THE ANSWERS ARE IN THE SYLLABUS
Now is a great time to begin to look at your syllabi for the spring semester. My colleague at George Mason's Center for Teaching and Faculty Excellence provides the following suggestions. At its most fundamental level, a course syllabus is essentially a contract between the instructor and the student and is a vital tool for communicating expectations between students and faculty. A well-constructed syllabus provides a road map for the course, answers frequently asked questions, can help to lessen student anxiety, and allows the faculty member to concentrate on instruction. At another level, though, a syllabus is the embodiment of your philosophy of teaching and learning. Implicit in every assignment, every choice of textbook, every discussion topic should be an indication of what you want your students to learn from your course and why you want them to learn it.  Because critical thinking is at the heart of academic work, emphasize how your course will help them develop the kinds of skills with inquiry and problem solving that will benefit them throughout their time in college and into their lives as professionals. Continuing reading here.

GOING TO THE RESEARCH FOR SOLUTIONS
Dr. Maryellen Weimer’s latest post asks some really good questions about how we can use research to improve teaching and learning. She writes, “Evidence-based teaching seems like the new buzzword in higher education. The phrase appears to mean that we’ve identified and should be using those instructional practices shown empirically to enhance learning. Sounds pretty straightforward, but there are lots of questions that haven’t yet been addressed, such as: How much evidence does there need to be to justify a particular strategy, action, or approach? Is one study enough? What about when the evidence is mixed—in some studies the results of a practice are positive and in others they aren’t? In research conducted in classrooms, instructional strategies aren’t used in isolation; they are done in combination with other things. Does that grouping influence how individual strategies function?” Continue reading here.

THE GOOD OLD DAYS
Looking for some levity? Allison M. Vaillancourt’s latest post made me laugh while I was learning. She writes, “Who Melted My Cheese? would challenge the still-common worldview that academic life will eventually return to “normal” if we just sit patiently. According to that view, all the annoyances we are currently experiencing — state funding reductions, demands for accountability, and students who want their course content to be compelling — are simply fads that will soon fade if we just stay the course and insist on running our institutions like we did in the 1980s, or even the 1880s.” Continue reading here.