The Office of Teaching and Learning blog highlights ideas, practices, and conversations that shape teaching and learning across our institution. Here, you’ll find reflections, insights, and perspectives on learning that inspire innovation and thoughtful practice.
The movie M3GAN (2023) is a tale about an artificially intelligent (AI) humanoid that learns from interactions and, ultimately, becomes a killer. The movie stands in a long line of films that highlight our collective fear that machine learning will eventually replace or destroy us. It is interesting that this movie was released only weeks after ChatGPT, an AI program, gained popularity in the media for its own learning abilities.
MyDU has officially replaced PioneerWeb. The new MyDU platform offers a more organized, user-friendly hub for DU staff and faculty from which many DU necessities can be easily accessed.
Even though video technology like Zoom has become exponentially more prevalent in the classroom than it was two years ago, it’s still not always clear when and how to use it.
Navigating any college course as a student can be challenging, and large classes can present particular challenges. For instructors, prompting meaningful engagement in a large class can also seem overwhelming.
Using technologies such as Zoom in our teaching can give students the opportunity to interact with us – and each other – in real time. While we in the OTL recommend that no more than 50% of your course be synchronous, providing at least some opportunities for these real-time interactions can help create the sense of community and connection that is so critical in this time when many of our students are likely feeling isolated and disconnected.
Several years ago, I co-taught large classes of 65 to 100 students. The program was hybrid and designed for students to both come to class and work asynchronously to meet the course requirements. We chose to implement Canvas discussions in the online portion. Students were divided into groups of five and asked to post once a week (30 minutes) and respond to their peers once each week (30 minutes). This activity was assigned for eight-week sessions.
Maybe you teach a writing course and want to add options, like video or audio responses, to give students more choice in how they showcase their learning for the summative assessment. Or maybe you teach a STEM course and are looking for ways to better document students’ processes and their growth as a part of their final assignment.
First, utilizing an ePortfolio for low stakes, formative assessments has been shown to increase student engagement and completion of assignments. In a recent study, researchers found that having students complete low stakes, formative assignments within an ePortfolio and gathering them for inclusion in a larger, comprehensive ePortfolio supported higher levels of completion and engagement.
