Learning in teams offers unique benefits to understand and address contemporary, global, and local challenges through effective and thoughtful learning journeys. However, learning in teams is not always thoroughly planned or effectively delivered. In trying to better understand what processes support or hinder effective and innovative learning in…

The increased prevalence and severity of academic-related distress is of significant concern on college campuses. Of particular relevance to instructors is the anxiety relating to classroom teaching and evaluation practices. Sources of evaluation anxiety include student uncertainty about the nature of the expected demands as well as their ability…

This study analyzed the effect of a learning philosophy assignment on students' intellectual development and mastery of first-year biology and second-year biochemistry course content. We used pre- and post-surveys to assess students' cognitive complexity, and compared students' midterm and final exam marks to assess mastery of course content. The…

This practice-sharing piece outlines two main approaches to flexible summative assessment schemes, including for each approach one example from my practice and another from a published study. The bento approach offers the same assessments to all students but a variety of grade weighting schemes, allowing students to change weighting during the…

How can creating a simple stick figure comic help us tell -- and deeply listen to -- true stories of social injustice and practice anti-oppression strategies? More specifically, how can creating a series of stick-figure comics help learners enhance their understanding of the Indigenous Peoples' testimonies in the Truth and Reconciliation Report…

Oppression and marginalization of people who identify as LGBTQ+ persist on university campuses despite their right to be free of discrimination under the Ontario Human Rights Code. In an attempt to highlight the real and detrimental impacts of normative heterosexual and cisgender ideologies on Ontarian students the Ontario Undergraduate Student…

Students often express surprise at their grades on papers. This gap between expectation and achievement may stem in part from lack of facility with revision strategies. How, then, can teachers work with their students to foster more effective revisions? This question in teaching and learning has inspired an interdisciplinary collaboration: one of…

Creative Problem-Solving (CPS) can be a transformative teaching methodology that supports a dialogical learning atmosphere that can transcend the traditional classroom and inspire excellence in students by linking real life experiences with the curriculum. It supports a sense of inquiry that incorporates both experiential learning and the…

This project began in response to a perceived need to assess students' perceptions with respect to the emerging use of audience response systems (clickers) in several mid- to large-size undergraduate courses at the University of Victoria. We developed and validated a "Clicker Use Survey" to gather students' opinions with respect to…

This paper recounts the author's experience with giving a Needs Assessment for improvement by university teachers. Subjects were from the University of Lethbridge and the 2008 Society for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education (STLHE) conference session. Teachers at the University (n = 77) indicated they could spend 5-15 hours in teaching…