Classes Taught

While the semester-by-semester evaluation data can be meaningful, I think looking at it through the prism of the classes I've taught offers a different perspective. For the purposes of both concision and clarity, I've clustered some of the classes I've taught when they are categorically similar. In addition to eliminating a lot of redundant reflection, this also increases the sample size, which for an English faculty member, is often a challenge when attempting to find statistically significant trends. Looking back on all these classes I've taught during my time at Xavier, I see a lot of growth on my part, especially in how I present the material to the students and in how I view our relationship. For the classes in which I've seen myself as learning with the students (see, particularly, Modern English Grammars, the Senior Seminars, and Dystopias, Real & Imagined), the students respond to that parity. My overall evaluation results improve not because I've done a better job teaching them but because they've felt more comfortable and confident in those classes with me.

College Writing (ENGL 1000 & ENGL 1010)

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ENGL 1000, Intensive College Writing, 4 credits, undergraduate.
Taught Fall 2008.

ENGL 1010, College Writing, 3 credits, undergraduate.
Taught Fall 2007, Spring 2008, Fall 2014, Fall 2017, & Fall 2022.

I've only taught this introductory writing class sporadically in recent years, although I am developing a plan to incorporate a semester-long focus on digital reading and writing and am hoping to make it a more consistent part of my teaching load during the fall term. Students struggle to understand the emphasis the traditional model of this class places on proper "academic" writing, especially when, more often than not, it is the only class they are taking in the fall that requires any significant writing. In recent years, the class has been a combination of the workshop model with a focus on the creation of eportfolios that document growth over the semester. The most recent evaluation data, from Fall 2022, was lost as a result campus-wide hack in November.

Advanced Rhetoric & Composition (ENGL 1020 & ENGL 1023)

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ENGL 1020, Composition & Literature, 3 credits, undergraduate.
Taught Spring 2008, Spring 2009, Spring 2013, Spring 2014, Spring 2016, & Spring 2017.

ENGL 1023H, Introduction to Literature, 3 credits, undergraduate.
Taught Fall 2009, Spring 2010, Fall 2011, Spring 2012, Fall 2013

I have often referred to Composition & Literature as a schizophrenic class, as it has two distinct purposes: to further the students' academic writing skills and to introduce them to literary study. While both foci are meant to work together, they often intrude upon each other, preventing the class from ever focusing significantly on either. As a result, students are often overwhelmed with the challenges of literary analysis while trying to sound properly "academic" in their writings. The formality, I have found, hampers the students ability to communicate their ideas effectively, which should still be the primary focus of a first-year writing class.

Modern English Grammars (ENGL 2200/PRWT 2200)

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ENGL 2200/PWRT 2200, Modern English Grammars, 3 credits, undergraduate: Spring 2010, Fall 2012, Spring 2015, Fall 2016, Fall 2018, Fall 2019, Fall 2020, Fall 2021

To be honest, when I was first asked to teach Modern English Grammars, I said yes simply because I was the new guy, and that's what my grad school advisor told me to say when asked to teach anything. Despite that, I quickly came to love the class, even as I have adapted every time I've taught it. No two semesters have been quite the same, but by the eighth iteration, I think the class, for which I used both inverted pedagogy and gamification to better engage the students, was one of my best.

The Graphic Novel and Social Justice (ENGL 2510/ART 2510)

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ENGL 2510/ART 2510, The Graphic Novel & Social Justice, 3 credits, undergraduate: Spring 2015 [co-taught with Shayna Blum], Fall 2016 [co-taught with Gus Jenkins], Spring 2018 [co-taught with Gus Jenkins], Spring 2020 [co-taught with Gus Jenkins], Spring 2022 [co-taught with Gus Jenkins]

As with all of my classes, this class has evolved quite a bit since I first imagined it during the FaCTS year focused on interdisciplinary teaching. As a co-taught class, it could be a great struggle, but is instead my easiest class to teach. The students are often surprised by the rigor of the class, which challenges them to work through several unique examples of a genre that has generally be disregarded as frivolous. One technique that has proven quite successful is the use of reading guides that prompt the students before, during, and after their reading of a text. This class, more than most, embodies the mission of Xavier through its focus on an art form uniquely suited to battle injustice.

Advanced Writing (ENGL 3150)

ENGL 3150, Advanced Writing, 3 credits, undergraduate: Fall 2009

Having only taught this class once many years ago, I don't have much to reflect upon. It was in this class that I first used Wikipedia as an assignment, having each student select an article to substantially revise and edit. My first experience with Making Knowledge Public, the work appealed to the students, even those who were otherwise resistant to the idea of taking another writing-focused class.

Survey of American Literature I & II (ENGL 3160 & ENGL 3170)

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ENGL 3160, Survey of American Literature I, 3 credits, undergraduate: Fall 2011, Spring 2014, Fall 2014, Fall 2018, Fall 2021

ENGL 3170, Survey of American Literature II, 3 credits, undergraduate: Spring 2012, Spring 2015, Spring 2019, Spring 2022

Coming out of my work on Read Today, Lead Tomorrow, I radically changed the way I teach these two survey classes by abandoning the traditional anthology model, in which the class works through many short reading selections, and embracing the Great Books model, through which we read six or seven book-length text over the course of the semester. The students have responded well to this change, which allows us to spend significantly more time on each text, discussing it, analyzing it, and writing about it.

Senior Seminar (ENGL 4020)

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ENGL 4020, Senior Seminar in American Literature, 3 credits, undergraduate: Fall 2012 [The Postmodern Novel], Spring 2018 [The American Short Story]

The English Department's Senior Seminar allows faculty to teach upper-level courses focused on specific and often untaught areas of literature. It's an enjoyable class most notably because you are engaging with students through literature they have often not yet been exposed to. I'll be teaching it again in Fall 2023 exploring the imaginary Mississippis seen in William Faulkner's Yoknapatawpha County and Jesmyn Ward's Bois Sauvage.

Advanced Writing (GENG 5150)

GENG 5150, Advanced Writing, 3 credits, graduate: Spring 2009

As with the undergraduate version of Advanced Writing, having only taught this class once, I can't offer much reflection. Teaching a graduate-level writing class to professional educators was the most challenging teaching experience of my career by that point and may still be so over a decade later. I've since led a voluntary writing workshop for graduate students that was much better received.

College Experience (XCOR 1000)

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XCOR 1000, College Writing, 3 credits, undergraduate: Fall 2018, Fall 2019, Fall 2020, Fall 2021, Fall 2022

Although many on campus seem to fear this class, it is often the most rewarding to teach. By allowing faculty to engage with the students in a more relaxed manner, this class can help create strong connections, which can be critical to the student's ongoing success at Xavier. As I teach it, the class challenges students to reflect upon their place within the campus and the university and to find ways to grow as a student and as a member of the campus community.

New Orleans Experience (XCOR 1012)

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XCOR 1012, New Orleans Experience, 3 credits, undergraduate: Spring 2019 [City as Text], Spring 2021 [City as Text], Summer 2022 [Digitizing New Orleans], Spring 2023 [New Orleans Book Club]

As an anomale, the first iteration of the class, I think, was still the most successful. In that class, the students worked together to greatly expand the Wikipedia article about Gert Town, taking it from a stub-class article to a B-class article. Only 2% of Wikipedia articles have been awarded B-class status.

Dystopias, Real and Imagined (XCOR 3010)

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XCOR 3010, Dystopias, Real & Imagined, 3 credits, undergraduate: Spring 2020, Spring 2022 (online), Spring 2023 (online)

Although I'm only now teaching the third iteration of this class, it is by far my favorite class to teach, surpassing Modern English Grammars and the Senior Seminars. Even as a now fully asynchronous class, I feel a great connection with the students who seem to truly love the content we explore and the research and analysis we do on that content. As a class that dwells heavily on the idea of oppression, I've found that a certain amount of levity is necessary, which also helps bridge the technological void that exists between all of us. The research project, which has traditionally been a class podcast, has since morphed into something with more options for the students while still maintaining the ideals of the Digital Humanities and Making Knowledge Public.

Course Showcase

Although syllabi and course evaluations can tell you a good deal about a class, it's difficult, I think to truly understand how a course is taught without significantly more detail. In an ideal world, visiting the classroom of a teacher you are reviewing will give you a glimpse into the process; however, that option is not even an option for asynchronous classes. I hope that what follows offers a greater understanding of how I teach not just this class but all my classes.

Dystopias, Real & Imagined (XCOR 3010, Engaging the Mission)

I created Dystopias, Real & Imagined to help meet the need for enough of the upper-level XCOR classes in response to so many existing students asking to switch to the new core curriculum when it was unveiled in 2018. X-Core required only 40 hours of coursework, whereas the old core required 60, and X-Core embraced the ideal of student choice, whereas the old core was highly structured. As a result, when X-Core was implemented, many sophomores and juniors asked to change their catalog year so that they could benefit from the unique general education offered by X-Core. This, though, meant that the faculty had to quickly adapt existing courses and create new courses for those upper-level students.

Getting Started

This is the Course Tour video I provide students before classes begin to help them understand how the class has been designed.

I first taught this class in Spring 2020, which means although the class was planned and begun as an in-person class, it pivoted several weeks into the semester to what Xavier called Remote Learning, as did every other in-person class at Xavier, meaning that the class continued to meet twice a week but over Zoom. When I next had the opportunity to teach the class in Spring 2022, having gone through the training and development process for #LearnEverywhereXULA, Quality Matters' Applying the QM Rubric (APPQMR), and other workshops about online instruction, I redesigned the class to an Online/Asynchronous modality. Although I have adopted the techniques and better practices from those training experiences into my other classes, this class stands alone in terms of design and pedagogy, in my opinion.

Because I use technology (Brightspace, in particular, but other tools as well), I make sure students understand how the course is set up before we begin the class. Although Course Tour videos are usually associated with just online classes, more and more I think they should be made for every class, since every class is different, even when taught by the same instructor, not just in how it looks in Brightspace, but in terms of the course content: assignments differ, grading practices differ, feedback and other communication methods differ. In the video, you can see the Course Tour for the Spring 2023 incarnation of my Dystopias, Real &s Imagined.

Making Knowledge Public

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The Dispatches from Room 101 web site serves as the central repository for all course documents and the public student work.

Dystopias, Real & Imagined embraces a number of pedagogical models, such as Transdisciplinarity and the Digital Humanities. As such and because the course is intended to help students see how their own learning can embody Xavier's mission of social justice, I've embedded the ideal of Making Knowledge Public, meaning most of the work of the class uses technology to share our thinking and our explorations with anyone who has access to the internet. To achieve this, much of the work of the class is done outside of Xavier's LMS, Brightspace. The website, Dispatches from Room 101, serves a number of functions:

  • As the syllabus for the course, embracing both the humanizing idea of a Liquid Syllabus as discussed by Michelle Pacansky-Brock (Pacansky-Brock, M., Smedshammer, M., & Vincent-Layton, K. (2020). Humanizing online teaching to equitize higher education. Current Issues in Education, 21(2).) and the student-centered syllabus model developed at the University of Virginia's Center for Teaching Excellence (Palmer, M. S., Bach, D. J., & Streifer, A. C. (2014). Measuring the promise: A learning‐focused syllabus rubric. To improve the academy: A journal of educational development, 33 (1), 14-36. );
  • As a repository for all course assignments sheets, developed using Mary-Ann Winkelmes's Transparent Assignment model (Winkelmes, Mary-Ann, Matthew Bernacki, Jeffrey Butler, Michelle Zochowski, Jennifer Golanics, and Kathryn Harriss Weavil. (2016). “A Teaching Intervention that Increases Underserved College Students’ Success.” Peer Review 18 (1 / 2), 31-36.), and associated resources for those assignments; and
  • As the course blog, a common method for teaching students to write meaningful assignments without the stigma of needing to be overly "academic". Over the iterations of the course I've responded to student feedback by cutting back on the number of blog posts they are required to complete. Initially, they had to complete 14 weekly blog posts in response to different prompts; now, each week they are given a different prompt, but they only have to write a blog post in response to six of them, thereby reducing the workload and embracing student choice.

The Upside Down

This video is an example of the "pre-reading" microlectures I provide the students before they work through one of the complex articles we explore as a class.

While some would suggest that inverted pedagogy only works in synchronous classes, I've applied the same thinking to this asynchronous course, in particular by keeping the balance of the class on the learning activities rather than on the presentation of content. In order to do so, the course follows a basic pattern each week, and although some students express concern about the workload when the first see the schedule, within a few weeks, they have settled into the planned routine that involves different Encounters, Engagements, and Reflections.

  • Encounters are the presentation of course content. They generally take the form of novels and movies, microlectures, external videos, and annotated reading assignments. Students watch, read, or otherwise absorb the material. In the past I've simply used YouTube to present lecture material, but this year, I've begun using VoiceThread to make those lectures interactive. You can see an example of an older lecture video on the right.
  • Engagements are activities that let them work with the content that has been presented to them. Sometimes these are activities that they work on in isolation, sometimes they are text-based discussions in Brightspace, and sometimes they are media-rich discussions using VoiceThread. I try to vary not just the activity but the medium to avoid too much redundancy.
  • Reflections are activities that challenge them to consider and assess their own learning. In addition to the blog posts already discussed, the students complete a Weekly Private Learning Journal in which they discuss their engagement with the class over the past week, review their success with that week's learning outcomes, and offer me feedback on what worked or didn't work.

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The Learning Plan for each week describes the learning outcomes and the activities that will help the students meet those outcomes.

Given the common difficulty of staying on track with an asynchronous course, I try to help the students using multiple methods. Every Sunday morning, they gain access to that week's Learning Plan in Brightspace, a page that describes the learning outcomes for the week and descriptions of the activities that will help them achieve those outcomes, as well as links to each assignment (all relying on the TILT model discussed above). Although the students are not expected to begin work on Sunday, some students, especially those with heavy course loads or difficult work schedules, prefer to get a head start on the week. Each Monday morning, the students receive an email from me with an overview for the coming week, an outline of that week's activities, and usually some accolades for the work they did during the previous week. On Fridays, I send out a shorter email, usually with some kind of update, and a reminder of their remaining tasks for that week. All this works alongside Brightspace's notification and calendar system, in which every activity has been set up. Students, overall, are appreciative of the reminders and different avenues to follow, based on the feedback they've provided.

Conclusion

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This chart compares course evaluation data between the in-person and online modalities of this class.

Discussing most any aspect of the first time this class was offered during the Spring 2020 term is difficult considering the sudden pivot to remote instruction and the challenges created by the pandemic and lockdown orders. However, the class was able to proceed, without significant change, other than the need to make time during every class session to discuss our frustrations and difficulties. Despite that, I think it is significant to consider the chart to the left which compares the evaluation data from the Spring 2020 class, taught in person and remotely, and the Spring 2022 class, taught fully asynchronously. There is an unquestionable improvement in all categories (even time management, interestingly), including in the three questions that are focused not on my teaching but on the class itself. The class provides the students with an understanding of what they will learn, how they will learn it, and the agreement between those two plans.

Classes Created

I've been involved in various curricular revisions over the years, but I've also devoted a fair amount of time to creating new classes, beyond the Directed Readings and Special Topics classes I've taught on occasion. I find creating classes one of the most enjoyable aspects of the teaching life, even as it often demands compromise and concession. By embracing the Backwards Design model, I've found starting with nothing but what the students should learn one of the most effective processes to work with.

In Progress

In Summer 2022, I was asked by a student to do a Directed Readings (Independent Study) on the genre of cyberpunk. Ultimately, we put together a reading list that looked at literary and cinematic examples while also reading secondary sources about the sometimes confused and often competing ideals of transhumanism and posthumanism. I am currently working to turn that independent study into a new XCOR 3010 course, tentatively called Cyberpunk and the Transhuman, which would explore the genres of cyberpunk and its off-shoot biopunk through the ethical debate between the transhumanist movement and posthumanism.

ENGL 1026, Digital Rhetoric and Composition

With the implementation of the Xavier's new core curriculum, X-Core, students were given the option to take a class other than Composition and Literature for their second first-year writing class requirement. However, few classes were developed to address this option. This class was developed to overlap with student interest in new and developing programs at Xavier like the Digital Humanities minor and the Cybersecurity minor by embedding writing instruction with content about digital literacy, digital citizenship, and digital safety.

Course Description

This course teaches advanced rhetoric and composition by focusing on interdisciplinary skills like researching, reading, and writing as digital scholars and citizens.

Learning Outcomes

  1. Students will be able to differentiate between primary and secondary sources.
  2. Students will be able to demonstrate an ability to critically analyze primary texts through compositions that adhere to appropriate rhetorical conventions.
  3. Students will be able to locate, evaluate, and integrate primary and secondary sources, synthesizing such information into research-based writing, following and using appropriate citation practices.
  4. Students will be able to demonstrate comprehension of discipline-specific terminology through writing exercises.
  5. Students will be able to produce compositions that maintain a central argument and are free of logical fallacies and mechanical errors that distort meaning or interfere with clarity and comprehension.
  6. Students will be able to develop facility in critically evaluating the work of their peers in a constructive manner.
  7. Students will be able to leverage existing digital technologies ethically & efficiently to solve problems, complete tasks, & accomplish goals.
  8. Students will develop proficiency as self-regulated learners.

ENGL 2501/Art 2510, The Graphic Novel and Social Justice

Poster promoting the Spring 2020 section of the class with information and images about the graphic novels that would be read

Developed through the support of the Center for the Advancement of Teaching's FaCTS initiative, this class embraces the ideals of interdisciplinary learning by focusing on the interdisciplinary art of comics and its longer form, the graphic novel. The class challenges students to see a medium that has been dismissed as trivial since its creation as a powerful means of exposing injustice. In order to ensure a truly interdisciplinary experience, this course was designed to be co-taught with a member of the Art Department faculty.

Course Description

This course is an interdisciplinary examination of comic art as a vehicle for social justice. This course will teach students to access comics, a genre generally dismissed as non-literary, at multiple levels: the textual, the visual, and the contextual. Students will develop and enhance skills at interpretation through these multiple literacies to value the political and cultural statements that can be made through the comic form. Students will also learn how to manipulate these various literacies to express their own commentaries upon issues of social justice important to them.

Learning Outcomes

  1. Students will be able to employ the language of comic design in analysis.
  2. Students will be able to interpret comic works at the textual level.
  3. Students will be able to interpret comic works at the visual level.
  4. Students will be able to interpret comic works at the socio-historical level.
  5. Students will be able to recognize the way comic works can comment upon social justice issues.
  6. Students will be able to make a statement about a social justice issue through the creation of a comic work.

ENGL 3260, Studies in American Literature

Poster promoting the Spring 2023 section of the class with information and images about the authors and novels that would be read

Developed in consultation with the American Literature Committee of the English Department (Dr. Thaddeo Babiiha, Dr. Ronald Dorris, and Sr. Donna Gould), this class was designed to offer students opportunities to study American literature in a more focused and intensive way than is possible in the two Surveys of American Literature the English Department offers, which were at the time the only classes taught with a specific focus on American literature.

Course Description

An intensive study of a selected period or movement within a period of American literature that explores the literature produced within that specific historical context. This course may be repeated for credit. This course counts as a period-based elective for English majors.

Learning Outcomes

  1. Students will be able to explain the techniques most common to a specific literary era or movement.
  2. Students will be able to recognize the socio-historical influences that bear on a specific literary era or movement.
  3. Students will be able to evaluate various texts of a specific literary era or movement for their literary and cultural merits.
  4. Students will be able to convincingly write and speak about the literature of a specific literary era or movement.
  5. Students will be able to employ effective literary analysis and MLA-style research methods in formal writing.

XCOR 1012, The City as Text/Digitizing New Orleans

This course was developed in response to the need to create classes that would fulfill the Connecting Communities requirement of X-Core and was supported by training through the Core Curriculum Enhancement grant. The course fuses the goals of the City as Text with the goals of the Digital Humanities to teach students about the history, culture, and geography of New Orleans by having them read the city as a text and create publicly accessable digital projects that teach others about the city.

Course Description

In The City as Text, we experience New Orleans by engaging in research about unique historical & cultural locations in the city and by contributing our research to online resources. Over the course of the semester, students will work research, write about, and teach about specific New Orleans loci. While these spaces may be physical in nature, they exist in different ways at different moments in time, and their significance changes depending upon the disciplinary lens through which we view them. Our scholarly endeavours will begin with contributions to Wikipedia articles and will culminate with submissions to one of several multimedia web sites that enable people around the world to interactively experience New Orleans.

Learning Outcomes

  1. Students will be able to communicate effectively through writing and speaking.
    • Students will write and speak clearly, concisely, and coherently about broad issues or questions pertaining to the New Orleans metropolitan area and region.
    • Students will formulate in speech and writing a rational, coherent, and well-informed view of their own on some broad issue or question pertaining to the New Orleans metropolitan area and region.
  2. Students will be able to use quantitative, empirical, and critical reasoning skills to solve problems.
    • Students will use reason and evidence to critically evaluate views expressed by others addressing specific questions pertaining to the New Orleans metropolitan area and region.
  3. Students will be able to incorporate diverse cultural perspectives in their analysis of issues, from local to global, and to recognize the interconnectivity of human experience.

XCOR 3010, Dystopias, Real and Imagined

Poster promoting the Spring 2023 section of the class with information and images about the graphic novels that would be read

In response to the need for new classes to fulfill the Engaging the Mission (XCOR 3010) requirement of X-Core, this class was developed as one of the first "pure" XCOR classes, one not crosslisted with other discipline-specific classes. The class takes a transdisciplinary approach at exploring the literary and cinematic genre of dystopia and applying the framework for interpreting such works to real-world events and circumstances. In response to student need, the class was adapted as a fully online, asynchronous course.

Course Description

In Dystopias, Real & Imagined we will explore the intersection between science fiction and reality by considering how the imaginary dystopias of literature and film are more realistic and more probable than we might want to realize. Over the course of the semester, we will attempt to identify the defining characteristics of a dystopia, to consider how those defining characteristics are able to develop in a "free society", and to use those defining characteristics as acid tests against the real world. Ultimately, we will ask how the fictional trope of the dystopia can empower us to prevent the imaginary from becoming reality.

Learning Outcomes

  1. Identify the defining characteristics of dystopia & analyze real & imagery contexts against that definition.
    • Critically analyze fictional & cinematic dystopias against a definition of dystopia.
    • Critically analyze contemporary events against a definition of dystopia.
  2. Communicate effectively through writing & speaking.
    • Articulate thoughts & ideas clearly & effectively in written & oral forms to persons in & out of an organization.
    • Articulate using oral & written communication multiple, competing perspectives on one or more "big ideas" pertaining to the mission.
  3. Use quantitative, empirical, and critical reasoning skills to solve problems.
    • Exercise sound reasoning to analyze issues, make decisions, & overcome problems.
    • Analyze & comprehensively describe the underlying assumptions of each view.
    • Evaluate these assumptions & using oral & written communication clearly state their conclusions.
  4. Apply socially responsible & ethical principles to promote equity & sustainability in ways that align with our mission as a historically Black and Catholic Institution.
    • Build collaborative relationships with colleagues & customers representing diverse cultures, races, ages, genders, religions, lifestyles, & viewpoints.
    • Challenge theories of social justice against various dystopian examples.
    • Demonstrate personal accountability & effective work habits.
    • Leverage existing digital technologies ethically & efficiently to solve problems, complete tasks, & accomplish goals.
  5. Develop proficiency as a self-regulated learner.

Teaching Evaluations

A few thoughts as I teach myself Tableau and learn how to better analyze and visualize my evaluation data: These charts show, I think, substantial growth in the second half of my teaching career. I can't help but credit much of that growth to my work in Xavier's Center for the Advancement of Teaching and Faculty Development, a job that allowed me to learn as I taught others. However, more than just learning, it has been my embracing of a number of student-centric pedagogies — flipped learning, transparent assignments, just-in-time teaching — that I think have most significantly improved my effectiveness in and out of the classroom (even as they contribute to the students' belief that I am not very good at managing my time).

Student Feedback

Over the years, I've increasingly incorporated student feedback into the weekly structure of my classes. Years ago, I began using Stephen Brookfield's C.I.Qs (Critical Incidence Questionnaire) during the last 5 minutes of every class, a short survey that asks students when they were and when they were not engaged during the week and what actions I had taken to either help or hinder their learning. These were informative, but used up a lot of paper. Now, as the students complete weekly self-assessments through Brightspace to reflect on their own learning, they also have the chance to offer me feedback on how our classes worked over the past week. This allows me to adjust the class as it is unfolding, and I think the students are both aware and appreciative of these efforts, even if I don't always act on their suggestions. As can be seen on the Class Taught page, I also make extensive use of CAT+FD's Midcourse Reviews much to the same effect.

I also take full advantage of the university's end-of-semester course evaluations, requesting them often out of cycle, in order to gather more data and more feedback from the students. Although I have issues with the questions that are currently asked on our course evaluations (I was on the committee that proposed a new teaching-focused review system in 2016), they still offer some useful and constructive input. Over the years, I have also asked students to complete end-of-semester evaluations of my own devising; however, I have not done so consistently enough to compile any longitudinal data from them.

In the end, any input from students is valuable input, and although only some of it can be codified and visualized, I take it all to heart in order to improve as a teacher and a person.

The charts below, for the time being, offer several snapshots, I think of my growth as as a teacher over the past 15-plus years. I'm particularly proud that "Respect for Students" stands out in all of them. The rather jumbled line graph at the end best captures that sense of improvement over those years, even though they continue to question my time management skills.

Some Preliminary (& Very Basic) Visualizations

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Fall 2007 to Spring 2022. This chart offers a comparison between positive (Excellent or Good) responses and negative (Fair or Poor) responses.
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Fall 2007 to Spring 2022. This chart shows the distribution of responses within each of the five options offered.
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Fall 2007 to Spring 2022. This chart suggests, overall, growth and improvement in every category.
The content on this page was last modified on Wed 22 Feb 2023.