Commentary Category
Junior Faculty Spotlight: Jennifer Ridgway
May. 18, 2020—Each month, the CFT highlights the work of our Junior Faculty Teaching Fellows. This month, Jennifer Ridgway, Nursing, talks about her teaching philosophy and interests. Engaging in the Center for Teaching’s (CFT) Junior Faculty Teaching Fellowship (JFTF) has become one of the greatest growth opportunities in my professional development as faculty. One of my primary goals in participating in this...
Latest Episode of the Leading Lines Podcast
May. 13, 2020—During this season of Leading Lines, we’re exploring the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on higher education. A big part of that impact lands on our students. Robin DeRosa is the director of the Open Learning & Teaching Collaborative, or Open CoLab, at Plymouth State University, a public liberal arts institution that’s part of the University. She...
Teaching Innovations at Vanderbilt: Faith Rovenolt and high impact learning experiences
May. 11, 2020—By Faith Rovenolt, CFT undergraduate intern Faith Rovenolt initiated the Teaching Innovations at Vanderbilt blog series in spring 2019. She has shared posts based on interviews with Vanderbilt instructors every two weeks during the academic year since then. As she graduates and moves on to graduate school, she closes out the Teaching Innovations at Vanderbilt...
Flipgrid: Empowering Voices with Asynchronous Online Video Discussions
Apr. 21, 2020—by Patrick Murphy, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Spanish & Portuguese Flipgrid is a free online video tool from Microsoft that allows students to record video for up to 10 minutes. It has a lot of fun visual effects as well as intuitive assessment and feedback options that can be included in rubric evaluation...
Teaching Innovations at Vanderbilt: Chelsea Yarborough, Cross-Disciplinary Examples, and Online Covenant Building
Apr. 20, 2020—by Faith Rovenolt, CFT undergraduate intern During Spring 2020, the Teaching Innovations at Vanderbilt blog series will highlight teaching innovations that CFT staff have implemented and evaluated in their own courses. Something I’ve noticed in my time as a student is the false dichotomy sometimes constructed between disciplines. The most obvious example of this is...
Celebration of Learning Spotlight: Mahler as Editor, the 1899 Vienna Hofoper Production of Bärenhäuter
Apr. 14, 2020—On February 13, 2020, the Center for Teaching held a Celebration of Learning, an exhibition of students as producers. The event featured students from all over campus sharing what they learned, created, designed, and discovered. Chet Humphries’ project examines archival sources he worked with in Vienna (Mahler’s performance materials from the 1899 production of Siegfried Wagner’s Bärenhäuter) and tries...
From the Director
Apr. 13, 2020—Greetings from my home office, where I sit writing at the beautiful roll top desk I inherited from my father. A lot has changed since our March newsletter, at Vanderbilt, in middle Tennessee, and around the world, but I don’t have to tell you that. We’re all figuring out how to teach and learn and...
Pivoting to remote teaching and learning: Community health clinical hours from a distance through a weekly newsletter
Apr. 10, 2020—Brittany Haskell is a Nursing faculty member who is engaged in the CFT’s Junior Faculty Teaching Fellowship this year. She teaches in the Community Health course series, which requires that students engage in a particular number of clinical hours. During the transition to remote teaching and learning this spring, Brittany and her colleagues worked with...
Pivoting to remote teaching and learning: Community health clinical hours from a distance through parent education
Apr. 9, 2020—Jennifer Ridgway is a Nursing faculty member who is engaged in the CFT’s Junior Faculty Teaching Fellowship this year. She teaches in the Community Health course series, which requires that students engage in a particular number of clinical hours. During the transition to remote teaching and learning this spring, Jennifer and her colleagues worked with...
Student motivation journal club: Supporting our students’ motivation in the era of COVID-19
Apr. 8, 2020—by Cynthia Brame, CFT associate director Our student motivation journal club is ending the academic year in the age of COVID-19 and all that implies: working from home, teaching and/or taking classes remotely, reading shifting but consistently bad news each day. We are learning how to negotiate challenges of spotty internet connection, kids and animals...