TCC 2020
Synchronous Sessions
Keynote: Simple, Equitable, & Engaging - Dr. Bonnie Stewart and Dave Cormier
Bonnie and Dave will outline how a 3 part framework can help guide educators' approach to meaningful online teaching, especially online teaching that neither educators nor learners were planning on.
Reading with Purpose: Increasing engagement, understanding, discussion, and retention using active questioning during reading - Dr. Stacey MacKinnon
Getting student to read their texts and think about the material before class is one of the biggest challenges we have in teaching. So many don’t know what they do not know so a professor asking “are there any questions?” remains a desert of silence in many classrooms. For the past two years I have been experimenting with different approaches to getting students to do more than skim the page and wait until class to find out what’s important. The most successful of these approaches seems to be what we are tentatively calling “reading with purpose”. This simple approach includes ascertaining the point of doing the reading, active questioning while reading, searching for answers, then focusing on in what remains unknown or not understood.
Instructor as Dungeon Master: Gamifying a course with Moodle - Dr. Andrew Zinck
This presentation examines how one might transform a Moodle course site from a simple collection of static resources and assignment submission links into an engaging and thematic online world, using gamification strategies to draw students into a deeper narrative of the course. It will focus on the design, implementation, and lessons learned from a recently re-imagined first-year music history course in which students entered a fictional world and participated in a four-act adventure entitled Mystery at Outpost Alpha, a story that, at key points, also introduced narrative elements into the classroom.
Clarity, Care, Connection, and Credibility: Lessons from 15 Years of Online Teaching - Dr. Brenton Dickieson
While COVID-19 has launched many classroom teachers into the digital sphere, for some of us, isolation measure have simply provided a new context. In this conversation, I focus upon some of the ways that an online environment can be a natural extension of our classroom teaching. There are no doubt many differences, and the research of online learning experts is important, but I want to argue that the core principles of digital teaching are the same as teaching in other settings. Moreover, this new or expanding teaching space into the digital realm can help us clarify who we are as professors, and what is critical to our teaching philosophy. This session combines various discussion styles and is meant to feel like an online classroom discussion with upper level students.
What can we learn from the COVID-19 pandemic about teaching through systemic disruptions? - Dr. Nino Antadze & Dr. Carolyn Peach Brown
In this session, we would like to discuss how UPEI professors and students reacted to course-related changes and disruptions due to the Covid-19 pandemic. We will draw on our own experiences as professors and will present the excerpts from students’ autoethnography assignment “Living through the Covid-19 pandemic” which they produced as part of the coursework.
In this session we hope to touch upon a broader question on how we, as instructors, can help students become more resilient in the face of systemic disruptions, especially when such disruptions are, to some extent, predictable going forward (such as Covid-19 pandemic).
Leveraging Small Class Size for Experiential Education - Dr. Laurie Brinklow, Shannon Snow, and Students
The objective of the Master of Arts in Island Studies (MAIS) seminar, 'Islandness: Culture, Change, and Identity', is to investigate the effects of insularity on small island populations so that students come away with a greater understanding of how 'islandness' and 'thinking with islands' underpins their own research. This year, the professor, Dr. Laurie Brinklow, decided to take advantage of the small class size and the tenets of experiential learning to provide an enriched curriculum for the four students, each of whom was interested in how islandness can be expressed creatively. In concert with Shannon Snow, they designed a program that would allow students to pursue their own creative interests through experiential learning projects - incorporating such elements as personal interest, and thesis and career goals - while addressing the objectives of the course. In this presentation, Laurie and Shannon outline the learning goals, the theory behind the approach, the process, and then the results - from the students themselves. The presentation concludes with reflections/assessment from teachers and students on the learning outcomes.
Teaching Business & Management at the University of Canada, Egypt: A Collective Reflection
During the 2019-2020 academic year, we, a group of seven business faculty members (Drs. Chen, Evans, James, Jelley, Mady, Pauley & Wagner), taught in the BBA and MBA programs at the University of Canada, Egypt (UCE). We delivered a wide range of in-person as well as online courses (e.g., entrepreneurship, marketing, organization management, strategy). Collectively reflecting upon this unique teaching experience, we will host this 1-hour “Ask an Expert” session at UPEI’s 3rd Annual Teaching Community Conference. We aspire to achieve (at least) four goals:
(1) share our teaching experience with UPEI’s teaching community at large
(2) foster idea exchange among conference participants
(3) facilitate dialogues on inter-cultural teaching and learning, and
(4) engage and promote a preliminary interdisciplinary educator network of UPEI.
Asynchronous Sessions
Presenting and Recording lectures using the Vittle app. - Dr. Barry Linkletter
For the past two years I have been presenting my classroom slides via the Vittle app using an iPad. The app allows me to present the slides on the classroom screen and to annotate them using the Apple pen peripheral. The app can record the presentation and export the recording as a video. I have been able to make lecture video recording available to students via Moodle within minutes of the class ending.
Since the change in teaching delivery due to the public health emergency it has enabled me to easily create video versions of lectures. In this video I will present the workflow that I use on the iPad combining Vittle and a movie editor (iMovie on iPad) to quickly and easily present information. I will demonstrate a typical slide presentation and a standard “chalk talk” using these tools.
Experiential Education at UPEI - Shannon Snow
Many UPEI students are actively seeking opportunities that will help them make connections between what they are doing in school and what they are doing in their communities and careers. Experiential education can give students the opportunity to practice the application of their knowledge, learn about workplace policies and processes, and gain valuable experience while building their networks. This presentation will give an overview of some of the types of experiential education happening across post-secondary education, a few examples of projects that are happening at UPEI, and an overview of what supports you can access from the Experiential Education team at UPEI.
How to Improve Your Audio Recordings - Dr. Patrick Burns
How to improve your audio recordings using open access software such as Audacity for recording your lectures and online materials. I will discuss how to access this material and introduce you to the basics of audio recording. The main objective of this presentation will be to demonstrate how to perform commonly used techniques on how to improve the quality of your audio recording including how to set yourself up and your recording environment.
PBL with Large Multidisciplinary Teams - Dr. Grant McSorley
The experience of students and faculty involved in the development of a nanosatellite (or CubeSat) in the context of 3rd and 4th year engineering design clinics. This project is unique, in that it includes multiple teams with students at both the undergraduate and graduate level, as well as collaboration between Engineering and Physics. The execution of the project required the team to develop coordination mechanisms, such as an "integration team", while the combination of students from different faculties introduced a multidisciplinary aspect. This project will last approximately four years, and transition to the 2nd year required knowledge transfer between the students. This project could be an interesting example to those who would like to use project-based learning or multidisciplinary student teams in their courses.
Research, Teaching & Service - Michelle C. Gough
Michelle's proposed research and experience as a first year PhD student. Exploring how looking to and using one's own identity as a pedagogical tool, while participating in Mi'kmaq events on PE, equips educators to teach about Treaty Education on PE.
Spectrum of Care - VCA 3612 - Dr. Michelle Evason
In February 2020, a new elective course was offered to the 3rd year DVM class at AVC-UPEI. This course (VCA 3612 Spectrum of Care in Small Animal General Practice), was able to be offered through the generous funding of The Stanton Foundation and their awarded Student-Focused Canine Care Course Development grant. This course was developed and taught by the PI (Dr. Michelle Evason) and collaborators.
The overarching course goal was to assist in building the knowledge and skills necessary for day-one DVM graduates to address the common canine health needs of economically diverse clientele. Over the course, students were introduced to the concept of spectrum of care, through lectures highlighting specific examples of using this concept for commonly encountered canine conditions. With an emphasis on clinical reasoning and evidence-based principles, students worked (individually and in groups) to identify a range of diagnostic and treatment options that span the full spectrum of care for these common clinical conditions, determine the likelihood of success for various options, and design client communication plans that facilitate informed decision-making.
Along with providing an overview of course outcomes, an example of one course lecture will be discussed.
Accessibility Checklist for Online Learning & Teaching - Nicole Wadden Garland and Jaclyn Borden
According to UPEI’s Strategic Plan, the University is dedicated to providing all students with an open, accessible and welcoming community. While online learning creates many opportunities to reduce barriers experienced by students with disabilities, it also creates new challenges; some students may require fewer accommodations while others may require more. For example, students with seizure disorders, acquired brain injuries, concussions and migraines may find working on the computer for long periods of time challenging and may require flexible deadlines or due dates. The potential barriers of online learning must be taken into serious consideration when planning and delivering content to ensure all students, including those with disabilities, are provided with equitable access.
Accessibility Services has developed a document, based on resources from other institutions, that highlights some important considerations while developing and delivering an online course. In this presentation we will review the document, how it could be used, and provide examples of how to reduce/remove barriers in an online setting.