Introduction

The following modules are primarily based on Susan Ambrose and colleagues, How Learning Works: Seven Research-Based Principles for Smart Teaching (2010). Jossey-Bass: San Francisco

The seven principles are:

• Students’ prior knowledge can help or hinder learning.
• How students organize knowledge influences how they learn and apply what they know.
• Students’ motivation determines, directs, and sustains what they do to learn.
• To develop mastery, students must acquire component skills, practice integrating them, and know when to apply what they have learned.
• Goal-directed practice coupled with targeted feedback enhances the quality of students’ learning.
• Students’ current level of development interacts with the social, emotional, and intellectual climate of the course to impact learning.
• To become self-directed learners, students must learn to monitor and adjust their approaches to learning.

You’ll start with the module Teaching for Learning which addresses ways in which you the instructor learns ways to organize knowledge, motivate learners, address threshold concepts, provide feedback, structure the learning environment and encourage metacognition. The second module Instructor as Technologist is designed to build digital literacy skills with a focus on how you can integrate technology into your teaching. The third module Instructor as Content Creator explores ways to curate from your learners’ perspective to create engaging, interactive, and open course materials. The fourth module Instructor as Collaborator explores tools for online collaborations. The fifth module Instructor as Experimenter discusses how you can experiment with different delivery modes and pedagogical approaches. The six module Instructor as Scholar examines how you can use your classroom, your courses and/or your professional area of practice as a research lab to explore how you might improve your teaching practice and positively affect learner outcomes and their satisfaction with the overall learning experience.

This course is asynchronous. The modules are self-paced and are designed to build on one another, so it is advised that you move through the modules in the order they are presented. If you have questions as you move through the modules, you can contact: teachingcentre@uleth.ca and you’ll receive a response within 24 hrs.