By Emily Ng The use of storytelling in the classroom to enhance student learning has been shown to promote critical thinking, information recall, and interest. One way stories do this is by tapping into students’ sense of self-relevance which allows them to explore aspects of the content that they can relate their own experiences or goals […]
Public Speaking Tips for New Instructors
By Maria DelGreco When I was first accepted into a graduate program in communication, I was assigned to be a discussion instructor for Public Speaking, a class that I had never taken let alone taught before. I was barely older than my students, fresh out of an undergraduate program, with zero teaching experience, and I […]
Your Lecture is as Unmoving as the Podium You Are Standing Behind
By Ashley Dhaim There are many less than optimal circumstances that affect teaching: early or late class times, class size, technology in the classroom–the list goes on and on. While the limitations on teaching are endless, there is one thing that we as teachers can turn into an opportunity for learning: the space of the […]
The Interrelatedness Between Teaching and Academic Advising
By Emma-Björngard-Basayne As someone who both teaches introductory philosophy courses and works as an Academic Advisor in the UConn School of Business, I have always felt that there is a strong connection between teaching and advising. Early on, I realized that my experiences advising and teaching were informing each other. For example, from advising, I […]
Provocation Pedagogy
By Krista Dotzel “But who are we to judge whether a 15 year old Yanomami girl in the Amazon can marry a 35 year old?! That’s being ethnocentric!” This impassioned proclamation came from a previously quiet and checked-out student in the introductory cultural anthropology class I was teaching. Other students in the class weren’t having […]
Not Just Trigger Warnings: Supporting Survivors of Sexual & Domestic Violence in the Classroom
By Lynne Alexander Sitting here in the aftermath of the Kavanaugh confirmation hearings and swearing-in ceremony, I feel anguished and drained. Surviving in this fractured and divided nation and being bombarded with imagery and rhetoric from all sides that is potentially triggering and deeply upsetting has been a struggle. The past few weeks were particularly […]
Diversity for Beginners: Easy First Steps Toward More Inclusive Courses
By Cynthia DeRoma Diversity and inclusion matter not just for equal opportunity considerations, but also for academic outcomes. Scholars who feel the objectivity of their field preempts them from having to worry about issues of inclusion should be aware that recent research has been showing positive correlations between diversity and academic success. For example, Steffens […]
Spring 2019 GCCI Electives
The following are the course descriptions and times for eligible GCCI electives offered in spring 2019. Note that we may update this list as additional electives come to our attention. There may be courses within your discipline on teaching that could be eligible to count toward the certificate.
Keeping it Old School: Using a Binder Method to Organize Course Materials
By Robin Grenier When I began my graduate program, the internet was just beginning to gain popularity as a research tool in academia. Faculty still relied heavily on filing cabinets filled with copies of articles from paper journals that were painstakingly copied, resized, and retained for use in their classes. I remember the day my […]
Register for Fall Teaching Seminars!
Graduate students enrolled in GRAD 6000 as well as all UConn graduate students and post-docs are welcome to attend our fall teaching seminars. Seminars are offered from 1:25pm-3:20pm in MONT 226 on the Storrs Campus unless otherwise noted. See the list of offerings and registration links below: 9/14 The Actor’s Tools and How They Can […]