My Goals as Teaching Fellow

On July 1, 2021, I took over the position of Math Faculty Teaching Fellow, following in the footsteps of two of my fabulous colleagues, Brian Forrest and Cyntha Struthers. I'm really excited to bring my expertise and passion to the job, and here are some of the things I'm hoping to accomplish in my 3 years:

Blended Learning Initiative

This is part of a long term University-wide plan to have more blended courses. COVID teaching was the push some needed to create resources, so let's use them for the long term! If you have an in-person component this Fall, I recommend trying it out. You can pick your favourite active learning demos/examples/discussions/ applications and flesh them out.

There is lots of support for developping flipped courses:

  • CTE workshops - formal two-day workshops (contact me) and the self-paced iBlend course available on Learn
  • Also lots of info on CTE's website, including their agile support team
  • Join the Blended Learning Team on Microsoft Teams (we have a special channel just for Math)
  • Informal support from me any time!

Teaching Research/Conference Participation 

I want to encourage more Faculty at all ranks and in all units to conduct teaching research, attend (and present at) teaching conferences, and attend the Math Faculty Teaching Seminar.

To achieve this, a lot of support and funding is available:

  • Teaching Research JumpStart Session - Sept 13, 2021 - CTE and ORE will be there to help get you started on your research idea and over the hump of applying for ethics approval to publish research about your own students (registration link)
  • For more in-depth help, CTE's website has a great page with lots of resources for doing teaching research
  • The Survey Research Centre can help with survey design if part of your project involves surveying students - they will do a free one-hour consultation for UW faculty! 
  • Math's Teaching Development Fund can cover travel and conference fees - you can propose any conference you like but here are some ideas. Proposals submitted to the web form by Sept 30 will be given priority.
  • LITE Grants for teaching research are due Oct 1
  • MEF funding requests are due Nov 1

Assessment Projects

Through a project with the Math Strategic Plan, we'll be looking at new ways of assessing students, both providing evidence-based best practices and measuring the impact on learning outcomes. I'll also be supporting new ways of assessing faculty teaching recommended by CTAPT, including Teaching Dossiers and Peer Review of Teaching.

Miscellaneous

  • Training for Grad Student Instructors: Planning to keep going with the Winter term "course" (hopefully a true course that students and instructors get credit for!) for grad students and post-docs who are going to be teaching soon.
  • Connect with Undergraduate Students: I hope to meet regularly with MathSoc VPA/Council and hear student feedback - in particular how to get the message through that while in flipped classrooms students feel like they are learning less than in passive lectures, they are actually learning more!
  • Encourage more uptake of outline.uwaterloo.ca. The system is extremely intuitive to use and produces accessible, searchable, time-stamped syllabi with much of the mandatory information automatically imported. 
  • Teamwork skills. Provide instructors using teamwork in their courses with material that can help students learn teamwork skills, similar to the Engineering Teamwork Clinic. 

If you have any comments, questions, suggestions, or requests for how I can help support your teaching at UW, please let me know. I look forward to working with everyone over the next three years.