Accessibility – Testing Accommodations
I am often stopped and asked a variety of questions regarding the students with disabilities (SWD) here at NMC. Many of those questions revolve around the approved accommodations. In the next several editions of this column I’ll share some of those in a Q & A...
Learning debt
Lately I've been studying Agile Programming. One idea new to me is the concept of "technology debt." The gist is this: if developers choose to release a version of software with fewer features or more bugs than planned and desired, they accumulate a debt that must be...
“Messy” Questions Often Elicit Critical Thinking
One strategy to elicit critical thinking is to omit important facts when presenting scenarios to students for classroom discussion. Often instructors take considerable care in class to articulate each important fact within a particular scenario that students will...
Searching for the Somatic (week 2)
My writings involve movement descriptions taken from my classroom. I am trying to bring the reader into a dance classroom to catch a glimpse of movement education. "Today we will start facing away from the mirror. Although the mirror serves as an important tool in...
It’s a Lesson…It’s a Study Guide…No, it’s a Moodle Quiz!
That’s right! Ever thought about using a quiz for a lesson? Or how about as a study guide? It’s easy, and it’s all in how you set it up. Instead of an assessment tool, re-purpose as an active learning activity where students can: Watch a video clip. Go to websites...
Thinking Inside The Box
Thinking Inside The Box By Brian Sweeney I spent two years in Germany with the U.S. Army, providing bomb disposal support to highly classified missions. I would get a call telling me to get to an airfield within usually 6 hours, without being told where I was going...
Lifetime Writing Prompt & Order of Magnitude
Instead of telling the students what the concept of order of magnitude is, I let them discover its meaning through a writing prompt. Following is the prompt statement (derived from a Just-In-Time physics question), the students' results, & the lead up to the...
An Argument Against Averaging Student Grades & Using the Killer Zero
Averaging student grades is an inaccurate way of measuring what they've achieved in class. At the end of the semester, do you add up all the points a student has earned throughout the term and then divide that number by the total amount of points possible to determine...
Own It: Learn How to Learn
When I look back on my college education I see class time spent listening to lectures and watching instructors work math problems on the board. Seldom, if ever, were we students given class time to think something through or work something out for ourselves. If...
In Search of the Somatic
My writings involve movement descriptions taken from my classroom. I am trying to bring the reader into a dance classroom to catch a glimpse of movement education. "We will start with an inhaling breath. On the exhale, bring both knees to the chest. Feel the flexion...