Faculty Professional Development

From University of California Davis. Expanded guide: Communicate effectively with your students
Establishing and maintaining clear communication via well-defined communication channels allows students to focus on learning. Even more than in a face-to-face class, students need clear guidelines for communicating with you and for interacting with other students as they navigate your course.

This extensive article from the Columbia University Center for Teaching and Learning covers a wide variety of aspects related to feedback for learning. If you’re looking for the what and the why, the characteristics and strategies, and ideas about reflecting on your own feedback practices, then this article is a great resource for you. Includes links to resources and references.

From the MIT Teaching and Learning Lab this brief article summarizes how to effectively incorporate feedback into your classroom.

This link provides direct access to The Teaching Professor’s archived articles related to feedback. According to the Teaching Professor’s website “the articles (they) seek due justice to the nuances of common teaching and learning challenges.” So, if you want to read practical articles written by faculty from a broad range of disciplines and institutions who are serious about improving learning, then you’ll want to check this out.

Seven brief activity ideas to keep motivation high, cultivate metacognition, and build strong learning communities. From Faculty Focus.

A practical guide that includes key factors for motivating students to engage, as well as practical examples and take-aways to incorporate in your course. From Cornell University's Center for Teaching Innovation.

Explore three frameworks for understanding student motivation with practical solutions for keeping students engaged. From Vanderbilt University Center for Teaching.

Find and mouse over "Topics" in the top menu. Then mouse over "Teaching Strategies and Techniques" and click on "Motivating Students" to access a treasure trove of practical articles on motivating students. Online and in-person learning, assignments, engaging with readings, supporting failure, mindsets, and more.

Integrating Soft Skills is a conference report on the impact of teaching soft skills to students as preparation for the expectations of the professional world.

Development of soft skills is necessary for the success of students entering into the professional workforce and there are ways in which this skill acquisition can be achieved with intentional help from academic institutions. Recognition of how skills are acquired through formal, informal and non-formal modes as well as creating awareness of soft skills through discussion to young learners of how it appears in their interactions and developing frameworks to reflect on everyday learning in the context of emerging with an understanding of soft skills are among the recommendations

Browse through a wealth of ideas and resources curated by WCC Faculty & CiTL Instructional Designers. Includes syllabus design, activities, course welcome sites, and more.

Humanized online teaching ensures the non-cognitive components of learning are addressed through instructor-student relationships and community, allowing connection and empathy to drive engagement and rigor. Six humanizing strategies with real teaching examples are discussed in this article.