I read an article in the New York Times this week called "Kids, Would you Please Start Fighting?" and I was struck by the thesis of the piece, especially as it relates to argument writing courses. The author discusses how argument is the genesis for creativity, and...
My first teaching job was at a public high school outside Chicago, and every week I had to submit that week’s daily lesson plans to my department chair. These plans included objectives and activities for each of my classes each day. I did this for the first two years...
This week in my mythology class we discussed Oedipus the King, the famous ancient Greek tragedy about a man (a king) who discovers that he accidentally, unknowingly killed his father, slept with his mother, and had offspring who were also his siblings. The day of that...
Do you <3 your textbook? If you don’t, your students probably don’t either. What would it be like to teach a course with text materials that did exactly what you want them to do? This is the Holy Grail of the OER project. Yes, the price of textbooks is insane...
With knowledge comes responsibility. Knowledge left unchecked or unshared can turn inward and devour the pupil. Some pupils wish to be devoured in order to avoid sharing knowledge. This, again, is the ego and thinking others cannot be trusted with knowledge. While...
I have been thinking about flipping my math class for several years. Last spring I finally did it. I completely flipped my MTH 120 class and will flip others as I find the time required to get it set up. The main tool that has allowed me to flip my class is EdPuzzle...
I get stressed, sometimes, by all of the grading and emailing that’s required of me in the middle of the semester, and by the unending to-do list I keep running in my brain. For work, I have a three column to-do list that, when not woefully neglected, works really...
Perhaps some of you have seen the video circulating on Facebook lately that features a collection of college students supposedly lining up for a race. But before the race begins, students answer questions that allow some of them to move ahead of their peers. The point...
There is a deep well of knowledge that not everyone knows how to access. Some who access it have no want to share it with others. Some share about the knowledge but they don't share the knowledge itself. Few find the knowledge. Fewer are willing and able to give true...