Events

April 28 & 29, 2021 | Free Virtual Event

Students enter and leave their post-secondary education with a multiplicity of commitments and identities that inform their experiences as learners. The majority of 21st-century students juggle jobs, family, health, and finances, in addition to coursework and planning for the future. Teaching the whole person – encompassing mind, body, heart, and spirit – addresses these competing pressures by affirming students’ and instructors’ humanity. According to Schoem, Modey and St. John (2017), supporting the whole student through teaching and learning provides a number of benefits by increasing “student commitment to learning because students see themselves as part of an engaged, supportive and caring scholarly community” (p. xii). How do we consider these factors as we educate the whole student at our institutions?

Learn more.

Friday, March 5, 2021
10 a.m.—12 p.m. AST
Online via Teams Meetings

This webinar is limited to Dalhousie faculty, instructors, and staff

In any given year 1 in 5 Canadians will experience a mental illness, and according to Statistics Canada youth aged 15-24 are the most likely group to suffer the effects of a mental illness, substance dependency and suicide.  Considering most university students are within this age group it is essential that those working with University students are provided the necessary knowledge and resources to recognize and respond to students in distress.

MH101 is a short yet informative presentation developed for university faculty and staff to increase awareness and understanding of mental illness and mental health problems, thus increase your confidence in supporting students.  MH101 will be delivered jointly by Joanne Mills, a Psychologist with Student Health & Wellness and two Stay Connected Peer Support workers who are students themselves.

Register

Registration closes Thursday, March 4 at 4 pm AT and is limited to 30 participants.  A link to the Microsoft Teams Meeting will be sent at least 1-day prior to the event.

Wednesday March 10, 2021
11 a.m.—12:30 p.m.
Online via Teams Meetings
Register

Despite social distancing, COVID has bought us together in more ways than one to support each another in our teaching and learning.  Are you interested in where we go from here? If so, please join us to explore the idea of the “Dalhousie Academic Landscape” (DAL) and to offer your input about our future directions.  This session will begin with a short overview by former Provost Teri Balser and will highlight the many ways in which teaching and learning are supported and enhanced at Dalhousie. Participants will then have the opportunity to engage in two of five possible breakout sessions to discuss how we can best build community and support teachers and teaching at Dal.  Join us to learn more about how DAL works and how you can get involved.

REGISTER

Breakout sessions will include:

Exploring ideas for a cross-Dalhousie teaching community: A Dalhousie Teaching Academy?

WHO: Anne Marie Ryan (Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences)

WHAT: Teaching Academies are common at top universities worldwide, and provide opportunity for cross-university peer-interaction and community focused on teaching and learning. If you have ever wished to connect with like-minded colleagues around teaching ideas, with whom you can share your teaching journey and develop a sense of belonging, join us for this session on building a Dalhousie Teaching Academy! Help define parameters for the Teaching Academy, and provide input into how such a community could best meet your hopes and needs, while providing a safe space to interact with faculty from within and beyond your own unit.

EXPECTED AUDIENCE: Faculty or instructors who are interested in helping define what a collective space for sharing ideas and providing advice by teachers, for teachers, and about teachers might look like. As a collective, we have many ideas, many questions, and many hopes for our students, and yet too few opportunities to share these with each othe​r. When we do engage in conversations, we often discover new and energizing ways to be creative and resolve some of the teaching dilemmas we face from time to time. We invite you to come and share your thoughts and ideas with others interested in considering a community around teaching for faculty, by faculty. 

Building connections beyond Dal: Explore the LEARN/CIRTL North American network!

WHO: Angela Siegel (Faculty of Computer Science) & Erin Careless (College of Continuing Education)

WHAT: CIRTL is a network of 38 universities across North America focused on the development of teaching and learning for grad students and faculty. Dalhousie is a new member of the network, and we are developing our programming as part of it. This session will provide an introduction to how CIRTL can help you advance teaching within your discipline, and how you can join a larger teaching and learning community across North American universities. You will also be invited to provide input about how a CIRTL “node” at Dal might best serve our faculty, staff, and students. 

EXPECTED AUDIENCE: CIRTL is focused mainly on supporting graduate student development, but we also welcome faculty members that are looking for broader connections as well. Join us and we'll help you find out how!

Teaching with technology: Using the tools available through Brightspace 

WHO: Les Tyler Johnson (Centre for Learning and Teaching) and Michelle McDonald (Academic Technology Services, and Dalhousie Libraries)

WHAT: The Brightspace LMS is a robust tool that supports teaching and learning, both through the platform itself and its integrated technologies, such as Panopto, Urkund, Collaborate, and more. In this session, facilitators will support you in your selection and use of the various tools available. Do you have a question about how to use a specific tool? Is there a specific activity or assessment you'd like to implement in your class and like to discuss what technology might help you bring it to life? Facilitators look forward to supporting these and related conversations on the suite of educational technology tools available at Dal.

EXPECTED AUDIENCE: Anyone who teaches.

A New Academic Web Portal: Building skills, careers, and community

WHO: Marlo MacKay (Dalhousie Libraries) and Suzanne Le-May Sheffield (Centre for Learning and Teaching)

WHAT: In an effort to bring related but often discrete elements of Dalhousie’s academic landscape together, we’re creating a web portal based on the pillars of skill building, career building, and community building. This portal is meant to be the virtual place where instructors and faculty will find professional development and skill building opportunities, as well as opportunities to connect with colleagues both within and beyond Dalhousie. Join this breakout room and help us develop the content you’d like to see featured on the portal.

EXPECTED AUDIENCE: Faculty and instructors who are interested in contributing to highlighting teaching and learning connections on the web across Dalhousie.

Elevating the Dalhousie graduate students and post-doctoral fellows experience: Your voice matters

WHO: Mabel Ho (Faculty of Graduate Studies) and Jill McSweeney-Flaherty (Centre for Learning and Teaching)

WHAT: How can you make the most of your experiences at Dalhousie?  Join us in this session where we invite you to tell us about your experiences at Dalhousie, what would you like to see, and explore how we can work together to build community and opportunities across campus. 

EXPECTED AUDIENCE: Graduate students, postdoctoral researchers, staff, and faculty members who are interested in supporting graduate students and post-doctoral fellows’ development and success at Dalhousie and beyond. 

Wednesday, March 10, 2021
2-3 p.m. AST
Online via Teams Meetings

Jake Nissen
Videographer
Email: jake.nissen@dal.ca

Join Jake Nissen, CLT's videographer, for a Q&A session about the work he does and how it might be helpful to you! Jake creates custom videos for your classes and programs that help to bring aspects of the classroom that would normally be enjoyed in person, directly to the students through online video.

REGISTER

Registration closes Wednesday, March 10 at 12:45 p.m.  A link to the session will be sent at least one-hour prior to the event.  If you do not receive the link or wish to register after it's closed, please email clt@dal.ca.

March 17, 2021
11:30 a.m.—1 p.m.
Online via Teams Meetings
Regsiter

Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is a learner-centred framework that guides course design and delivery. UDL considers that when a course is designed to support students with unique needs, this approach, in fact, supports all students in their learning. The core UDL principles of “multiple means of 1) engagement, 2) representation 3) and action and expression,” are each situated, for every learner, within their cultural framework. As such, many practitioners are co-implementing UDL and Culturally Responsive Pedagogy (CRP). Courses designed and taught through CRP apply decolonizing, anti-racist, and anti-oppressive theories and practices, and promote equity and inclusion through an intersectional lens. Both UDL and CRP are grounded in neurological science and when implemented, have a positive impact on student learning and wellness.

In this workshop, the facilitators will introduce the basics of UDL and CRP, guide participants in activities and discussions that get at the “why” of using UDL and CRP and give participants concrete ideas for incorporating these pedagogical frameworks in their course design.

Outcomes

By the end of this session, we aspire that participants will be able to:

• Describe the 3 UDL Principles and 6 CRP ‘strands’
• Articulate perceived value in adopting UDL and CRP
• Consider, and work through, perceived challenges an instructor might face in implementing UDL/CRP
• Identify at least two concrete action items to experiment with in current course design or revisions

Interactive Pieces

This session may involve opportunities to ask and answer questions; participate in large- and small-group (breakout rooms) discussions; and respond to prompts (via tools such as Padlet, chat, polls, etc.). Engaging in these activities is optional, meaning you can also attend the session and just sit back and listen. At the same time, we will also welcome you sharing your video and/or audio with the group during times of questions and discussion.

Facilitators

Tereigh Ewert, Senior Educational Developer (Diversity and Inclusivity)
Les T. Johnson, Educational Developer (eLearning)

REGISTER

Wednesday, March 24, 2021
11:30 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.
Online via Teams Meetings
Register

Diane Obed
Educational Developer (Indigenization)
Centre for Learning and Teaching

This session is offered for instructors who would like to explore decolonial frameworks and be able to apply them within their teaching methods, pedagogies and syllabi.  During the session, instructors will be invited to re-assess and review their syllabi and pedagogies through a decolonial lens, exploring how the academy’s colonial foundations influence teaching and learning. This process will help initiate the process of re-designing teaching pedagogies based on decolonial strategies and practices.

By the end of this workshop you will be able to:

• Engage with self-assessment that examine how coloniality influences and shapes our pedagogical teaching choices and classrooms
• Be able to recognize and value the application of decolonial principles to syllabi and pedagogies in building equity-minded teaching and culturally-relevant competencies

Register

Registration closes Wednesday, March 24 at 10 a.m. AT.  A link to the Microsoft Teams Meeting will be sent at least 1-hour prior to the event.  If you did you not receive the link, or wish to register once it's closed, please email clt@dal.ca.

Wednesday, April 7, 2021
2-3:30 p.m. AST
Online via Teams Meetings

Jill Marie McSweeney-Flaherty, PhD
Educational Developer
(Scholarship of Teaching & Learning | Classroom Spaces, Interim Graduate Students)

Do you have a scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) project bubbling in the back of your mind but haven’t had someone to bounce ideas off of? Are you in the process of planning a SoTL project and haven’t had time to dedicate to organizing? Are you deep into data analysis and trying to figure out what it all means? If this sounds like something you’re currently experiencing, then this session might be for you!

Join us for a dedicated hour to brainstorm, collaborate, and develop your SoTL musings or projects.

What you can expect: Participants will be broken into small groups of 4-5 where each participant will have 3 minutes to “present” or share their idea, project, or data to their group and ask their group members one question or area they’d like feedback on. The group will have 7 minutes to discuss the presenter’s question and offer their own thoughts. This will happen 4-5 times, giving each member of the group an opportunity to share and discuss their work.

What you need to complete prior to coming: Each participant is expected to informally share their idea, project, or findings with their small group in a 3-minute elevator pitch, and then ask their group members a question about their pitch. Don’t stress about preparing something fancy or overly involved, your pitch can simply be a casual conversation you share with your members. Some people might come with a fully developed project, while others might still be in the process of discovering their idea – all stages are welcome!

REGISTER

Registration closes Wednesday, April 7 at 12:45 p.m. AST and is limited to 25 participants.  A link to the Microsoft Teams Meeting will be sent at least 1-hour prior to the event.

Virtual Workshop 

REGISTER

The teaching dossier (or portfolio) is widely used by faculty members and instructors to document their teaching experience and responsibilities, and to provide evidence of the quality of their teaching practice and ongoing teaching skills development. Teaching dossiers and teaching philosophies are increasingly required for faculty and teaching positions at many institutions.

At Dalhousie, candidates for faculty appointments, re-appointment, tenure, or promotion are usually required to submit a teaching dossier as part of the application process.

The Creating a Teaching Dossier workshop takes place over a two-week period each May. In this four-part workshop, you'll have the opportunity to think about your own teaching and how to accurately capture your practice in a dossier.

Although there are four scheduled sessions included in the workshop, you should plan to spend additional time between the sessions working on your teaching dossiers. This includes preparing a draft of your Teaching Philosophy Statement during the first week. The act of compiling a dossier requires you to closely examine your own teaching practice—to help identify strengths and challenges and guide your plans for further developing your teaching. 

This workshop is intended for faculty members or post-doctoral fellows only. Graduate students should register for the Teaching Dossier Workshop designed for graduate students.

Please note: Participants enrolled in the Faculty Certificate in Teaching and Learning Program must attend both sessions in week 1 and at least one session in week 2.

Participants who are not enrolled in the Faculty Certificate Program should plan to attend both sessions in week 1 and are welcome to attend one or both sessions in week 2.

Schedule for Week 1 online synchronous sessions

• Monday, May 10^th, 2021 from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.
• Thursday, May 13^th, 2021 from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.

In the Monday session, you'll receive information and resources for effectively presenting your teaching ideas, experiences, and evidence in a teaching dossier that's tailored to your specific purpose. You'll receive examples and guidance for conceptualizing a teaching philosophy, and you'll begin to draft a teaching philosophy statement or re-work an existing statement.

In the Thursday session, a video of two faculty members—who have extensive experience reading and assessing teaching dossiers as committee members for the tenure, promotion, and hiring processes—will describe their experiences of reading and evaluating dossiers. You will have the opportunity to ask questions.

Also in the Thursday session, you'll exchange drafts of your teaching philosophy statements, to offer and to receive peer feedback.

Schedule for Week 2 online synchronous sessions

• Tuesday, May 18^th, 2021 from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.
• Friday, May 21^st, 2021 from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.

During the second week of the workshop, we will hold two virtual Teaching Dossier drop-in sessions.  Several educational developers from the Centre for Learning and Teaching will be present to offer feedback and advice in one-on-one, break-out rooms. You will also be able to reserve a timeslot for the week 2 online synchronous sessions in order to guarantee one-on-one time with an educational developer. We will post a Teaching Dossier Feedback Reservation Form in the coming weeks.

REGISTER

Additional Information

• The Step-by-Step Creation of a Teaching Dossier
• The Teaching Dossier Template

Cost

Free to Dalhousie employees

Contact

Centre for Learning and Teaching
email: clt@dal.ca

Friday, February 26
12-1:30 p.m. AST
Online via Collaborate Ultra and Microsoft Teams

Peter Newbury, PhD Educational Developer – CLT / Engineering

Kate Thompson, PhD Educational Developer (eLearning)

It’s well known that active learning strategies in the classroom result in better learning in students compared to more passive learning strategies. How can we integrate active learning into our online classes?

Join us for a practical demonstration of active learning in both Collaborate Ultra and Microsoft Teams!

Participants in this session will take part in two breakout group exercises – one in Collaborate Ultra, and one in Microsoft Teams. The presenters will not only facilitate the activities to allow you to get a feel for them from a student’s perspective, and they will also provide detailed step-by-step tips for how to plan and execute similar activities in your own online classes.

Presenters

Peter Newbury – Educational Developer with the CLT embedded in the Faculty of Engineering and the Faculty of Science
Kate Thompson – Educational Developer (eLearning) with the CLT embedded in the Faculty of Science

Registration closes Friday, February 26 at 10:45 am.  A link to the session will be sent at least one-hour prior to the event.  If you do not receive the link or wish to register after it's closed, please email clt@dal.ca.

Tuesday, February 16, 2021
10-11 a.m. AST
Online via Microsoft Teams Meetings

Peter Newbury, PhD Educational Developer – CLT / Engineering

Kate Thompson, PhD Educational Developer (eLearning)

Online courses introduce particular challenges with respect to academic integrity. Join us for a discussion of the pros and cons of a wide variety of methods for supporting academic integrity in online assessments.

Presenters

Peter Newbury – Educational Developer with the CLT embedded in the Faculty of Engineering and the Faculty of Science

Kate Thompson – Educational Developer (eLearning) with the CLT embedded in the Faculty of Science

Register

Registration closes Tuesday, February 16 at 8:45 am.  A link to the session will be sent at least one-hour prior to the event.  If you do not receive the link or wish to register after it's closed, please email clt@dal.ca.

Tuesday, February 9, 2021
2-4 p.m. AST
Online Via Teams Meetings

This webinar is limited to Dalhousie faculty, instructors, and staff

In any given year 1 in 5 Canadians will experience a mental illness, and according to Statistics Canada youth aged 15-24 are the most likely group to suffer the effects of a mental illness, substance dependency and suicide.  Considering most university students are within this age group it is essential that those working with University students are provided the necessary knowledge and resources to recognize and respond to students in distress.

MH101 is a short yet informative presentation developed for university faculty and staff to increase awareness and understanding of mental illness and mental health problems, thus increase your confidence in supporting students.  MH101 will be delivered jointly by Joanne Mills, a Psychologist with Student Health & Wellness and two Stay Connected Peer Support workers who are students themselves.

Tuesday, February 9, 2021
10-11 a.m. AST
Online via Microsoft Teams Meetings

Peter Newbury, PhD Educational Developer – CLT / Engineering

Kate Thompson, PhD Educational Developer (eLearning)

How long should your test be open and available for students to complete? How long should each student have to complete each question? Should you allow students to go back to previous questions? Should your tests be open book? What does open book mean? How and when should you communicate to students what the parameters of the test are?

Tests are full of questions. In this session we will provide some clarity on the answers to the above questions. We will consider the range of course types typical in the Faculty of Science, and how the recommendations might be different depending on the type of course and number of students.

Presenters

Peter Newbury – Educational Developer with the CLT embedded in the Faculty of Engineering and the Faculty of Science

Kate Thompson – Educational Developer (eLearning) with the CLT embedded in the Faculty of Science

Thursday, February 4, 2021
12-1 p.m. AST
Online via Collaborate Ultra

Getting feedback from students near the mid-point of a course is useful in any type of class – Learning what students are loving, and what they are struggling with can help you tweak your course to maximize student success. This kind of feedback, arguably, is even more important in online classes, especially if you are new to teaching online!  

Join us for a conversation about why, how, and when to collect feedback from students.  

We’ll discuss strategies that work well with small and large classes and compare the different approaches to feedback questions. We will then chat about how to interpret feedback, and how and when you should address feedback by making changes to your course.

Panelist

Kate Crane – An Educational Developer from the CLT embedded in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

Bruno Roy – CLT’s Technical Administrator, Student Ratings of Instruction

Kate Thompson – An Educational Developer from the CLT embedded in the Faculty of Science

Friday, January 22, 2021
1-2 p.m.
Online via Teams Meetings

Join us for a conversation about the benefits of creating an eLearning community of practice in your faculty or department. Our panelists will each talk about how their communities of practice emerged, the types of activities the communities engage in, and how they built awareness of and engagement in the communities.

Panelists

• Stephanie Bernier, Educational Developer, Faculty of Computer Science
• Laura Cumming, University Teaching Fellow, Faculty of Management; Faculty Associate, Center for Learning and Teaching
• Dr. Anne-Marie Ryan, University Teaching Fellow, Faculty of Science; Faculty Associate, Center for Learning and Teaching

Lunch & Learn sessions are informal interactive sessions that begin with a short presentation followed by a group discussion of the topic. Please feel free to bring your lunch, and be prepared to turn on your mic and/or camera for an engaging discussion!

Thursday, January 14, 2021
1-2 p.m.
Online via Collaborate Ultra

Robyn Moore, MA
Educational Developer (Students)
Centre for Learning and Teaching

We are constantly asking our students questions: on exams, on assignments, in classes. How can we make sure we are asking questions that will foster deep reflection, spur discussion, and support student learning? In this session, we will discuss how, why, and when we ask students questions and how this impacts student learning. 

REGISTER

Note

A link to join via Collaborate will be emailed to participants one hour prior to the start of the session.  Registration closes 1-hour and 15-minutes prior to the event. If you do not receive the link or wish to register past the closing time, please email clt@dal.ca.