Are you, or do you know, a graduate student who is teaching for the first time next fall?
Each year in August, 400-600 Graduate Teaching Associates (GTAs) across Ohio State attend Graduate Teaching Orientation. While some of these GTAs teach courses, others teach as lab or studio instructors, recitation leaders, or graders.
In past years, participants have shared that orientation eased their concerns about teaching for the first time, helped them feel part of Ohio State’s community of GTAs, and gave them valuable teaching strategies that they could immediately implement in their new roles....
The Drake Institute looks forward to partnering with the Academy of Teaching to host The Academy of Teaching 2024 Spring Conference on Tuesday, May 7, 2024, from 8:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. at the Blackwell Inn.
This year’s theme is “Celebrating Creativity in the Classroom.” From designing entire courses and individual assignments to delivering content and assessing student work, teaching is inherently creative. Likewise, student learning is the embodiment of creative activity, seen in the wide range of thinking, actions, and products students generate during a given term. More than simply a strategy for staving off classroom...
As the influence of Generative AI on higher education and society grows, it is important for instructors to discuss its uses and limitations in their courses. A new Teaching and Learning Resource Center (TLRC) post, AI Teaching Strategies: Having Conversations with Students , offers suggestions for having productive conversations about AI with students. This guide provides helpful information regarding current AI-related concerns such as copyright, privacy and security. This post provides a variety of practical strategies for discussing AI, conversation starters, and class activities. Check out this valuable post as you plan to discuss AI with your students....
Are you interested in sharing your creative teaching ideas and tips? Don’t miss the opportunity to submit your proposal for the Academy of Teaching Conference happening on May 7, 2024. This year's conference theme is "Celebrating Creativity in the Classroom". From designing entire courses and individual assignments to delivering content and assessing student work, teaching is inherently creative. Likewise, student learning is the embodiment of creative activity, seen in the wide range of thinking, actions, and products students generate during a given term. More than simply a strategy for staving off classroom boredom, creativity is essential to the kinds...
During Autumn Semester 2023 the Drake Institute launched a new community of practice (CoP) focused on generative AI (artificial intelligence) and its use in teaching and learning. The community is a collaboration with nearly 100 faculty and staff from a variety of administrative and academic units. The CoP focuses on sharing effective practices, creating new knowledge, and engaging in collective critical inquiry about the use of AI in teaching and learning.
To date, educational developers from the CoP have drafted a new Teaching and Learning Resource Center (TLRC) teaching topic, ...
Midterm is here—and now is the best time to collect feedback on your teaching! Midterm feedback provides instructors with opportunities to discuss or clarify feedback with students and make adjustments prior to the end of the semester. A Small Group Instructional Diagnosis (SGID), as a midterm feedback tool, can help any instructor at Ohio State improve their teaching. This includes graduate instructors who may be early in their teaching careers, or those who may be teaching lab or recitation sections rather than teaching their own course. During the SGID process, Drake Institute consultants come into the classroom to...
A new Teaching and Learning Resource Center (TLRC) teaching topic, AI Teaching Strategies: Transparent Assignment Design provides instructors with a model, Transparency In Teaching and Learning (TILT), for designing assignments in light of AI. The topic, crafted by representatives from the Center for the Study and Teaching of Writing, the Committee on Academic Misconduct (COAM), the Drake Institute, OAA Educator Professional Learning, and University Libraries describes the TILT model and gives practical examples for OSU instructors. Academic Integrity icons from COAM are also provided as a consistent transparent strategy for discussing AI assignments with students.
Whether working as graduate student instructors or TAs, preparing a teaching portfolio for the academic job market, or teaching post-graduation, most graduate students will need a toolkit of resources for building courses on their own. This semester in Graduate Teaching Toolkit, the Drake Institute's workshop series for graduate instructors, we'll explore each step of the course design process from writing course goals and assignments to choosing course content and classroom activities.
Along the way, we’ll consider some of the course design challenges commonly faced by graduate student instructors at Ohio State, including teaching a subject that they...
During autumn semester, Drake Institute staff and affiliates were thrilled to share expertise and contribute to ongoing discourse on effective pedagogy and student success at local, national, and global conferences. Our team members and collaborators delivered presentations on a range of topics, including assessment practices, information literacy, inclusive teaching, and student feedback on instruction. These presentations showcased evidence-informed practices and sparked conversations about developing and scaling teaching innovations.
Thank you for being a part of our vibrant teaching and learning community. As we turn our sights toward the new year, we look forward to another semester of...
The Drake Institute's Spring programming plan is now live! We've diligently been working to create workshops in many areas, including Assessing Student Learning, Curriculum & Course Development, Educational Technology, Inclusive Teaching, and other core competencies that make Ohio State instructors some of the best in the world. See below for some highlights in the calendar, or search the competency tags on our events page.
What we've been working on - New and featured for spring: