to Engage Creatively with Theory: a Holistic Rubric

Engaging with theory in the humanities is fun, creative, and intellectually risky work. When students are focused on getting it right for a mark, they miss the point of theory. This simple, holistic assessment method--a very simple "ungrading" approach--encourages and rewards risk-taking and creativity for B and A-level marks.

Ken Derry, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Historical Studies

Silver Linings: Online Pandemic Teaching Practices I Will Keep Using

Teaching online during a global pandemic for almost two years has been — to put it mildly — incredibly challenging, in many (often highly inequitable) ways. But there are practices and perspectives I learned from online teaching in this crisis that I think improved my classes, and helped make me a better teacher. I plan to continue as many of these as I can when I return to in-person teaching — including recording lectures, re-thinking exams, using checklists, removing late penalties, and being as kind as possible.

Spotlight on Teaching in Social Science (online)

Thursday, February 17^th from 2:00pm - 3:00pm

This event provides an opportunity for instructors to share teaching strategies and resources with colleagues who share their disciplinary context. It is also an opportunity for instructors from other disciplinary contexts to gather new ideas. The session will consist of four 10-minute presentations with an opportunity to ask questions after each presentation.

Contributors:

Alison Smith, Assistant Professor, Political Science

I will be talking about a creative book review assignment I assigned this term in my POL318 class, Power and Conflict in Federalism. The book review was for works of fiction. I gave students the option of engaging with the work in any form or medium they wanted to - I got many formal book reviews, but also a number of podcasts, three paintings, several poems, and even a song! Artistic works were accompanied with an "artist's statement" in which they explained their work and how the book helped them to better understand Canadian politics. In addition to allowing students to engage with a novel and express themselves creatively, the books we reviewed allowed for really great examples of policy failures and power struggles that we covered in class, giving students a very clear understanding of how policies affect different people.

Spotlight on Teaching in STEM (online)

Tuesday, March 1^st from 2:00pm - 3:30pm

This event provides an opportunity for instructors to share teaching strategies and resources with colleagues who share their disciplinary context. It is also an opportunity for instructors from other disciplinary contexts to gather new ideas. The session will consist of four 10-minute presentations with an opportunity to ask questions after each presentation.

Contributors:

Mike Pawliuk, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, CLTA, Mathematical and Computational Sciences

In Fall 2021 I taught a third year math course (MAT344 Intro to Combinatorics) without formal assignments, tests, or an exam. Students had "radical freedom" to create any portfolio of work they wanted to show their learning in the course. It went very well, and I'll discuss the important lessons I learned.

Jaimal Thind, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Mathematical and Computational Sciences & Alexander Rennet, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Mathematical and Computational Sciences

In 2019 the speakers (together with P. Glynn-Adey and M. Pawliuk) were involved in an active learning redesign of a large, multi-sectioned introductory mathematics course. We will discuss the collaborative nature of this redesign, its implementation, an accompanying SoTL project, and how this redesign helped us create an engaging online course experience during the pandemic.

Pooja Vashisth, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, CLTA, Mathematical and Computational Sciences

Using tangibles to teach STEM concepts

STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics), programming, computational thinking, etc. are more than buzzwords. Although not new, there is a clear interest from the academic community in using tangibles to emphasize core concepts. Using tangibles like cards help stimulate computational thinking necessary to develop the problem solving skills. This method results in more engagement by providing better opportunities for exploration. There are several clear applications of using cards for teaching STEM concepts. We will take a look at some of them at the showcase.

Tingting Zhu, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Geography, Geomatics and Environment & Department of Mathematical and Computational Sciences

As student engagement is a crucial predictor of learning outcomes in an online learning environment, this study investigates the use of interactive storytelling lecture trailers (ISLTs) as an engagement tool. The ISLTs were 2-3 minutes in length that serve as a preview for the lecture content. The trailers interweaved the actions and dialogues between the instructor and another character that is relevant to course topics in telling a cohesive story. Observational data and survey show that ISLTs are effective means for enhancing students’ behavioral, emotional, and student-instructor engagement.

Preparing the Teaching Dossier (online)

Thursday, March 24^th from 1:00pm - 3:00pm

Facilitated by Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, Institute for the Study of University Pedagogy

At the University of Toronto, teaching dossiers must be submitted as part of the review process for tenure review or continuing status review. This session will provide an overview of the content and structure of an effective teaching dossier, focusing on dossiers prepared for a review process, and with an emphasis on how to align this document with divisional and institutional expectations. Session participants will review the distinctive qualities of a teaching dossier, and will develop a plan for assembling and strengthening their own dossiers. They will also be led through the first steps of composing a Statement of Teaching Philosophy.

Writing an EDI Statement for your Teaching Dossier

Tuesday, March 29^th from 11:00am - 12:00pm

Facilitated by Ann Gagné, Educational Developer (Universal Design for Learning), Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, Institute for the Study of University Pedagogy

This session will highlight the literature on writing EDI statements and allow space for discussion of how to demonstrate connections to equity, diversity, and inclusion practices in your pedagogy.

Beyond Fill in the Blanks: Reconciliation, Indigenization, and Decolonization in the Context of Higher Education

Wednesday, March 30 from 2:00pm – 3:00pm

In partnership with the UTM Indigenous Centre

Facilitated by Danielle Lorenz, Department of Educational Policy Studies, University of Alberta

Following the release of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada's Final Report and Calls to Action in 2015, post-secondary institutions across the country began to make institutional commitments to reconciliation. More recently, with the advent of institutional equity, diversity, and inclusion policies, Indigenization and decolonization have also become priorities. This has resulted in many higher education professionals having questions about what they should and should not be doing. For instance,

What do reconciliation, Indigenization, and decolonization mean in the context of post-secondary classrooms, course design, and pedagogy?
How does one do reconciliation, Indigenization, and/or decolonization?
How does one avoid causing harm when engaging in reconciliation, Indigenization, and/or decolonization praxis?

This interactive presentation discusses these ideas as well as the realities of engaging in reconciliation, Indigenization, and decolonization in higher education; and explores the role of humility in learning communities.

Curriculum Mapping

Monday, April 4th from 1:00pm – 2:00pm

Facilitated by Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate, and Director, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, and Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

This workshop will outline how to engage in effective curriculum mapping, and will highlight the opportunities that can arise from the mapping process and dissemination of the maps themselves. We will discuss mapping at the assignment, course, and program level, and will explore different ways to both use and disseminate curricular maps.

Spotlight on Teaching in Management and Economics

Tuesday, April 26^thfrom 2:00pm - 3:00pm

This event provides an opportunity for instructors to share teaching strategies and resources with colleagues who share their disciplinary context. It is also an opportunity for instructors from other disciplinary contexts to gather new ideas. The session will consist of four 10-minute presentations with an opportunity to ask questions after each presentation.

Contributors:

Otto Yung, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Management

Integrating coding to develop a life-long transferable skill

In my talk I will share my experience of integrating coding into a social science curriculum (e.g., for finance, accounting, and management students). I will also share my teaching strategies (in-person and online) and assessments used to introduce and to build a foundation in a non-intimidating manner through community. Finally, I will discuss four (4) new courses introduced into the curriculum.

UTM Ready, Set, Teach

September 1^st from 10am - 12pm

The fall term can bring both excitement and uncertainty, but Ready, Set, Teach will help set you up for success as you jump into the new term. This event is meant to provide opportunities to learn from and with other UTM instructors. The theme for this year's Ready, Set, Teach is "About Community for Community". The event schedule can be found here.

Online Help Session for Instructors

September 1^st from 12pm - 1pm

Please join us for a drop-in online session to share solutions and discuss challenges.

Equity in my discipline: Social Science & STEM (online)

Panelists:

Martha Balaguera, Assistant Professor, Political Science
Jerry Flores, Assistant Professor, Sociology
Andrew Petersen, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Mathematical & Computational Sciences
Vera Velasco, co-founder of Filipinos in Canada - Academics, Researchers and Scholars (FiCARS) association

In this session, panelists will discuss how equity is part of the pedagogy, research, and community in their respective disciplines. The session will provide participants opportunities to reflect on equity practice gaps and what specific equity initiatives relate to their teaching & learning and research.

Equity in my discipline: Management & Economics and Arts & Humanities (online)

Panelists:

Sonia Kang, Associate Professor, Management, Canada Research Chair in Identity, Diversity, and Inclusion
Anjuli Raza Kolb, Associate Professor, English and Drama
Ellyn Walker, Acting Director/Curator, Blackwood Gallery, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Visual Studies

In this session, panelists will discuss how equity is part of the pedagogy, research, and community in their respective disciplines. The session will provide participants opportunities to reflect on equity practice gaps and what equity specific initiatives relate to their teaching & learning and research.

Term-End Reflection (online)

Tuesday, December 7^th from 11:00am - 12:30pm

Facilitated by Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate, and Director, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, and Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology; Ann Gagné, Educational Developer (Universal Design for Learning), Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, Institute for the Study of University Pedagogy ; and Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, Institute for the Study of University Pedagogy

Connect with your colleagues to reflect on this past year in an interactive, collaborative session. This session will provide an opportunity to share pedagogical strategies that worked well and to ask your colleagues for suggestions to address challenges that you encountered during the term.

Preparing to Teach: Syllabus Clinic

Facilitated by Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology; Ann Gagné, Educational Developer (Universal Design for Learning), Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre; and Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

This session will help you avoid common syllabus mistakes, saving you valuable time later in the term. We will discuss strategies for managing the administrative load of teaching, and will provide an overview of additional resources you can turn to for help when needed.

Summer Camp for Sessional Instructors: Prepare for Fall Term

Facilitated by Ann Gagné, Educational Developer (Universal Design for Learning), Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre; and Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Calling all sessional instructors! We hope you will join us at a summer camp designed with your teaching context in mind. This summer camp will consist of a brief webinar and provide immediate and personalized strategies that will work for you and the courses you are teaching. Given the time and scheduling pressures often faced by sessional instructors, the session time was decided by participants. Core elements of camp will be provided as asynchronous resources.

Preparing to Teach: Inspiration and Suggestions for Using Quercus

Facilitated by Simone Laughton, Head, Library & Instructional Technologies, UTM Library; Kenneth Berry, Instructional Technologies Specialist, UTM Library; and Angie Cappiello, Instructional Technologies Specialist, UTM Library

This session is an opportunity to learn what has worked well (and what hasn’t) for other instructors using Quercus. We will profile strategies that instructors are using for Quercus, and will also have an opportunity to troubleshoot challenges you might be facing.

Summer Camp for Instructors: Prepare for Fall Term

Facilitated by Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology; Ann Gagné, Educational Developer (Universal Design for Learning), Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre; and Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Join us for summer camp! This summer camp will consist of brief daily webinars and workshops to provide immediate and personalized strategies that will work for you and the courses you are teaching.

Inclusive Pedagogical Considerations for 2SLGBTQ+ Students

Facilitated by Anna Thomas, Assistant Professor, Department of English and Drama, Ann Gagné, Educational Developer (Universal Design for Learning), Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre; Nythalah Baker Director, Equity, Diversity & Inclusion; and Allison Burgess, Director, Sexual & Gender Diversity Office

This session will discuss strategies for including and framing pedagogy and content in a non-heteronormative way. The event will start with a roundtable of graduate and undergraduate students who will be speaking to 2SLGBTQ+ representation, initiatives, and awareness in educational spaces. There will then be small group discussions about pedagogical strategies to support students such as auditing readings, pronoun use, and resources for 2SLGBTQ+ inclusion.

A Learner-Centred Approach to Course Design

Facilitated by Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

This workshop will provide framework to support the course design process guided by the principles of constructive alignment. We will consider how course-level learning outcomes can be aligned with assessments and teaching and learning activities.

Getting Ready to Teach this Summer: Lessons from the Past Year

Facilitated by Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology; Ann Gagné, Educational Developer (Universal Design for Learning), Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre; and Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

This session is geared toward instructors who are teaching remotely for the first time this summer. We will provide an overview of things to keep in mind when teaching remotely, informed by UTM instructors’ experiences this past year.

TLC Year-End Reflection

Facilitated by Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology; Ann Gagné, Educational Developer (Universal Design for Learning), Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre; and Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Connect with your colleagues to reflect on this past year in an interactive, collaborative session. This session will provide an opportunity to share pedagogical strategies that worked well and to ask your colleagues for suggestions to address challenges that you encountered during the term.

Teaching with Technology Showcase

Facilitated by Simone Laughton, Head, Library & Instructional Technologies, UTM Library; Kenneth Berry, Instructional Technologies Specialist, UTM Library; and Angie Cappiello, Instructional Technologies Specialist, UTM Library

This session will highlight how UTM instructors are enhancing learning environments for their students by integrating technology into their courses. The goal of the session is to spark new ideas and to facilitate a conversation about the effective use of technology to support and enhance instructional practices.

Mental Health Syllabus Workshop

Facilitated by Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology; and Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

This workshop will explore how the syllabus is a foundational document to support mental wellness for students and instructors. Participants will have an opportunity to review their syllabi and apply wellness concepts for future iterations of their course.

Dish With One Spoon Treaty Workshop

Facilitated by Ange Loft

In this workshop participants will be presented with treaty information through the lens of foundational agreements. Participants reflect on their personal relationship to treaty through discussion around Indigenous practices of gift giving, kin building, resource sharing, and acknowledgement.

Curriculum Mapping

Facilitated by Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

This workshop will outline how to engage in effective curriculum mapping, and will highlight the opportunities that can arise from the mapping process and dissemination of the maps themselves. We will discuss mapping at the assignment, course, and program level, and will explore different ways to both use and disseminate curricular maps.

Demystifying the Dossier Series: Preparing the Teaching Dossier

Facilitated by Megan Burnett, Associate Director, Centre for Teaching Support & Innovation, University of Toronto & Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre.

At the University of Toronto, teaching dossiers must be submitted as part of the review process for tenure or continuing status. This session will provide an overview of the content and structure of an effective teaching dossier, focusing on dossiers prepared for a review process, and with an emphasis on how to align this document with divisional and institutional expectations. Session participants will review the distinctive qualities of a teaching dossier, and will develop a plan for assembling and strengthening their own dossiers.

Community Engaged Learning

Facilitated by Michael DeBraga, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream; Experiential Learning Faculty Liaison; Jennifer Esmail, Assistant Director, Experiential Learning and Centre for Community Partnerships; Joan Simalchik, Associate Professor, Department of Historical Studies and Women's Studies, and Alysha Ferguson, Manager, Community Engaged Learning, Centre for Student Engagement

This workshop will provide an introduction to "community-engaged learning" (CEL) as a pedagogy and practice. Attendees will learn about the foundational pedagogical principles of CEL, how CEL differs from other forms of experiential learning, and some introductory considerations for course design and partnership development.

Indigenous Lunch & Learn

Introductions: Tee Duke, UTM Assistant Director, Indigenous Initiatives

Presenters:

Jennifer Adese, Canada Research Chair in Métis Women, Politics, and Community. Associate Professor, Department of Sociology
Kristen Bos, Assistant Professor, Women and Gender Institute/Department of Historical Studies. Co-director of the Technoscience Research Unit

This lunch and learn is an opportunity to meet and hear about research that is being lead by Indigenous scholars on campus.

Dr. Jennifer Adese will be speaking to: "Extinguishing the Dead: Colonial Anxieties and Métis Scrip Research"

Dr. Kristen Bos's talk will be speaking to how she/we cultivate values and protocols, which includes comfort as a right and refusal as an ethic, at her environmental data justice lab at the Technoscience Research Unit.

Round-Table Discussion: Inclusive Pedagogy - Equity Approaches

Facilitated by Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Skills Centre; Fran Odette, Professor, George Brown University; and Nythalah Baker Director, Equity, Diversity & Inclusion

In this roundtable we will discuss comprehensive approaches to a more equitable pedagogy. We will explore how race, class, disability, and LGBTQ2S+ awareness can intersect and are part of an inclusive pedagogy and curriculum.

Statistics for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL)

Presented by Tingting Zhu, Lecturer (CLTA), Department of Geography, Geomatics, and Environment, Carly Prusky, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre & Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre.

This workshop will address some of the common uses for statistics in SOTL work, and is an opportunity for faculty to ask questions about the statistical framing of research.

Compassion Fatigue Workshop

Facilitated by Shawna Percy, Life Voice

Based on the work of registered Psychotherapist and renowned speaker Francoise Mathieu, the Compassion Fatigue Workshop addresses the impact of burnout and vicarious trauma, and discusses how to get back to a place where we function out of a healthy capacity as instructors relating to learners.

How You Can Help Students Develop Their Foundational Academic Skills

Facilitated by the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

If students are to be successful both in specific courses and in their academic careers, they need to master a number of academic skills - and instructors can help them do that. In this workshop, members of the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre will provide attendees with resources and activities to help students develop the foundational academic skills they need, with the emphasis on activities that do not require a great deal of preparation, that can be done in 10 minutes or less, and that can be integrated with your teaching of content.

The session will provide activities and tips for helping students with the following five academic skills:

effective reading;
notetaking;
study planning & distributed practice;
academic integrity; and
problem solving

Voice Care for Instructors

Facilitated by Jake Simons

As instructors, care and use of our voice is often not something that is commonly part of our course preparation. Join us as we explore techniques that will strengthen your voice and will help provide care for your vocal cords as you teach remotely.

Winter Camp for Instructors

Facilitated by Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology; Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre; & Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre.

During this two-hour workshop we will highlight what worked (and what didn’t) during the fall term, looking forward to designing courses for Winter 2021. The session will share strategies related to course policies and syllabi, assessments, synchronous and asynchronous lectures, and managing student workload. We will also discuss approaches for supporting students, building community, and managing instructor workload. The workshop will be followed by a 2-hour drop-in session the next day (Tuesday, December 15^th from 10am - 12pm) that aims to help instructors apply the strategies discussed to their individual courses.

Round-Table Discussion: Racially-Inclusive Pedagogy

Join us for a roundtable where we discuss racially-inclusive pedagogical strategies that you can use both in-class and remotely. This is an opportunity to pose questions about how to make your courses, and assessments more inclusive.

Creating Accessible Documents and Inclusive Course Design

Facilitated by Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

This session will review inclusive course design and assessment possibilities in a holistic manner. We will explore document requirements for accessibility and how to address barriers to inclusivity in your courses.

Organizational Strategies for Teaching

Facilitated by Rafael Chiuzi, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Institute for Management and Innovation

In this session, participants will have the opportunity to learn different organizational strategies and management techniques to enhance their teaching and self-organization. From your strengths and weaknesses to elaborating planned approaches to innovation, this session is designed to offer several tools to help instructors think about their teaching.

TDI (Teaching Development & Innovation) Grant Winner Showcase

Presented by Bogdan Simion, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Mathematical and Computational Sciences, and Vivienne Luk, Assistant Professor, Teaching Steam, Department of Chemical and Physical Sciences and Department of Forensic Science

This session provides an opportunity for our TDI-award-winning instructors to share their pedagogical research with colleagues in short, 10-minute presentations. The TDI Grant Winner Showcase is also a great opportunity for faculty to gather ideas and learn more about the innovative teaching and learning initiatives happening on the UTM campus.

More information on the TDI Grant and other Teaching and Learning Grants from UTM can be found here: https://www.utm.utoronto.ca/tlc/funding-award-opportunities/teaching-learning-grants#tdi

Multimodality: Pedagogy and Technology

Facilitated by Rosa Junghwa Hong, Assistant, Professor, Teaching Stream, French Program Department of Language Studies; Elizabeth Parke, Senior Research Associate, Collaborative Digital Research Space; and Joanna Szurmak, Research Services & Liaison Librarian

In a series of lightning talks, faculty will present examples of how multimodality and universal design for learning (UDL) strategies have worked with their assessments. Faculty will speak to the pedagogy of the tools they have used and how the tools have supported active learning and engagement.

Indigenous Student Panel and Curriculum Workshop

This panel will discuss the importance of an Indigenous curriculum in all aspects of pedagogy at the University of Toronto. We will provide some resources and examples of Indigenous initiatives that are taking place in UTM classrooms and communities, led by both students and faculty. We will converse on the importance for all UTM students and faculty to understand the long-lasting consequences of the historical relationships between Universities and Indigenous peoples in Canada, and begin a discourse on possible ways for UTM to move forward toward reconciliation. This panel differs from previous years, in that the dialogue will center around the needs and perspectives of Indigenous students.

The panel will be immediately followed by a two-hour Indigenous Curriculum Workshop. As a response to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls to Action, this workshop will focus on approaches to Indigenizing and decolonizing the curriculum. We will focus on an overview of incorporating inclusive pedagogy and Indigenous ways of knowing into courses. Participants will also have the opportunity to bring a current course syllabus with them to reflect on Indigenizing and decolonizing their specific courses.

Mid-Term Instructor Check-In

Facilitated by Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology & Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Reflecting on your teaching practice is critical to your learning and development. It can help you find solutions to challenges that arise within the learning environment. This session provides an opportunity for you to reflect on how the term has been going, to ask any questions that may have come up, and to check-in with your colleagues.

Academic Integrity Panel

Panelists:
- Lucy Gaspini (Director, Academic Success & Integrity Panel)
- Lisa Devereaux (Manager, Academic Integrity and Affairs)
- Michael Kaler, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Writing Specialist for the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre
- Chet Scoville, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of English
- Steve Szigeti, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream,Institute of Communications, Culture, Information and Technology
- Christoph Richter, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Biology
- TJ Yusun, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Mathematical and Computational Sciences
- Navdeep, Student panelist

This panel will explore academic integrity issues from the faculty, student, and administrative perspective. In this dialogue faculty will present research on academic integrity as well as explore what academic integrity means to students.

Creating an Equitable Classroom

Facilitated by Michael Kasprzak, Assistant Director, TATP/CTSI Teaching and Learning, and Jasjit Sangha, Learning Strategist, Academic Success Centre

In this interactive workshop, we focus on how to bring an equity lens to your work as an educator. Participants can expect to troubleshoot case studies in groups, write reflectively on one’s own and identify teaching practices to adopt this semester online (together and individually). To do this, we think through unconscious bias, the role of language and engage in deep listening to draw awareness to power relations in the classroom.

Facilitating Synchronous Tutorials for Teaching Assistants

Facilitated by Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre and Jessica Carlos, Graduate Student Support Strategist, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

This session will address strategies for engagement and classroom management for synchronous tutorial and practical sessions. We will look at similarities and differences between in-person and online classroom management and provide strategies and tools to foster an engaging community online for different course enrollment sizes. Join us with your questions for a lively and informative session to help prepare for the coming term.

Ready, Set, Teach Day (Online)

View Event Timetable

How do I start off on the right foot on the first day of class? How can I protect my students’ and my own wellbeing throughout the term? What are pedagogical opportunities for remote teaching and learning? What support and resources does the UTM campus offer instructors? The fall term can bring both excitement and uncertainty, but Ready, Set Teach Day will help set you up for success as you jump into the new term. All sessions will provide opportunities to learn from and with other UTM instructors.

Summer 2020 Events

Prepare for Fall Term: Community Building for Remote Courses

Webinar

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology
Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Community building is an important component to remote course delivery. This webinar will address the similarities and differences between in-person and online community building and provide strategies and tools for instructors and teaching assistants to use to foster an engaging community and support classroom management.

Prepare for Fall Term: Inclusive Assessment Design

Webinar

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology
Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

This webinar will review inclusive assessment possibilities for online courses. By keeping learning outcome alignment in mind, we will explore how to design assessments with academic integrity and pedagogical rigour that will be appropriate for remote delivery.

Summer Camp for Instructors: Prepare for Fall Term

Webinars, Workshops, and Asynchronous modules

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology
Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Join us for one of our summer camps! This summer camp will consist of brief daily webinars and workshops to provide immediate and personalized strategies that will work for you and the courses you are teaching. You can select the week that is most convenient for you.

Mid-Term Instructor Check-In

Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Reflecting on your teaching practice is critical to learning and development. It can help you find solutions to challenges that arise within the learning environment. This session provides an opportunity for you to reflect on how the term has been going, to ask any questions that may have come up, and to check-in with your colleagues.

Dual Delivery Instructor Session

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Join us for a discussion on dual delivery possibilities for the fall semester. This is a space to bring in your pedagogical and technological questions in relation to dual delivery. Together we will address solutions to challenges that may arise within this learning delivery mode.

Prepare for Fall Term: Dealing with Difficult Issues in the Classroom

Webinar

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

What do I do if my students aren’t attending lecture, either online or in person? If some students are being disruptive in class? If there is an emergency in the classroom? If my online class gets zoom-bombed? If a student has disclosed a private matter to me? If one of my students is in crisis?

This session will provide an overview of difficult issues you may face as an instructor, and will highlight strategies and resources to use in order to deal with them.

Prepare for Fall Term: Inspiration and Suggestions for Using Quercus

Webinar

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology
Simone Laughton, Head, Library & Instructional Technologies, UTM Library

This session is an opportunity to learn what has worked well (and what hasn’t) for other instructors using Quercus. We will profile strategies that instructors are using for Quercus, and will also have an opportunity to troubleshoot challenges you might be facing.

Prepare for Fall Term: Syllabus Clinic

Webinar

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology
Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

With about 8 weeks before the start of the new term, now is a perfect time to update your syllabus, or start a new one from scratch. This session will help you avoid common syllabus mistakes, saving you valuable time later in the term. We will discuss strategies for managing the administrative load of teaching, and will provide an overview of additional resources you can turn to for help when needed.

Prepare for Fall Term: Why do you Need a Course Map (And How to Create One)

Webinar

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology
Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

In this session you will learn how to create a course map and the pedagogical reasons behind why it is important. The course map is the blueprint for your course, and will help you in making key instructional decisions, such as deciding mode of instruction (synchronous vs asynchronous vs hybrid). Your course syllabus will then become the student-facing version of this course map.

Just-in-Time Syllabus Clinic

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

As the next term begins July 6, 2020, this session will help you avoid common syllabus mistakes, saving you valuable time later in the term. We will discuss strategies for managing the administrative load of teaching, and will provide an overview of additional resources you can turn to for help when needed.

End-of-Term Debrief

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Join your colleagues in an end-of-term debrief session where we will discuss pedagogical strategies that worked and any challenges that you encountered during the term.This session provides an opportunity for you to reflect on the term, and to identify any supports that would help.

Just-in-Time Exam Clinic

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

In this session, happening before the exam period, we will discuss exam strategies that are appropriate to particular departments and for small or large enrollment courses. It will provide an overview of additional resources you can turn to for help when needed.

Mid-Term Instructor Check-In

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Reflecting on your teaching practice is critical to learning and development. It can help you find solutions to challenges that arise within the learning environment. This session provides an opportunity for you to reflect on how the term has been going, to ask any questions that may have come up, and to check-in with your colleagues.

Inclusive Assessment and Academic Integrity

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

This webinar will review inclusive assessment possibilities for online courses. By keeping learning outcome alignment in mind, we will explore how to design assessments with academic integrity and pedagogical rigour that will be appropriate for remote delivery.

Classroom Management & Cultivating Community in an Online Environment

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Classroom management is important in an online and remote environment. Some classroom management skills used in in-person delivery are applicable remotely; however, there are other factors specific to online delivery to keep in mind. This webinar will address the similarities and differences between in-person and online classroom management and provide strategies and tools for instructors and teaching assistants to use to foster an engaging community online.

Spring Into Online Course Design Series

This series of four webinars are designed to support faculty, instructors, and teaching assistants as they prepare for Summer 2020 Online course design and delivery.

1. An Intro To Online Teaching and Learning: The ADDIE Model

Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

This webinar will address the ADDIE Model to online course design. Focusing on Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation, and Evaluation, this webinar will give instructors the foundation needed to think about building an online course that is accessible, rigorous, and inclusive.

2. Learning Outcomes for Online Courses

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

This webinar will review creating assessable learning outcomes for online course delivery. We will look at the importance of aligning learning outcomes to course goals and assessments, as well as how to chunk content in a way that scaffolds well online.

3. Inclusive Assessment and Academic Integrity

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

This webinar will review inclusive assessment possibilities for online courses. By keeping learning outcome alignment in mind, we will explore how to design assessments with academic integrity and pedagogical rigour.

4. Just-in-Time Syllabus Clinic

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

This session will help you avoid common syllabus mistakes, saving you valuable time later in the term. We will discuss strategies for managing the administrative load of teaching, and will provide an overview of additional resources you can turn to for help when needed.

UTM Webinar Series: Helping Teaching Assistants Prepare for Supporting Students in an Online Environment

Webinar 1: Classroom Management & Cultivating Community in an Online Environment

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

Jessica Carlos, Graduate Student Support Strategist, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Classroom management is important in an online and remote environment. Some classroom management skills used in in-person delivery are applicable remotely; however, there are other factors specific to online delivery to keep in mind. This webinar will address the similarities and differences between in-person and online classroom management and provide strategies and tools to foster an engaging community online. Join us with your questions for a lively and informative session to help prepare for the coming term.

Webinar 2: Grading & Giving Effective Feedback in an Online Environment

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

Jessica Carlos, Graduate Student Support Strategist, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Feedback on activities and assessments is an integral part of teaching and learning experiences. In this webinar we will address how feedback strategies typically used in in-person tutorial, practical, and lecture delivery translates to a remote teaching and learning environment. We will discuss effective and efficient workflows using evidence-based pedagogy and address the tools available to grade and give feedback remotely.

Curriculum Mapping

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

This workshop will outline how to engage in effective curriculum mapping, and will highlight the opportunities that can arise from the mapping process and dissemination of the maps themselves. We will discuss mapping at the assignment, course, and program level, and will explore different ways to both use and disseminate curricular maps.

Demystifying the Dossier Series: Preparing the Teaching Dossier

Workshop

Megan Burnett, Associate Director, Centre for Teaching Support & Innovation, University of Toronto

At the University of Toronto, teaching dossiers must be submitted as part of the process for tenure review or continuing status review. This session will provide an overview of the content and structure of an effective teaching dossier, focusing on dossiers prepared for a review process, and with an emphasis on how to align this document with divisional and institutional expectations. Session participants will review the distinctive qualities of a teaching dossier, and will develop a plan for assembling and strengthening their own dossiers. They will also be led through the first steps of composing a Statement of Teaching Philosophy.

Special note: this workshop will focus on the preparation of a teaching dossier by appointed faculty members for the purposes of undergoing a review process (tenure or continuing status). Teaching dossiers prepared for job searches carry different expectations and will not be the main focus of this session. Instructors preparing job application dossiers are still welcome to participate in this workshop.

Faculty Panel: Encouraging Attendance, Engagement, and Preparation

Panel

Jade Atallah, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology, UTM
Rosa Junghwa Hong, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Language Studies, UTM
Steve Szigeti, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Institute of Communications, Culture, Information and Technology, UTM

Join us to engage in a critical discussion focused on encouraging student attendance, engagement and preparation. Panel members, representing a variety of disciplines, will comment on the challenges of encouraging student attendance, engagement and preparation and will share ideas and advice. The panelists will address the following questions:

Are there any instructional strategies that have worked particularly well for encouraging student attendance, engagement, and preparation?
Are there any instructional strategies that you implemented to try to encourage student attendance, engagement, and preparation that did not work as you expected?
When it comes to student engagement, where do you draw the line between the responsibilities of the instructor and the responsibilities of the students?
What are your thoughts on making attendance and/or participation part of the grading scheme for a course?

Mid-Term Instructor Check-In

Webinar

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology
Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Reflecting on your teaching practice is critical to your learning and development. It can help you find solutions to challenges that arise within the learning environment. This session provides an opportunity for you to reflect on how the term has been going, to ask any questions that may have come up, and to check-in with your colleagues.

How You Can Help Students Develop Their Foundational Academic Skills

Lightning Talks

Andie Burazin, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, CLTA, Department of Mathematical & Computational Sciences & Numeracy and Scientific Literacy Specialist, RGASC
Michael deBraga, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream & WIL Faculty Liaison, RGASC
Tyler Evans-Tokaryk, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream & Director, RGASC
Michael Kaler, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream & Writing Specialist, RGASC
Thomas Klubi, Learning Strategist and Program Manager, RGSAC
Kerrie Martin, Program Strategist, RGASC
Laura Taylor, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream & English Language Learner (ELL) Specialist, RGASC

If students are to be successful both in specific courses and in their academic careers, they need to master a number of academic skills - and instructors can help them do that. In this workshop, members of the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre will provide attendees with resources and activities to help students develop the foundational academic skills they need, with the emphasis on activities that do not require a great deal of preparation, that can be done in 10 minutes or less, and that can be integrated with your teaching of content.

The session will provide activities and tips for helping students with the following five academic skills:

effective reading;
notetaking;
study planning & distributed practice;
academic integrity; and
problem solving.

Fall 2019 Events

Faculty Showcase: Innovative Assessment

Lightning Talks

Learn about some of the innovative ways UTM instructors are assessing student learning. Join us for four lightning talks meant to spark ideas for new assessment strategies you could try in your own classroom. Showcased assessments include:

Taking Student Research Public (Historical Studies)

Daniel Guadagnolo, Sessional Lecturer, Department of Historical Studies

Team-based capstone project (World Building – Earth Science)

Lindsay Schoenbohm, Associate Professor & Chair, Earth Science, Department of Chemical & Physical Sciences

Cross-Curricular Case Competition (Innovat-ED – Language Studies)

Liz Coulson, Lecturer, Department of Language Studies; Ilan Danjoux, Lecturer, Department of Language Studies; & Rosa Hong, Assistant Professor Teaching Stream, Department of Language Studies

Problem-based learning (Virtual Mystery Project - Anthropology)

Sherry Fukazawa, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Anthropology & Andrew Petersen, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Mathematical & Computational Sciences

Indigenous Lunch and Learn: Reconciliation

Maria Hupfield, Assistant Professor Department of Visual Studies and Department of English & Drama, Canada Research Chair in Transdisciplinary Indigenous Arts

Robin Gray, Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology

Sherry Fukuzawa, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream & Associate Chair, Department of Anthropology

Nicole Laliberte, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Geography

This lunch and learn is an opportunity to meet, acknowledge place and space, discuss reconciliation, and think about strategies to put discourse into practice.

UTM Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) Showcase

Lightning Talks

This session provides an opportunity for instructors to share their pedagogical research with colleagues in short, 10-minute presentations. It is a great opportunity to gather ideas and learn more about the innovative teaching and learning initiatives happening on the UTM campus. The following projects will be discussed:

“MAT133Y5 Renewal” (TDI Grant recipient, November 2018)

Tyler Holden, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Mathematical & Computational Sciences and Andie Burazin, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, CLTA, Mathematical & Computational Sciences & Numeracy and Scientific Literacy Specialist, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

“STiTCH via Quercus: A Cross-Course Student Collaboration Project in Forensic Science” (TDI Grant recipient, May 2018)

Vivienne Luk, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Anthropology, Forensic Science Program

“Evaluating the Impact of Geo-Gebra on Student Engagement in a First-Year University Linear Algebra Course” (TDI Grant recipient, May 2018)

Xinli Wang, Sessional Lecturer, Department of Mathematical and Computational Sciences

"Students' participation and self-presentation in academic integrity related cases"

Michael Kaler, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream & Writing Specialist, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre; Chester Scoville, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of English and Drama; Steve Szigeti, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Institute of Communications, Culture, Information and Technology; & Christoph Richter, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology

Tips for Preparing a Teaching Development & Innovation Grant Proposal

Seminar

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology, UTM

The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) investigates teaching and learning issues to find context-relevant and evidence-informed solutions. In this workshop we look at how to get a project started and different approaches to SoTL work. Bring your SoTL idea and explore possible forms of evidence and approaches to analysis as well as considerations for ethics and funding. We also look at where to find more resources and how to make SoTL work public.

Mid-Term Instructor Check-In

Webinar

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology
Ann Gagné, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Reflecting on your teaching practice is critical to learning and development. It can help you find solutions to challenges that arise within the learning environment. This session provides an opportunity for you to reflect on how the term has been going, to ask any questions that may have come up, and to check-in with your colleagues.

Setting Up Student Teams for Success: A Workshop on the Agile Method of Project Management as Applied to Team-Based Undergraduate Research Projects

Workshop

Paul Piunno, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Chemical & Physical Sciences and winner of the 2018-19 President’s Teaching Award.

This workshop will begin with an overview of the Agile method of project management and why it may be the preferred project management technique for engaging students in team-based research projects. The online Agile project management system, Kerika, will be demonstrated, with attention focused on how it may be used to effectively engage students as members of high-performance teams. Participants are encouraged to bring a laptop computer so that they may set up their own Agile storyboards.

UTM Ready, Set, Teach Day

How do I start off on the right foot on the first day of class?
How can I protect my students’ and my own wellbeing throughout the term?
What are active learning classrooms and what pedagogical opportunities do they offer?
What support and resources does the UTM campus offer instructors?

The fall term can bring both excitement and uncertainty, but Ready, Set Teach Day will help set you up for success as you jump into the new term. All sessions will provide opportunities to learn from and with other UTM instructors.

9:30-10:00	Registration & Coffee (IB 335)
10:00-10:30	Welcome (IB335) How to Do a Land Acknowledgement Who Are Our Students?
10:30-11:30	Faculty Lightning Talks: Setting The Tone: The First Lecture (IB 335) Vivienne Luk: “Connections Before Content” Judith Poe: “The Rest of the Story” Katherine Rehner: “Building a Classroom Community” Teresa Lobalsamo: "What Goes Around, Comes Around: Tips for a Top First Lecture" Ken Derry: “Setting the tone: The First Lecture” Elizabeth Coulson: TBD Helene Wagner: “Don’t tell them – show them!” Sarah Richardson: "Why Coffee or Tea is always my first Question: Sign up Sheets and Class Community Building" Barbara Murck: ““It’s Not a Course, It’s a Way of Life”
11:30 – 12:15	What Do I Do If...? Dealing With Challenging Situations (IB 335)	Quercus Instructor Help (IB 340)
12:15 – 1:00	Lunch (IB345)
1:00 – 2:00	Interactive Workshop - An Actor's Guide to Vocal Care and Performance Strategy: Advice for the Classroom (IB 335)	Active Learning Classroom Showcase (MN 1270)
2:05 – 3:00	Faculty Lightning Talks: My Best Teaching Advice (IB 335) Maria Hupfield: “Addressing Indigenous Content and Students in the Classroom” Michael Kaler: "Using the Syllabus as a Tool for Clarifying Student Expectations and Outcomes" Paul Piunno: “The Use of Self-Reflection Reports for Effective Management of group work” Tenzin Yindok: “Creating Personal Learning Experiences for Students” Tyler Holden: “A Secret Weapon That You Already Bring To Class” Andrijana Burazin: “Having a Beginner’s Mind” Elizabeth Parke: "White Boards, Handouts, & PPT Key Tools for Low Stakes Group Work" Alex Rennet: "Why Charity is Important in Teaching"
3:00 onwards	Community Building: The Conversation Continues (DV 3130 - Council Chambers)

Prepare to Teach: What do I do if?: Dealing with difficult issues in the classroom

July 23rd from 11am - 12pm, offered online

What do I do if my students aren’t coming to lecture? If some students are being disruptive in class? If there is an emergency in the classroom? If a student has disclosed a private matter to me? If one of my students is in crisis? This session will provide an overview of difficult issues you may face as an instructor, and will highlight strategies and resources to use in order to deal with them.

Prepare to Teach: Inspiration and suggestions for using Quercus

July 16th from 11am - 12pm, offered online

We have now had a year with our new LMS Quercus. This session is an opportunity to learn what has worked well (and what hasn’t) for other instructors using Quercus. We will profile strategies that instructors are using for Quercus, and will also have an opportunity to trouble shoot challenges you might be facing.

Prepare to Teach: Syllabus Clinic

July 9th from 11am - 12pm, offered online

There are about 8 weeks before you need to submit your syllabi for fall courses – a perfect time to update your syllabus, or start a new one from scratch. This session will help you avoid common syllabus mistakes, saving you valuable time later in the term. We will discuss strategies for managing the administrative load of teaching, and will provide an overview of additional resources you can turn to for help when needed.

ALC Show & Share (Showcase)

May 1, 2019 from 11am-12pm, NE 2170

UTM’s Active Learning Classrooms (ALC) provide instructors from all disciplines with a unique opportunity to explore how space, active learning pedagogy and technology can promote student learning. During this session, instructors who have taught in the ALCs this year will share how they facilitate a student-centered learning environment in their courses through active learning strategies, technology and classroom space. All are welcome to attend - no experience teaching in an ALC is necessary.

TLC year-end lunch (Celebration)

May 1, 2019 from 12-1pm, NE 2100

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology, UTM

Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM

This is your chance to share and showcase teaching & learning successes (and challenges) from the past year. Please join us for lunch followed by several informal sessions, sharing opportunities, and discussions of challenges.

Getting started in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) (Workshop)

April 17, 2019 from 10am-1pm in NE 5128

Nicola Simmons, Assistant Professor, Department of Graduate and Undergraduate Studies in Education, Brock University.

The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) investigates teaching and learning issues to find context-relevant and evidence-informed solutions. In this workshop we look at how to get a project started and different approaches to SoTL work. Bring your SoTL idea and explore possible forms of evidence and approaches to analysis as well as considerations for ethics and funding. We also look at where to find more resources and how to make SoTL work public.

Dr. Nicola Simmons is a faculty member in Educational Studies at Brock University. She has held national and international leadership roles in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning and was Founding Chair of SoTL Canada as well as past chair of the Educational Developers Caucus. Her work focuses on higher and adult education, including the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. She has given hundreds of workshops in teaching and learning over the past 35 years. In 2017, she was named a 3M National Teaching Fellow and Brock’s inaugural Open Access Award winner, and in 2016 received an inaugural Educational Developers’ Caucus Distinguished Educational Development Career Award. Currently, she holds a Brock Chancellor’s Chair for Teaching Excellence.

How to identify and mitigate unconscious bias in teaching and learning (Seminar)

April 9, 2019 from 12:30-1:30pm in NE 5128

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology, UTM

This session will present an overview of unconscious bias, specifically looking at the teaching and learning context. We will explore how to identify different types of implicit bias, and will examine strategies to prevent and/or mitigate this bias.

Demystifying the dossier series: Preparing the teaching dossier (Workshop)

March 19, 2019 from 11am-1:30pm in NE 5128

Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM

Megan Burnett, Associate Director, Centre for Teaching Support and Innovation, University of Toronto

At the University of Toronto, teaching dossiers must be submitted as part of the review process for tenure review or continuing status review. This session will provide an overview of the content and structure of an effective teaching dossier, with an emphasis on how to align this document with divisional and institutional expectations. Session participants will review the distinctive qualities of a teaching dossier, and will develop a plan for assembling and strengthening their own dossiers. They will also be led through the first steps of composing a Statement of Teaching Philosophy.

Moving from feedback to feedforward: Best practices and useful tips (Workshop)

March 7, 2019 from 2-4pm in NE 5128

Michael Kaler, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream & Writing Specialist, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM

In this workshop, we'll discuss the differences between viewing responses to student work as (summative) 'feedback' versus (formative) 'feedforward.' We'll talk about how to integrate responses into the structure of the course as a whole, discuss best practices to make sure that our feedforward is taken seriously by students, and get some hands-on practice in applying these techniques to student writing.

Indigenous curriculum reform initiatives at UTM (Panel)

February 27, 2019 from 12-1pm in NE 5128

Panel members:

Jennifer Adese, (Otipemisiw / Metis) Associate Professor, Department of Sociology, UTM.
Robin Gray, Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology, UTM. Dr. Gray is Ts’msyen from Lax Kw’alaams, BC, and Mikisew Cree, with Dene roots, from Fort Chipewyan, AB.
Stepfanie Johnston is an Anishinaabe/Metis student. MA Anthropology with a Collaborative Specialization in Indigenous Health
Nicole Laliberte, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Geography, UTM
Sherry Fukuzawa, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Anthropology, UTM
Cat Criger, Indigenous Advisor, UTM

This panel will discuss the importance of an Indigenous curriculum in all Divisions at UTM. We will provide some resources and examples of Indigenous initiatives that are taking place in UTM classrooms. We will converse on the importance for all UTM students and faculty to understand the long lasting consequences of the historical relationship between Universities and Indigenous peoples in Canada, and begin a discourse on possible ways for UTM to move toward reconciliation.

Faculty perspectives on active learning (Panel)

February 7, 2019 from 2:30-4pm in NE 5128

Panel members:

Yuhong He, Associate Professor, Department of Geography, UTM
Sanja Hinić-Frlog, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of BIology
Paul Piunno, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Chemical and Physical Sciences
Chester Scoville, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of English and Drama, UTM

Join us to gather ideas and advice from experienced colleagues for integrating active learning opportunities in both small and large courses. Panel members, representing a variety of disciplines, will comment on the challenges of implementing active learning and will share ideas and advice. The panelists will address the following questions:

What key components make active learning activities effective? Are there any strategies you have found particularly effective?
How do you address student resistance to active learning?
What strategies do you use to facilitate group work?
How you make time for active learning while still ensuring you cover all of your course content?
How do you use technology to facilitate active learning?

Faculty perspectives on teaching large classes (Panel)

November 13, 2018 from 1-2:30pm in NE 5128

Panel members:

Ken Derry, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Historical Studies;
Sherry Fukazawa, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Anthropology;
Judith Poë, Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Chemical & Physical Sciences;
Alex Rennet, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Mathematical and Computational Sciences

Join us to gather ideas and advice for teaching large classes from experienced colleagues. Panel members, representing a variety of disciplines, will comment on the challenges of teaching large classes and will share ideas and advice. The panelists will address the following questions:

How do you manage the logistical/administrative issues that come with teaching a large class?
How do you counteract anonymity in large classes?
Are there any teaching strategies that you have found particularly effective for teaching large classes?
How do you handle assessment in large classes?
What advice do you have for working with TAs?

Where you fit in the big picture: Aligning your course with program expectations (Seminar)

November 8, 2018 from 1-2pm in NE 5128

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology, UTM

In this session, we will explore how to align your course and assignments with broader program expectations and learning outcomes. We will discuss how to identify potential gaps and alignment opportunities. Both challenges and strategies will be explored through this workshop.

Course design 101: Designing effective assessments (Workshop)

October 30, 2018 from 10am-12pm in NE 4107

Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM

This workshop will provide an overview of the core principles and strategies of effective assessment design. A survey of assessment strategies and their alignment with different learning outcomes will also be shared. Participants will be asked to analyze sample assignments and reflect on the design of their own assignments.

The dreaded group project: Tips for supporting meaningful student collaboration (Seminar)

October 17, 2018 from 1-2pm in NE 4107

Monika Havelka, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Geography

Having students work in groups to produce any type of “deliverable” – a report, a presentation, etc. – has intrinsic pedagogical value, and models professional behaviour in many disciplines. However, the experience can be fraught with difficulties for students and instructors alike. How do we make group work a positive, equitable learning experience? This seminar will draw on experiences I have had teaching several courses with very heavy reliance on group work to produce a significant final product – we will talk about what works and what doesn’t in terms of fostering “buy-in” and enthusiasm among group members, maintaining personal accountability, and developing good project management skills that students can take forward into the workplace or into higher levels of academia.

Developing students' critical reading skills (Workshop)

September 27, 2018 from 11am-1pm in NE 5128

Tyler Evans-Tokaryk, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream & Director, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

This workshop will present a brief overview of the scholarship on critical reading, focusing in particular on studies testing the efficacy of specific reading strategies and on research documenting the impact of different methods of instruction. It will then take participants through a set of interactive exercises practicing different reading methods using academic texts from across the curriculum. One of the primary aims of this workshop is to provide instructors with strategies for integrating writing support into their classes without sacrificing or compromising coverage of course content.

Course design 101: Writing learning outcomes (Workshop)

September 19, 2018 from 2-4pm in NE 5128

Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM

Carefully written learning outcomes provide numerous benefits for both students and instructors. This session will begin with a brief review of relevant literature and an introduction to key resources for writing learning outcomes. The majority of the session will be spent practicing writing clear, measurable, and meaningful learning outcomes. Participants are encouraged to bring a copy of a syllabus for a course for which they would like to develop learning outcomes or revise existing ones.

Preparing to teach: A just-in-time syllabus clinic (Workshop)

August 30, 2018 from 1:20-2:20 pm

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology, UTM

Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM

Classes are just around the corner, and you’ll need to submit your syllabus soon. This session will help you avoid common syllabus mistakes, saving you valuable time later in the term. We will discuss strategies for managing the administrative load of teaching, and will provide an overview of additional resources you can turn to for help when needed.

Understanding Student Stress as an Academic Integrity Risk Factor

Seminar, April 23, 2018 @ 12:00 p.m. - 1:00 p.m. in IB 210

Daniela Janes, Senior Lecturer, Department of English & Drama, UTM; Michael Kaler, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream & Writing Specialist, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM; & Chet Scoville, Assistant Professor, Department of English & Drama, UTM.

The issue of academic integrity is a perennial concern, as students’ unethical use of sources hampers their intellectual growth, inhibits their development into disciplinary insiders, damages their sense of ethics and self-image, and consumes a great deal of instructors’ time and energy. Academic integrity is often approached in a way that emphasizes legal aspects and penalties; however, research shows that the motives for improper behavior are often grounded in contextual factors, such as student stress, more than intellectual criminality. Thus, it seems to us that giving students tools to help them cope with their stress might be useful in addressing academic integrity issues, as well as supporting student wellness and autonomy. In this presentation we will discuss a project (developed for a large, first year English course) in which the goal to provide students with those tools, both for their own wellbeing and to see if this decreases the temptation to plagiarize. In this session, we will present our project, our motivations, the research context, and the (preliminary) results.

By the end of the session, particpiants will have developed their understanding of the role of wellness and stress management in the fostering of academic integrity, been exposed to some of the research on the topic, learned about one approach to addressing these issues, and shared in our planning and lessons learned. We will also provide an example of a student stress management module for participants to reflect upon.

Daniela Janes has been teaching in the Department of English and Drama at UTM since 2006, and has been working with students as a Writing Instructor at the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre since 2013. She holds a doctorate in English literature from the University of Toronto. She has published on historical fiction, social reform writing, reader-writer interactivity, and the short story cycle. Her interest in helping students build skills and confidence in their writing has led to her current pedagogical research, which focuses upon the relationship between stress and plagiarism in the context of her large first-year literature class.

Michael Kaler is an Assistant Professor and Writing Specialist at the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, where his research interests include writing program assessment and productive feedback. He holds doctorates from Université Laval (Quebec, QC) in sciences religieuse and York University (Toronto, ON) in ethnomusicology, and a MA in sciences religiouses from U. Laval; he is also TESL-Canada and TESL-Ontario certified and has taught English both in the private sector and with the Graduate Centre for Academic Communication at the University of Toronto. He has published widely on such topics as ancient gnosticism, early Christian heterodoxy, the Grateful Dead, science fiction, and the musical expression of religious experience. He reintroduced the teaching of the Coptic language to the Department of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations (U. Toronto), teaching there from 2005-2008, and has taught at McMaster University and York University as well.

Let's get started: Tips from a Quercus Early Adopter

Workshop, April 18, 2018 @ 2:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m. in UTM Library Classroom B, room 190

Barbara Murck, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Geography

Join us for an interactive session where Barb Murck will share her perspectives on being an early Quercus adopter. During the first hour of the session, Barb will cover general information and advice. The second hour will provide participants with an opportunity to open up their Sandbox and try out Quercus!

Exploring the Value of Board Games as Pedagogical Tools

Seminar, April 10, 2018 @ 1:00 p.m. - 2:00 p.m. in IB 210

Lee Bailey, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Economics, UTM; & Tom Klubi, Learning Strategist and Program Manager, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM

In this session, Lee and Tom will describe the approach, outcomes, and lessons learned of the game-enhanced learning project they implemented in Lee's second-year economics course. This project explored the feasibility of scaling up the use of games as teaching tools for use in larger classes (100 students).

Improving the Effectiveness of Feedback

Workshop, March 26, 2018 @ 3:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m. in DH 3050

Mairi Cowan, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Historical Studies & UTM Facutly Writing Fellow; Michael Kaler, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream & Writing Specialist, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM; & Abdullah Farooqi, PhD Candidate, Department of History and the Anne Tanenbaum Centre for Jewish Studies

We put a lot of time and effort into providing feedback for our students, because we recognize that good feedback has the potential not only to justify a grade, but also to help students improve in their future assignments. If the feedback is not understood, used, or even read by the student, however, it is not having any of the desired effects. In this presentation, we will discuss some of the recent findings of research into what makes feedback more or less likely to be used by students, and provide illustrative examples of feedback produced in a submit / revise / resubmit assignment from a large first-year History course for group discussion.

Mairi Cowan is an Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, and the Program Director for History in the Department of Historical Studies. The question of how to provide good feedback is at the centre of her project as the 2018-2019 Writing Fellow at the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre.

Michael Kaler is an Assistant Professor and Writing Specialist at the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, where his research interests include writing program assessment and productive feedback. He holds doctorates from Université Laval (Quebec, QC) in sciences religieuse and York University (Toronto, ON) in ethnomusicology, and a MA in sciences religiouses from U. Laval; he is also TESL-Canada and TESL-Ontario certified and has taught English both in the private sector and with the Graduate Centre for Academic Communication at the University of Toronto. He has published widely on such topics as ancient gnosticism, early Christian heterodoxy, the Grateful Dead, science fiction, and the musical expression of religious experience. He reintroduced the teaching of the Coptic language to the Department of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations (U. Toronto), teaching there from 2005-2008, and has taught at McMaster University and York University as well.

Abdullah Farooqi is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of History and the Anne Tanenbaum Centre for Jewish Studies at the University of Toronto. His research looks at relations between Jews, Christians, and Muslims in the medieval Mediterranean. Abdullah has extensive experience as a TA and recent experience as a Course Instructor. He also works as a peer trainer for UofT's Teaching Assistants' Training Program at the Centre for Teaching Support and Innovation, where he is interested in uses of gamification in higher education.

Teaching Critical Reading Across the Curriculum

Seminar, March 19, 2018 @ 12:00 p.m. - 1:00 p.m. in DH 2070

Tyler Evans-Tokaryk, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream and Director, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM

This workshop will present a brief overview of the scholarship on critical reading, focusing in particular on studies testing the efficacy of specific reading strategies and on research documenting the impact of different methods of instruction. It will then take participants through a set of interactive exercises practicing different reading methods using academic texts from across the curriculum. One of the primary aims of this workshop is to provide instructors with strategies for integrating writing support into their classes without sacrificing or compromising coverage of course content.

Tyler Evans-Tokaryk is an Associate Professor, Teaching Stream and the Director of the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre at UTM. His research interests include Writing Across the Curriculum, English as International Language, and critical discourse analysis; he is also involved in the assessment of RGASC programs to monitor and improve the quality of student learning. Tyler recently spent a year as a Visiting Fellow at the University of Johannesburg (South Africa) where he was introduced to some unique and effective strategies for teaching Critical Reading skills to post-secondary students.

Demystifying the Dossier Series: Preparing the Teaching Dossier

Workshop, March 7, 2018 @ 11:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m. in DH 3075

Megan Burnett, Associate Director, Centre for Teaching Support and Innovation, University of Toronto

At the University of Toronto, teaching dossiers must be submitted as part of the review process for tenure review or continuing status review. This session will provide an overview of the content and structure of an effective teaching dossier, with an emphasis on how to align this document with divisional and institutional expectations. Session participants will review the distinctive qualities of a teaching dossier, and will develop a plan for assembling and strengthening their own dossiers. They will also be led through the first steps of composing a Statement of Teaching Philosophy.

At the end of this interactive session, participants will be able to address the following questions:

What is distinctive about my approach to teaching?
What have been my major accomplishments as a teacher?
How can I effectively present my teaching skills and knowledge to a review committee?

Special note: this workshop will focus on the preparation of a teaching dossier by appointed faculty members for the purposes of undergoing a review process (tenure or continuing status). Teaching dossiers prepared for job searches carry different expectations and will not be the main focus of this session. Instructors preparing job application dossiers are still welcome to participate in this workshop.

Megan Burnett is the Associate Director of the central teaching support office at the University of Toronto, the Centre for Teaching Support & Innovation (CTSI), where she has been actively involved in faculty development for over ten years. Megan has guided the development of key initiatives at CTSI, such as the annual Course Design Institute, and created programming on active learning and lesson planning. Megan has also led resource development, workshops and consultations for faculty members preparing teaching dossiers for the purposes of tenure review, continuing status review and promotion. As Associate Director, Megan oversees a team of staff members who support educational technologies, the Scholarship of Teaching & Learning, teaching assistant training and graduate student professional development, as well as the institutional course evaluation framework and online system. Prior to becoming Associate Director, Megan was the Assistant Director of CTSI and coordinated the university-wide Teaching Assistants’ Training Program, overseeing a team of 15 graduate student peer trainers.

Megan has a Master’s degree in French literature and taught for many years as a TA and sessional lecturer at U of T before entering the realm of educational development.

Getting Innovation Up and Running: The Writing Development Initiative, how it works, and how it can help

Seminar, February 21, 2018 @ 12:00 p.m. - 1:00 p.m. in IB 210

Michael Kaler, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream & Writing Specialist, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM; & Nicole Laliberte, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Geography, UTM

If you have ideas about how you could enhance the use of writing or instruction in writing in your course, the Writing Development Initiative (WDI) could help you develop and apply them. In this seminar, we will discuss what the WDI is, why it exists, how to apply, and the criteria for application; we'll also look at ways in which it can give projects the opportunity to be tested and to grow over time. There will also be time for discussion, so please bring your questions and ideas - about writing or the WDI - and be prepared to share!

Michael Kaler is an Assistant Professor and Writing Specialist at the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, where his research interests include writing program assessment and productive feedback. He holds doctorates from Université Laval (Quebec, QC) in sciences religieuse and York University (Toronto, ON) in ethnomusicology, and a MA in sciences religiouses from U. Laval; he is also TESL-Canada and TESL-Ontario certified and has taught English both in the private sector and with the Graduate Centre for Academic Communication at the University of Toronto. He has published widely on such topics as ancient gnosticism, early Christian heterodoxy, the Grateful Dead, science fiction, and the musical expression of religious experience. He reintroduced the teaching of the Coptic language to the Department of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations (U. Toronto), teaching there from 2005-2008, and has taught at McMaster University and York University as well.

The Teaching Fellowship: A Model for Mentoring Graduate Student Teachers

Seminar, February 12, 2018 @ 12:00 p.m. - 1:00 p.m. in DH 2070

Jayne Baker, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Sociology, UTM; & Nathan Innocente, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream and Acting Associate Chair, Undergraduate - CLS, Department of Sociology, UTM

In this session, we present a teaching fellowship model developed in the Sociology department designed to mentor graduate students with little or no teaching experience. Components of this model include discussions about, and instruction in, teaching philosophies, assessment, learning outcomes, course management, and strategies for student engagement and classroom instruction. The model also includes extensive observation, instructor feedback, and one-on-one mentoring. As part of our presentation, we include feedback from graduate student fellowship participants about the strengths and weaknesses of the model.

Jayne Baker is an Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream in the Sociology department at the University of Toronto Mississauga. Her research centres on hierarchies among university institutions (Sociology of Education) to increasing student learning in core concepts and competencies including research and writing (Scholarship of Teaching and Learning). She teaches courses at all grade levels and sizes, from 12 to 1,000. In addition to teaching required courses in research methods and introductory sociology, she also teaches courses in education and a course on masculinities. As part of her interest in supporting student learning and engaging students outside of the classroom, Jayne frequently works with undergraduates and graduate students within her own research.

Nathan Innocente is an Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream in the Department of Sociology at the University of Toronto Mississauga. He teaches introductory and experiential learning courses as well as courses focusing on white-collar crimes and criminal justice. His research examines the organizational antecedents for mortgage fraud and the intersection between mortgage fraud and identity theft, as well as problem-based learning in criminology, the effectiveness of test preparation strategies, and assessments of mentorship models. With a significant focus on mentorship, he has worked with over forty graduate and undergraduate students during his five years at UTM, including through independent study courses, teaching and research opportunity programs, and the graduate teaching fellowship.

Creating a More Equitable Classroom: Questions, Considerations and Practices

Lunch & Learn, February 2, 2018 @ 11:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m. in DH 3050

Marie Vander Kloet, Assistant Director, TATP/CTSI Teaching and Learning, CTSI, UTSG; & Jasjit Sangha, Faculty Liaison, CTSI, UTSG

In this interactive workshop, we focus on how to bring an equity lens to your work as an educator. Participants can expect to troubleshoot case studies in groups, write reflectively on one’s own and identify teaching practices to adopt this semester (together and individually). To do this, we will think through unconscious bias, the role of language and engage in deep listening to draw awareness to power relations in the classroom.

Marie Vander Kloet is the Assistant Director, Teaching Assistants Training Program/Centre for Teaching Support and Innovation (TATP/CTSI) at the University of Toronto. Marie leads the TATP - a peer-training program providing pedagogical support to the three campuses of the University of Toronto for teaching assistants and graduate students. At CTSI, Marie contributes to all aspects of CTSI programming, research and services; her areas of foci include graduate student teaching development and accessibility, equity and inclusion. Prior to becoming an educational developer, Marie completed her PhD in Sociology and Equity Studies in Education and the Graduate Collaborative Program in Women and Gender Studies at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto.

Jasjit Sangha is Faculty Liaison, Teaching and Learning, at The Centre for Teaching Support and Innovation at the University of Toronto. She supports faculty through individual consultations, providing feedback on teaching dossiers, in-class observations, and support with teaching award files. She is also involved with work related to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, the Peer2Peer Faculty Mentorship Project, equity related programming and the development of resources. She completed her PhD in Adult Education at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto.

Introducing ‘Learning How to Learn’ Principles: Concepts and Impact on the Student Experience

Seminar, January 26, 2018 @ 1:00 p.m. - 2:00 p.m. in IB340

Tanya Kirsch, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Management

In combining learning science with pedagogy, a number of “Learning How to Learn” concepts from a Coursera “Massive Open Online Course” (MOOC) were introduced into the pedagogy of a third year Finance course with the aim of enhancing student learning both inside and outside the classroom. This practical session shares and discusses the ideas, tools and techniques of “Learning How to Learn” and highlights its impact on the student learning experience. The session is relevant to a variety of disciplines as the tools are generic, and not specific to the Finance course where they were introduced. The tools were used in a class size of 65 students, but can be applied equally to both small and large class formats.

Tanya Kirsch is an Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream at the University of Toronto (Mississauga). She teaches Finance and Investments courses, as well as the occasional Accounting course. Tanya studied in South Africa where she obtained her CA CPA and CFA designations. She has worked both in the Accounting profession (with Ernst & Young in Cape Town and in Toronto), and in the Investment profession as an equity analyst and portfolio manager. Tanya has taught Finance and Accounting as a sessional lecturer at Ryerson and The Schulich School of Business, and has taught full time at UTM since 2012.

Students as examiners: crowd-sourced exam preparation

Paul Denny, Department of Computer Science, University of Auckland

Seminar, December 6, 2017 @ 1:00 - 2:30 p.m.

In many classrooms, students expend significant effort preparing to be examined. Self-testing, by answering practice questions, is popular with many students and is known to be effective. However, large repositories of practice questions are not always readily available and can be very time consuming for instructors to create. So what happens when students generate their own practice questions, targeting the material they are learning, and contribute them to a shared repository where they can be answered, rated and discussed by their peers? What do students think about this, how useful are the questions in practice and does the activity help students learn? It turns out there are many interesting answers to these questions. This talk will introduce the motivation for having students build and moderate their own practice question banks, and will report on some of the practical challenges and measurable benefits, drawing upon data from popular online tools that host millions of student-generated questions.

Paul Denny is a senior lecturer in Computer Science at the University of Auckland. His interests include developing and evaluating technologies for supporting collaborative learning, particularly involving student-generated resources, and for exploring ways to motivate students to engage within online learning environments. Paul is a recipient of the National Tertiary Teaching Excellence Award (2009) and the Computing Research and Education Association of Australasia Teaching Award (2010). His visit to the University of Toronto is supported by an Association of Commonwealth Universities Fellowship.

Preparation and Participation: Strategies for Motivating Students

Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM

Workshop, November 23, 2017 @ 3:00 - 4:00 p.m.

Understanding how and why students are motivated to learn can help us become more effective teachers. This session will share principles of learner motivation, and will provide an opportunity to consider and evaluate strategies aimed at encouraging students to prepare for and participate in class.

Dianne Ashbourne is an Educational Developer at the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre. She holds an M.A. in Education from the University of British Columbia. Her current pedagogical interests include student engagement, articulation of learning outcomes, curriculum mapping, and active learning spaces.

Learning to Learn: Building Academic Tenacity in Our Students

Karen Smith, Faculty of Science, Microbiology & Immunology, The University of British Columbia

Seminar, November 9, 2017 @ 1:00 p.m. - 2:30 p.m.

There is growing interest and momentum from educators to explore how they can better support students throughout university. Student engagement, academic tenacity and wellbeing can be the foundation for success. This session will explore ways we can increase academic tenacity by encouraging self-regulated learning skills, promoting social belonging and supporting a growth mindset. We will consider what issues and challenges we face in this role of supporting the whole student and how we can build capacity for all educators.

Demystifying the Dossier Series: Demonstrating and Capturing Teaching Success

Megan Burnett, Associate Director, Centre for Teaching Support & Innovation, University of Toronto

Workshop, October 25, 2017 @ 11:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.

As part of the Demystifying the Dossier Series, this workshop serves as a pre-‘teaching dossier’ workshop, and is the companion to the Working with Your Course Evaluations session (registration open Fall 2017) and Preparing Your Teaching Dossier session (registration open early 2018). Faculty are welcome to attend one or multiple workshops in the series.

At the University of Toronto, a teaching dossier must be submitted as part of the formal review process for tenure and continuing status. Beyond the information included in an academic CV, a teaching dossier describes and documents an instructor’s teaching expertise and goals and priorities for teaching and learning. It also highlights personal contributions to course and curriculum design efforts in a department or program, evidence of student impact, and evidence of teaching leadership. Given the range of evidence that is possible, and the importance of the narrative that surrounds this evidence, the dossier can be challenging to produce if insufficient time or attention is allotted to the tracking of teaching achievements and the collection of supporting documentation. To build the best case around one’s teaching, a faculty member needs a strategy for identifying and collecting the best possible evidence. This workshop aims to help clarify such a strategy and shed light on the iterative and critically reflective processes needed to gather optimal material for the dossier.

This session offers practical tips on how to produce, document, collect and reflect on the materials necessary for the compilation of an effective teaching dossier, including course evaluation data, teaching support materials, and evidence of professional development and educational leadership. This workshop will not focus on how to draft the actual dossier, rather, we will examine strategies for ensuring that you are ready to prepare a dossier when the time comes.

Megan Burnett began her time at the University of Toronto as a PhD Candidate in the Department of French. Over the span of 10 years, she taught as a TA, Course Instructor and sessional instructor. She then coordinated the TATP, overseeing a team of 15 graduate student peer trainers and a Curriculum Developer. In her role as Assistant Director of the Centre for Teaching Support & Innovation, Megan provided support to faculty members working with TAs as well as guidance to those faculty members preparing teaching dossiers for tenure or promotion, or seeking to design/re-design courses or assignments. Megan routinely lead sessions on lesson planning, documenting your teaching and active learning for both the CTSI and TATP Workshop Series and co-facilitated the annual CTSI Course Design Institute. Nationally, Megan collaborates with colleagues across Canada on issues related to faculty and graduate student professional development. She is founder and Past Chair of a special interest group within the Society for Teaching & Learning in Higher Education that focuses on TA and graduate student development.

Making Curriculum Mapping Meaningful

Fiona Rawle, Associate Dean, Undergraduate & Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Biology, UTM

Seminar, October 5, 2017 @ 3:00 - 4:00 p.m.

Location: DV 2094C

This workshop will outline how to engage in effective curriculum mapping, and will highlight the opportunities that can arise from the mapping process and dissemination of the maps themselves. We will discuss mapping at the assignment, course, and program level, and will explore different ways to both use and disseminate curricular maps.

Fiona Rawle is the Associate Dean, Undergraduate, at UTM, and also an Associate Professor, Teaching Stream in the Dept. of Biology. Her pedagogical research interests include scientific literacy, student engagement, curriculum mapping, inquiry-based instruction, and active learning. She is currently leading the Biology Curriculum Mapping Project, as well as UTM’s Curriculum Mapping Initiative.

Ideas for Working with - and through - Student Writing

Michael Kaler, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream & Writing Specialist, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM

Workshop, September 28, 2017 @ 1:00 - 3:00 p.m.

In this workshop, we will discuss ways to use student writing as a learning tool. We will discuss its use not just as a means of developing discipline-appropriate writing skills (though this is crucial), but also as a means of enhancing student assimilation and retention of course- or discipline-related content and modes of thought; we will also discuss how instruction related to writing can help develop students' critical reading skills. Sample exercises and ideas will be presented, and participants are encouraged to bring their own materials to share with the group.

Michael Kaler is an Assistant Professor and Writing Specialist at the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre. He holds doctorates from Universite Laval (Quebec, QC) in sciences religieuse and York University (Toronto, ON) in ethnomusicology, and an MA in Sciences Religiouses from U. Laval; he is also is TESL-Canada and TESL-Ontario certified. He has published widely on such topics as ancient gnosticism, early Christian heterodoxy, the Grateful Dead, science fiction, and the musical expression of religious experience. He reintroduced the teaching of Coptic to the Department of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations, teaching there from 2005-2008, and has taught at McMaster and York as well. Since 2012 he has focused on teaching writing skills first through the Office of English Language and Writing Services at U of T), and for the past four years at the RGASC.

Game-Enhanced Learning

Lee Bailey, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Economics, UTM

Tom Klubi, Learning Strategist and Program Manager, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM

Seminar, April 18, 2017 @ 1:00 - 2:00 p.m.

The use of board games as pedagogical tools has a wide range of benefits. Previous applications a game-enhanced approach consistently shows that students acquire a deeper understanding of the core curriculum content, and that students experience an expansion in their motivation and level of engagement within the course. High-engagement gameplay has the potential to produce within each participant an “emergent behavior” – that is, a more organic awareness of new meanings within the core curriculum and an increased accessibility to core concepts.

In this session, Lee and Tom will describe a range of contexts in which of board games have been used as teaching tools in the post-secondary classroom, with emphasis on their experiences at UTM. Plans to use game-enhanced learning in Lee’s ECO 200 course this summer will also be discussed.

Tom Klubi is the supervisor for the Peer Facilitated Study Group program, which applies the Supplemental Instruction peer mentoring model to the UTM community. Tom also coordinates the P.A.S.S. (Promoting Academic Skills for Success) Program for students who have been placed on academic probation/suspension and students entering the university under probationary status, where he incorporates games to help students develop their academic skills. Tom has wide-ranging personal board game collection on which he draws for the teaching and training approaches he develops.

Lee Bailey, is in an Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, with over 20 years of experience teaching in the Department of Economics at UTM. He has a reputation for being an innovative instructor, constantly trying to improve his teaching by experimenting with a range of instructional strategies. This summer, Lee plans to add game-enhanced learning to his repertoire of instructional strategies by using economic simulation games to reinforce course concepts.

Assessing the value of integrating writing into a required methodology course in sociology

Jayne Baker, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Sociology, UTM

Tyler Evans-Tokaryk, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream and Director, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM

Agata Piękosz, PhD, Department of Sociology, University of Toronto

Shannon Board, Undergraduate Student, Sociology and Criminology, Law and Society, University of Toronto

Seminar, April 7, 2017 @ 11:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.

Writing across the curriculum (WAC) has been implemented in many universities as a way to address growing concerns around a decline in the quality of student writing. The Sociology department at UTM has always integrated writing in many courses, but only recently has targeted particular courses in our program where specific writing instruction could be introduced. SOC221 (Logic of Social Inquiry) is one of these courses. In this presentation, we review our assessment of whether the quality of a student's research question-submitted in each of three assignments (stages of a single scaffolded assignment)-improves over time. The goal of the research project is to assess whether students' writing improves from the beginning to end of the semester in the ways envisioned in the design of tutorials and writing assignments.

The assessment involves evaluating as a team the research questions of a randomly-selected sample of 70 SOC221 students, using a set of research question assessment criteria developed in the initial stages of the project. In addition, we use a survey of SOC221 Teaching Assistants, who receive training, do most of the assessment of student writing, and interact closely with the students.

Stress, Anxiety, and Failure: Normal or a Mental Illness?

Andrea Carter, Assistant Dean Student Wellness, Support & Success

Seminar, February 13, 2017 @ 12:00 p.m. - 1:00p.m.

In this seminar, Andrea will distinguish between when stress and anxiety is a natural reaction to events versus when issues might be related to a mental health need. Discussion will focus on how students engage during times of stress, how to respond to these challenges, and what to do when the concerns are more complex.

Participants will learn how to engage students during difficult times, techniques that can limit possible future disasters, and who at UTM can assist in challenging situations.

Andrea Carter is the Assistant Dean Student Wellness, Support & Success at the University of Toronto Mississauga. Over the past ten years, Andrea has address institutional crisis and critical incident response at the University of Toronto. Andrea is a part time faculty member at the University of Western Ontario, in the faculty of interdisciplinary studies. She holds a Masters of Counselling Psychology from the University of Western Ontario. Her research interests are concentrated on institutional matters related to organizational policy, risk management and legislative compliance.

Experiential Learning and Indigenous Ways of Knowing

Cat Criger, Aboriginal Elder, Traditional Teacher and Mentor, Indigenous Centre, UTM

Nicole Laliberte, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Geography, UTM

Seminar, January 25, 2017 @ 2:00pm - 3:00pm in IB 370.

In alignment with the University of Toronto’s mandate for Aboriginal inclusion, the geography course on Indigenizing Space and Place was designed to incorporate indigenous ways of knowing into our current curriculum. This course not only introduces students to literature on indigenous knowledges and indigenous place-based identity, it also strives to guide students through an inquiry-based learning process inspired by the current best practices in Indigenous pedagogical studies. Funding from the UTM Teaching Development Grant in combination with matching funds committed by the Department of Geography provided resources that supported the experiential and inquiry-based aspects of this course through Teaching Assistant training, on-campus Teaching Circles and off-campus field trips. The effectiveness of these programs were assessed via student and TA reflections and surveys. Lessons learned from this project will contribute to future collaborations across disciplines and departments in a concerted effort to increase indigenous experiential learning opportunities at UTM.

Nicole Laliberté is an Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream in the Department of Geography at the University of Toronto Mississauga. Her research draws upon critical geographic theory, feminist theory, and anti-oppression pedagogies to examine systems of violence ranging from the intersections of militarism, development, and human rights in post-war northern Uganda to violence in institutions of higher learning in North America. She holds a PhD in Geography and Women’s Studies from The Pennsylvania State University.

Mr. Cat Criger is an Aboriginal Elder, Traditional Teacher and Mentor from the First Nations People. He is Cayuga (Guyohkohnyoh), Turtle Clan of the Six Nations Haudenosaunee or People of the Longhouse. Cat has been working as a Traditional Teacher and Healer for more than 20 years in the Native and multi-cultural community in Canada, the USA, England, Germany, Poland, and Wales. He was taught in the old way, working for many years with the guidance of an Aniishnawbe Elder (Zaawawagaabo) and other First Nations Elders, and was taught to do traditional ceremonies, teachings, circles, one to one work and to help all people to 'walk in a good way' though life.

Developing and Aligning Student Learning Outcomes

Dianne Ashbourne, Educational Developer, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM

Workshop, November 25, 2016 @ 2:00 – 4:00 p.m.

This interactive workshop will introduce participants to best practices for developing course-level student learning outcomes (SLOs). Participants will have an opportunity to practice writing clear, measurable, and meaningful SLOs for their courses with support from other participants and the workshop facilitator. Alignment of SLOs to learning activities and assessments will also be discussed. Participants are encouraged to bring a copy of a syllabus for a course for which they would like to develop SLOs or revise existing SLOs.

Dianne is the Educational Developer for the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre. Her role on campus is to support the pedagogical development of UTM faculty members. She holds an M.A. in Educational Studies from the University of British Columbia where she focused on higher education and research. methodology. Prior to coming to work at UTM, Dianne worked at Capilano University where she collaborated with faculty members to develop tools and processes to facilitate the assessment of student learning outcomes.

Problem Based Learning in the Social Sciences

Sherry Fukuzawa, Lecturer, Department of Anthropology, UTM

Nathan Innocente, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Sociology, UTM

Seminar, October 26, 2016 @ 10:00 a.m.

Problem-based learning (PBL) is a self-directed learning strategy where students work collaboratively in small groups to investigate open-ended relatable case scenarios. Students develop transferable skills that can be applied across disciplines, such as collaboration, problem solving, and critical thinking. PBL is an active learning technique that has been associated with increased student engagement and intrinsic motivation.

In this session we will outline the fundamentals of Problem-based learning from the implementation to the assessment. We will discuss some challenges of executing PBL in a traditional curriculum, and provide suggestions to successfully put PBL into practice for diverse student populations.

Sherry Fukuzawa is a sessional lecturer III in the department of anthropology at UTM. She has been implementing an online hybridized PBL project called the “Monthly Virtual Mystery” in a large first year undergraduate course since 2010. Sherry is currently researching the relationship between intrinsic student motivation and PBL for diverse student populations in the Active Learning Classroom.

Nathan Innocente is an Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream in the Department of Sociology at the University of Toronto Mississauga. He teaches courses in identity crime, white-collar and corporate crime, crime and organizations, criminal justice, and introductory and experiential learning courses. His current PBL research assesses student attitudes to PBL and compares the knowledge acquisition and problem-solving skills of students in a PBL and lecture-based version of the same course. His disciplinary research examines the organizational antecedents for mortgage fraud and the intersection between mortgage fraud and identity theft.

Giving Formative Feedback on Sentence Level Issues

Michael Kaler, Lecturer and Writing Specialist, Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre, UTM

Workshop, October 12, 2016 @ 1:00 - 4:00 p.m.

Assessing student writing is difficult; turning that assessment into productive formative feedback is even more so. While this is true whether we are dealing with macro-level issues such as overall argumentation and structure, or smaller scale issues such as grammar and sentence level, many instructors and graders find the latter sorts of issues especially difficult to respond to. As experienced, professional authors in our respective fields, we surely know how to write correct and readable prose, but there is a distinction between knowing what “good” writing is and being comfortable with giving useful feedback to students. We know, but how do we put that knowing into words that our students will understand and respond to?

Beginning with a review of research-based best assessment practices (and taking into consideration the concerns of both native English speakers and English Language Learners), this workshop will provide an opportunity to collaborate and share ideas and approaches to address such concerns. Having been introduced to—or reminded of, as the case may be—some of the research literature on the topic, participants will then build collaboratively on this foundation through group assessment of writing samples and discussion of issues related to grammar and sentence-level clarity (with a special focus on English Language Learner issues). The workshop is open to TAs as well as instructors.

Michael Kaler is a Lecturer and Writing Specialist at the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre. He holds doctorates from Universite Laval (Quebec, QC) in sciences religieuse and York University (Toronto, ON) in ethnomusicology, and an MA in Sciences Religiouses from U. Laval; he is also is TESL-Canada and TESL-Ontario certified. He has published widely on such topics as ancient gnosticism, early Christian heterodoxy, the Grateful Dead, science fiction, and the musical expression of religious experience. He reintroduced the teaching of Coptic to the Department of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations, teaching there from 2005-2008, and has taught at McMaster and York as well. Since 2012 he has focused on teaching writing skills first through the Office of English Language and Writing Services at U of T), and for the past three years at the RGASC.

Strategies for teaching large classes: lessons from Australia, New Zealand and the West Coast of North America

Michelle French, Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, Department of Physiology, University of Toronto

Seminar, September 30, 2016 @ 2:00 p.m.

Michelle will present approaches to enhance the effectiveness of your large class teaching. These will include: active learning strategies to enhance student learning and skill development, approaches to prepare students for class, methods for assessment and teaching technologies. Many of the approaches come from the interviews that Michelle conducted with over 100 instructors and the 20 classroom visits that she made during recent visits to 18 universities in Australia, New Zealand and North America. Seminar attendees will leave with a list of resources and new strategies to transform their large class teaching.

Michelle French is an Associate Professor, Teaching Stream in the Department of Physiology at the University of Toronto (U of T). Over the past 16 years, she has taught university courses in physiology, genetics, cell and molecular biology, regenerative medicine and scientific communication. She holds a BSc and an MSc from U of T and a PhD in physiology from Western University. Her post-doctoral studies were conducted at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute for Medical Research in Melbourne and at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto. Michelle is the recipient of several teaching awards including an Excellence in Life Sciences Award: Undergraduate Teaching from the Faculty of Medicine at U of T.

Fall 2023

Drop-In Sessions: Integrating Generative AI in Assessment Design

Winter 2023

Artificial Intelligence and Teaching Lunch & Learn

Preparing a Teaching Dossier

Meaningful Student Portfolios (online)

Rubrics – Ask Me Anything (AMA) Session (online)

Supporting ADHD Learners Facilitated by Karen Costa (online)

Using Peer Assessments to Support Student Learning (online)

Fall 2022

Beyond The Reading List: Pedagogies of Belonging

September 21, 2022 from 12:00 - 1:00 pm (via Zoom)

Instructor Meet + Mingle with UTM Educational Developers

Tips for Preparing a Teaching Development & Innovation Grant Proposal and Idea Sharing Roundtable

UDL Basics and Guidelines

Lightning Talks: Rethinking Assessment

Reflective Teaching

TLC Term-End Lunch

Summer 2022

Summer Camp for Instructors (online)

A Celebration of Teaching Excellence at UTM (online)

Monday, May 9th 2022 from 10:00am - 12:00pm (BBQ lunch hosted in-person from 12:00pm - 1:00pm in the CCT Courtyard)

Term-End Reflection (in-person)

Monday, May 9th 2022 from 1:00pm - 2:00pm (BBQ lunch hosted from 12:00pm - 1:00pm in the CCT Courtyard)

Winter 2022

Spotlight on Teaching in the Arts and Humanities (online)

Spotlight on Teaching in Social Science (online)

Spotlight on Teaching in STEM (online)

Preparing the Teaching Dossier (online)

Writing an EDI Statement for your Teaching Dossier

Beyond Fill in the Blanks: Reconciliation, Indigenization, and Decolonization in the Context of Higher Education

Curriculum Mapping

Spotlight on Teaching in Management and Economics

Fall 2021

UTM Ready, Set, Teach

Online Help Session for Instructors

Equity in my discipline: Social Science & STEM (online)

Equity in my discipline: Management & Economics and Arts & Humanities (online)

Term-End Reflection (online)

Summer 2021

Preparing to Teach: Syllabus Clinic

Summer Camp for Sessional Instructors: Prepare for Fall Term

Preparing to Teach: Inspiration and Suggestions for Using Quercus

Summer Camp for Instructors: Prepare for Fall Term

Inclusive Pedagogical Considerations for 2SLGBTQ+ Students

A Learner-Centred Approach to Course Design

Winter 2021

Getting Ready to Teach this Summer: Lessons from the Past Year

TLC Year-End Reflection

Teaching with Technology Showcase

Mental Health Syllabus Workshop

Dish With One Spoon Treaty Workshop

Facilitated by Ange Loft

Curriculum Mapping

Demystifying the Dossier Series: Preparing the Teaching Dossier

Community Engaged Learning

Indigenous Lunch & Learn

Round-Table Discussion: Inclusive Pedagogy - Equity Approaches

Statistics for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL)

Compassion Fatigue Workshop

How You Can Help Students Develop Their Foundational Academic Skills

Facilitated by the Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre

Voice Care for Instructors

Fall 2020

Winter Camp for Instructors

Round-Table Discussion: Racially-Inclusive Pedagogy

Creating Accessible Documents and Inclusive Course Design

Organizational Strategies for Teaching

TDI (Teaching Development & Innovation) Grant Winner Showcase

Multimodality: Pedagogy and Technology

Indigenous Student Panel and Curriculum Workshop

Mid-Term Instructor Check-In

Academic Integrity Panel

Creating an Equitable Classroom

Facilitating Synchronous Tutorials for Teaching Assistants

Ready, Set, Teach Day (Online)

2019 - 20 Events

Summer 2020 Events

Prepare for Fall Term: Community Building for Remote Courses

Tips for Preparing a Teaching Development & Innovation Grant Proposal and Idea Sharing Roundtable