CTE is very pleased to share the news that Tommy Mayberry (Instructional Developer for TA Training and Writing Support) and Sarah Ruffell (a Waterloo Alumna and graduate of the CTE Certificate in University Teaching program), have received the Innovation in Education Award from the University of Pittsburgh's Council on Instructional Excellence. Their winning submission is entitled "The Science Library Project," which their abstract describes as follows:
"The Science Library Project has students creating children’s books about key course content. At the end of this project, the student writer-publishers are able to display their critical and creative work as they collaborate with local teachers in a networked conversation about science and multimodal communication. This innovative pedagogical approach to assessment is important both inside and outside of the Sciences because it participates in
High Impact Practice (HIP) pedagogy to have students invest a significant amount of time and effort over an extended period of time as they participate in frequent, timely, and constructive feedback and, most importantly, have the opportunity to discover the relevance of their learning through real-world applications in the public demonstration of their book projects. The Science Library Project activates written and visual communication modes to motivate Science learners to engage with course concepts in deeper and creative ways."
The image above is an example of student work that was produced for the project.
Tommy and Sarah will also be presenting on this project on April 26 at Waterloo's annual Teaching and Learning Conference.
Incidentally, after completing her PhD at Waterloo, Sarah is now Assistant Professor of Biology in the Division of Biological and Health Sciences at the University of Pittsburgh-Bradford.
