Graduate Student Learning Communities (GSLCs) are cohorts of graduate students regularly gathering to discuss a teaching and learning topic of interest while forming a supportive community. During these learning communities, we ask questions about teaching and learning, try out teaching innovations, reflect on the effectiveness of our practice, and/or create new models of practice. We share a question or an interest, and then deepen our knowledge by interacting on an ongoing basis. GSLCs are part of the Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning’s (CITL) mission to promote transformative learning experiences for IUB instructors.
Participants will be required to prepare for, attend, and actively participate in learning community meetings (likely to happen twice per month). Participants may be expected to produce certain documents, complete readings, and provide feedback to other learning community participants. After successful completion of the GSLC, participants receive an acknowledgement letter summarizing their accomplishments for their teaching portfolios. Participation in a GSLC satisfies, in part, requirements for the CITL’s Graduate Teaching Apprenticeship Program. Graduate students do not receive any monetary compensation for their participation. See specific learning community descriptions for any criteria needed to apply.
We request that individuals apply for only one GSLC per semester. You will be notified shortly after the application closes.
Applications are due Sunday, May 23rd at 11:59 PM ET.
Transforming Your Research Into Teaching Workshop Series (Summer 2021)
Facilitators: Leslie Drane, Madeleine Gonin, and Rajagopal Sankaranarayanan
This is a 7-session workshop series designed to expose you to the basic elements of course design. Over the course of this workshop series, you will design a course syllabus and course unit based on your current area of research interest. This workshop series is open to MFAs, PhDs, and Post-docs from any academic discipline. At the end of the workshop series, you will present your course to the group.
Past GSLCs
Orientation Peer Facilitator (Spring 2021)
Facilitators:Leslie Drane
Learn to be a CITL workshop facilitator for the Fall 2021 Associate Instructor Orientation while gaining new pedagogical knowledge and skills. Participants will design and lead AI-specific workshops on topics such as: teaching and learning theories; making use of class time; managing classroom authority and boundaries; and classroom climate (e.g., teaching controversial topics; engaging in group work; strategies for equitable classroom participation). CITL will provide ongoing training, mentoring, and resources on developing and facilitating a workshop. We are planning to offer Fall 2021 Associate Instructor Orientation online and we can help you become confident in leading presentations over Zoom.
Reflecting on Your Inclusive Teaching Practice
CITL Facilitator: Greg Siering
Inclusive teaching practices help us ensure that all students have equitable opportunities to learn, and that they feel valued and supported in their learning. These practices can vary in focus, as well as the knowledge and time required to implement them. This learning community will utilize a series ofreflective teaching checklistsdevised by the University of Michigan as a framework for exploring our teaching and identifying ways we can make our classes more inclusive. The research-based principles we will explore include Critical Engagement of Difference, Academic Belonging, Transparency, Structured Interactions, and Flexibility. The ultimate goals of this work are 1) to identify some easily implementable changes we can make to our teaching; and 2) to set longer-term goals for learning and instructional development.
Improving Course Accessibility for All Students through Universal Design for Learning
Facilitators:Madeleine Gonin and John Paul Kanwit
Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is “a framework to improve and optimize teaching and learning for all people based on scientificinsights into how humans learn” (http://udlguidelines.cast.org/). The UDL framework helps instructors make their course material accessible to all learners by providing multiple means of engagement, representation, and ways for students to demonstrate what they have learned. This learning community will provide an introduction to UDL and then move to more specific discussions of course accessibility, assumptions about ability/disability, and neurodiversity. Recognizing the particular challenges that instructors will face this semester and beyond, we will also consider the application of UDL to online courses. Finally, we will ask participants to discuss how UDL could be used in various disciplinary settings.
Intersections of Identity and Instruction
CITL Facilitator: Charmian Lam, Megan Betz, and Leslie Drane
Diverse, historically underrepresented and/or underserved graduate students face particular difficulties as associate instructors (e.g., discrimination, marginalization, isolation, problems with classroom authority, etc.). These challenges can impede AIs’ productive identity formation as both teachers and scholars in higher education. The Intersections of Identity and Instruction Graduate Student Learning Community seeks to promote the engagement and professional development of diverse graduate students as associate instructors. This community will provide a safe space for engaging instructors in strategies for holistic and equitable education
Community Engaged Learning
CITL Facilitator: Michael Valliant
Community engaged teaching and learning, AKA service-learning, combines learning goals and community service in ways that produce multiple benefits for students, community, and instructors. Students can demonstrate improved application of knowledge, greater interpersonal development, and improved social responsibility and citizenship skills. Instructors can discover new avenues for research and publication via new relationships between faculty while the community benefits from student participation as valuable human resources needed to achieve community goals and potentially building capacity for positive social change. This learning community will bring together instructors who want to explore how to use community engaged pedagogies in their classrooms. Through the fall 2020 semester, members will discuss foundational readings to understand the key elements of community engaged learning.
Transforming Your Research Into Teaching
Facilitators: Charmian Lam, Madeleine Gonin, and Leslie Drane
This 7-session workshop series will expose you to the basic elements of course design. Over the course of this workshop series, you will create a course proposal based on your current area of research. The workshop series is open to graduate students and post-doctoral scholars from any academic discipline. At the end of the series, you will have designed a full course syllabus and you will present your course to the group.
Improving Student Belonging in Classes and Majors
Facilitators: Leslie Drane and Madeleine Gonin
Historically underrepresented and marginalized students may face unique difficulties (isolation, marginalization, discrimination, etc.) that cause them to change majors early in their college careers, decide to transfer to another institute for higher education, or discontinue their education. This learning community will bring together instructors who want to explore how to help students to develop a sense of belonging in a class, major, and/or discipline. This learning community will meet in Fall 2019, with the possibility of extending the GSLC into Spring 2020. The fall semester will include foundational readings. If members wish to continue into the spring semester, they will conduct a research project on the topic of sense of belonging in their class, major, and/or discipline. The results will be documented and shared to extend the impact of these transformations.
Introduction to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL)
Facilitators: Shannon Sipes and Leslie Drane
For many instructors, the classroom can be a source of interesting questions about students’ learning. For example: what is the impact of a specific active learning technique on my students’ understanding of course material? How do my students prepare for exams, and how does that correlate with their performance? Does my students’ prior coursework or academic background correlate with their performance in my class? In seeking answers to these kinds of questions, instructors can use the research methods of their own discipline to examine their teaching and their students’ learning. This is the premise underlying the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SOTL), a program that helps instructors take a scholarly approach to their teaching and share the results of their inquiry with theircolleagues. In this GSLC, participants will engage in SOTL by formulating a research question, applying their disciplinary expertise to identify methods to investigate the question, and gathering evidence to address it.
Orientation Peer Facilitator
Facilitators: Leslie Drane and Madeleine Gonin
Learn to be a CITL workshop facilitator for the Associate Instructor Orientation while gaining new pedagogical knowledge and skills. Participants will design and lead AI-specific workshops on topics such as: teaching and learning theories; making use of class time; managing classroom authority and boundaries; and classroom climate (e.g., teaching controversial topics; engaging in group work; strategies for equitable classroom participation). CITL will provide ongoing training, mentoring, and resources on developing and facilitating a workshop.
Diversity, Inclusion, and Equity in the Classroom
CITL Facilitator: Shed Siliman
Diverse, historically underrepresented and/or underserved graduate students face particular difficulties as associate instructors (e.g., discrimination, marginalization, isolation, problems with classroom authority, etc.). These challenges can impede AIs’ productive identity formation as both teachers and scholars in higher education. The Intersections of Identity and Instruction Graduate Student Learning Community seeks to promote the engagement and professional development of diverse graduate students as associate instructors. This community will provide a safe space for engaging instructors in strategies for holistic and equitable education.
Learn to be a CITL workshop facilitator for the AI orientation while gaining new pedagogical knowledge and skills. Participants will design and lead AI-specific workshops on topics such as: teaching and learning theories; making use of class time; managing classroom authority and boundaries; and classroom climate (e.g., teaching controversial topics; engaging in group work; strategies for equitable classroom participation). We will provide ongoing training, mentoring, and resources on developing and facilitating a workshop. To learn more about the expectations, check out this summary document.
Talking About Teaching
CITL Facilitator: Leslie Drane
This graduate student learning community will promote the engagement and professional development of graduate students as they prepare to talk about their teaching in a variety of settings and to multiple audiences. Through workshops, readings, and the creation of pedagogy-related materials, members will learn about strategies on how to share what they have learned about teaching with others. Topics will include: backward course design, writing course syllabi, creating diversity statements, organizing a teaching portfolio, and approaching an academic interview. Participants will receive opportunities to practice talking about teaching and will leave the community having produced multiple pedagogy-related materials.
Classroom Inquiry
CITL Facilitator: Katie Kearns
Graduate student participants will engage in evidence-based and reflective teaching practice. Grounded in discussions of literature about learning and pedagogy, participants will develop, implement, and assess an innovative approach that addresses a learning challenge for their students. Graduate students will also gain experience communicating professionally about their teaching. This community of inquiry and encouragement will foster an evolution in teaching techniques and a greater attentiveness to scholarly teaching.
Evidence-Based Teaching in Science, Technology, Informatics, and Math (STIM)
CITL Facilitator: Francesca White
How do people learn? What are the most effective approaches to teaching scientific reasoning skills? How do we create spaces that ensure lasting learning in STIM disciplines? How do we ensure access and inclusivity in our teaching approaches? How do we know students are learning in our classes? Graduate students in STIM and SBE disciplines (e.g., astronomy, biology, chemistry, computing, informatics, math, medical sciences, and physics, as well as social, behavioral, and economic sciences) are invited to join a community to find answers to these questions through local and national discussions of evidence-based methods in teaching.
Intersections of Instruction & Identity
CITL Facilitator: Rachel Boveja
Are you interested in learning strategies for teaching with diversity? Do you identify as a member of a marginalized group? The Intersections of Identity and Instruction Graduate Student Learning Community (I3 GSLC), a partnership of the Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning and the University Graduate School, seeks to promote the engagement and professional development of diverse graduate students as associate instructors. This community provides a welcoming space for unpacking diverse identities, teaching, and education.
Learn to be a CITL workshop facilitator for the AI orientation while gaining new pedagogical knowledge and skills. Participants will design and lead AI-specific workshops on topics such as: teaching and learning theories; making use of class time; managing classroom authority and boundaries; and classroom climate (e.g., teaching controversial topics; engaging in group work; strategies for equitable classroom participation). We will provide ongoing training, mentoring, and resources on developing and facilitating a workshop.
Talking About Teaching
CITL Facilitator: Leslie Drane
This graduate student learning community will promote the engagement and professional development of graduate students as they prepare to talk about their teaching in a variety of settings and to multiple audiences. Through workshops, readings, and the creation of pedagogy-related materials, members will learn about strategies on how to share what they have learned about teaching with others. Topics will include: backward course design, writing course syllabi, creating diversity statements, organizing a teaching portfolio, and approaching an academic interview. Participants will receive opportunities to practice talking about teaching and will leave the community having produced multiple pedagogy-related materials.
Classroom Inquiry
CITL Facilitator: Katie Kearns
Graduate student participants will engage in evidence-based and reflective teaching practice. Grounded in discussions of literature about learning and pedagogy, participants will develop, implement, and assess an innovative approach that addresses a learning challenge for their students. Graduate students will also gain experience communicating professionally about their teaching. This community of inquiry and encouragement will foster an evolution in teaching techniques and a greater attentiveness to scholarly teaching.
Intersections of Instruction & Identity
CITL Facilitator: Yari Cruz
Are you interested in learning strategies for teaching with diversity? Do you identify as a member of a marginalized group? The Intersections of Identity and Instruction Graduate Student Learning Community (I3 GSLC), a partnership of the Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning and the University Graduate School, seeks to promote the engagement and professional development of diverse graduate students as associate instructors. This community provides a welcoming space for unpacking diverse identities, teaching, and education.
Orientation Peer Facilitator
CITL Facilitators: Katie Kearns, Leslie Drane, Yari Cruz
Learn to be a CITL workshop facilitator for the AI orientation while gaining new pedagogical knowledge and skills. Participants will design and lead AI-specific workshops on topics such as: teaching and learning theories; making use of class time; managing classroom authority and boundaries; and classroom climate (e.g., teaching controversial topics; engaging in group work; strategies for equitable classroom participation). We will provide ongoing training, mentoring, and resources on developing and facilitating a workshop.
Talking About Teaching
CITL Facilitator: Leslie Drane
This graduate student learning community will promote the engagement and professional development of graduate students as they prepare to talk about their teaching in a variety of settings and to multiple audiences. Through workshops, readings, and the creation of pedagogy-related materials, members will learn about strategies on how to share what they have learned about teaching with others. Topics will include: backward course design, writing course syllabi, creating diversity statements, organizing a teaching portfolio, and approaching an academic interview. Participants will receive opportunities to practice talking about teaching and will leave the community having produced multiple pedagogy-related materials.
Evidence-Based Teaching in Science, Technology, Informatics, and Math (STIM)
CITL Facilitator: Katie Kearns
How do people learn? What are the most effective approaches to teaching scientific reasoning skills? How do we create spaces that ensure lasting learning in STIM disciplines? How do we ensure access and inclusivity in our teaching approaches? How do we know students are learning in our classes? Graduate students in STIM and SBE disciplines (e.g., astronomy, biology, chemistry, computing, informatics, math, medical sciences, and physics, as well as social, behavioral, and economic sciences) are invited to join a community to find answers to these questions through local and national discussions of evidence-based methods in teaching.
Intersections of Instruction & Identity
CITL Facilitator: Jordan Lynton and Katie Kearns
Are you interested in learning strategies for teaching with diversity? Do you identify as a member of a marginalized group? The Intersections of Identity and Instruction Graduate Student Learning Community (I3 GSLC), a partnership of the Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning and the University Graduate School, seeks to promote the engagement and professional development of diverse graduate students as associate instructors. This community provides a welcoming space for unpacking diverse identities, teaching, and education.
Orientation Peer Facilitator
CITL Facilitators: Katie Kearns
Learn to be a CITL workshop facilitator for the AI orientation while gaining new pedagogical knowledge and skills. Participants will design and lead AI-specific workshops on topics such as: teaching and learning theories; making use of class time; managing classroom authority and boundaries; and classroom climate (e.g., teaching controversial topics; engaging in group work; strategies for equitable classroom participation). We will provide ongoing training, mentoring, and resources on developing and facilitating a workshop.
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