News

April 26 Teaching & Learning Newsletter

Apr 26, 2018, 15:41 PM
CITL Teaching and Learning News: April 26, 2018
 
 
 
Announcements
 

Call for Presenters: August 2018 Grad Academy and Grading Symposium

Faculty, academic professionals, and experienced TAs are invited to participate as presenters and facilitators in the Graduate Academy for College Teaching (August 20-21, 2018), CITL's program for new TAs with classroom teaching responsibilities, and the Symposium on Grading & Office Hours (August 21, 2018), our program for those TAs with non-classroom responsibilities. There are opportunities to create your own concurrent session, facilitate a lesson from a pre-existing lesson plan, or facilitate microteaching sessions. Facilitating microteaching is a particularly fun and easy way to volunteer even if you are somewhat new to teaching yourself.  Follow this link to volunteer.

Congratulations to This Year's Certificate Recipients

CITL will be awarding 115 certificates at this year's Celebration of College Teaching on May 2. We appreciate the work and dedication shown by this year's recipients. If you want to earn a certificate next year, start now by learning about the requirements on our website.

CITL Exam Services: Office Hours for Finals Week

CITL Exam Services in room 247 of the Armory Building will be open for final exams from 8:30 a.m.-6 p.m. Friday, May 4, and Monday, May 7, through Friday, May 11. This includes being open during the lunch hour. We are closed Saturday and Sunday during finals. Contact 244-3839 or exams@illinois.edu with any questions.

Create Virtual Reality Experiences with Styly

Learn how to create and experience VR without any coding or downloads with Styly. Representatives from Styly will be on campus to demonstrate how anyone can easily transform their imagination into their own virtual world viewable on the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift headsets. May 1st, 10:00-11:30am, Armory room 428.  Registration Required.

Call for Applications: 2018-2019 Illinois Leadership Center (ILC) Faculty Fellows Program

The Illinois Leadership Center is now accepting applications for the 2018 – 2019 Faculty Fellows.  The ILC Faculty Fellows is a group of leadership scholars from a variety of disciplines, with an interest and focus on leadership research and/or leadership education.  Click here for more information. Deadline to apply is May 18.
 
 
CITL Events & Workshops

Want to see what workshops and events are coming later in the semester? Look at our full calendar for more information.

Pedagogy workshops are done for the semester, but check back later for our summer offerings.
 
 
CITL Technical Training
Technical training does not count for workshop hours towards the Graduate Teacher Certificate or the Certificate in Foundations of Teaching, but may count towards the Certificate in Technology-Enhanced Teaching.
Wednesday, May 2
Compass 2G Workshop: Grade Center Drop-In Clinic
10:00 A.M. - 11:00 A.M., Room 156 Armory, Conference Room G
Thursday, May 3
Compass 2G Workshop: Grade Center
9:30 A.M. - 11:30 A.M., Room 428, Armory Building
Thursday, May 3
Compass 2G Workshop: Grade Center Drop-In Clinic
11:00 A.M. - 12:00 P.M., Room 156 Armory, Conference room G
Monday, May 7
Compass 2G Workshop: Grade Center Drop-In Clinic
9:30 A.M. - 10:30 A.M., Room 156 Armory, Conference room G
 
Training Opportunities Across Campus
Want to see what training opportunities exist across campus? Though they don't count for CITL certificate credit, they can help you develop important technical and professional skills. Look at the Illinois Staff Training Calendar for more information.  Also check out the Savvy Researcher Series, and Graduate College Events.
Tuesday, May 1
InDesign CC: Manage Graphics
1:00 P.M. - 3:00 P.M., room 27, Illini Hall
Sponsor: FAST 3 / Webstore Training Services
 
Teaching Tips

Conquering 'Forty Percent of the Grade': Interactive Strategies for Helping Students Prepare for Comprehensive Final Exams

“But it’s 40% of the grade!” First-year Political Science students commonly raise this concern about the comprehensive final exam often given at the end of introductory survey courses. Many are simply unsure about how to study for cumulative exams. Further, commonly recommended approaches (such as reading carefully and taking notes) tend to preference visual learners. Students who learn best by talking through their ideas and actively participating are often at a disadvantage and struggle with identifying strategies that work for them. Preparation often becomes an anxiety-provoking, last-minute cram session filled with more stress and caffeine than actual learning. Here are four strategies to help students of all learning styles identify key concepts, relate them to one another, and develop critical essay arguments during the course of the final exam.

Final Exams

A common complaint from students is that final exams do not always test the kinds of knowledge that is asked for in homework or quizzes or presented in lectures. Whether this perception is accurate or not, it's still an excellent starting point for talking about what you are testing when you give a final exam. The worst final exams can seem unfocused, determined to test everything, or random things. The best final exams are learning moments. If you presented a set of learning goals and objectives to your students on your syllabus, you're way ahead of the game, because that means you've thought through what is important to you for a particular class. The very simplest procedure then is to develop an exam that will demonstrate whether students have achieved these objectives.