Winthrop Conference on Teaching and Learning

Today’s classroom demands a different style of engagement and assessment, primarily due to the changing nature of today’s learners. In fact, according to Liz Dwyer in “How Gaming is Changing the Classroom,” by the time students are age 21, they will have participated in over 10,000 hours of video gaming. As a result, using traditional pedagogies and “skill and drill” teaching strategies aren’t as effective with students who are more inclined to favor a controller over a book. Therefore, regardless of the discipline, adding gamification to the classroom can dramatically increase student engagement and also provide instructors with instantaneous assessment tools as well. Karl M. Kapp, author of “Games, Gamification, and The Quest for Learner Engagement,” claims that “Game-based learning can turn disconnected, bored learners into engaged participants.” This session will focus on presenting methodologies for engagement and assessment that lend themselves to gamification as well as offer attendees the opportunity to practice with and build their own games during the session. During the workshop, attendees will have an opportunity to use PollEverywhere, CandyLand, Jeopardy, Bingo, various puzzle activities, and online game repositories.

While knowing one’s students is often emphasized in discussing teaching strategies, we feel it also necessary for students to know each other. Student-student rapport is not frequently emphasized, and the majority of existing research focuses more on teacher-student rapport. In establishing student-student rapport in our classes, we find ourselves drawing on research from other fields where there is a recent and burgeoning interest in and emphasis on team-building. We find this existing research valuable and inarguably applicable to the way we teach. Our common pedagogical goals led to more discussion and a further analysis of how we work to create student-student and teacher-student rapport in a dance technique class, as well as why we believe it is a necessary component of our teaching. Establishing student-student rapport is beneficial in any educational classroom. Our presentation will include a summary of existing research on the topic, a history of our efforts to establish student-student rapport, and a discussion of the techniques we have found useful in helping students engage with one another. We will also discuss the benefits and make the argument that spending time helping students get to know each other will reap great benefits in the end.

Digital badges are online records of achievements that are awarded to learners for mastery of a specific set of educational contents. Often referred to as micro-credentials, digital badges are being used by many higher education institutions to assess and validate clearly defined chunks of knowledge, competency, or accomplishment.

At present, the use of digital badges is widespread. As a result, the perception exists that digital badges might be over-sold and over-hyped, as an assessment tool. Instructional design practice, however, reveals that learning objectives are best attained when course contents are broken into manageable chunks. In this context, digital badges, serving as visible proofs of learning achievement or mastery of new skills, can thus help build the recipient’s self-confidence and strengthen his/her intrinsic motivation.

Further, a digital badge system that is used as part of a course provides critical feedback to instructors regarding learners’ performance. Thus, from a summative assessment standpoint, instructors have the opportunity to gauge learners’ engagement, persistence and achievement simply by examining the number and types of badges issued in their courses.

At present, there are no agreed-upon measures for what types of learning contents equate to the award of a digital badge. As a result, acceptance of digital badges outside of its issuing organization is limited. However, many third party organizations such as Mozilla are exploring ways in which to increase portability and transferability of digital badges.

In this session, we provide an overview of digital badges. We will also examine how a digital badge system could possibly be implemented at Winthrop. Finally, we will look at the benefits and challenges of implementing digital badges or achievements in different educational settings such as non-credit programs, certificates offerings or regular courses.

If you are new to online instruction or are a veteran looking for fresh ideas for designing your online courses, this presentation will demonstrate user-friendly design for online courses, including course menu links, instructions, content examples and tips for making the all-important first week of class work to make the whole semester more dynamic. Take away ideas to jump-start your course organization and create a meaningful learning experience for students.

Twenty five years ago the Mathematical Sciences Education Board (Scheaffer 1990) stated that “Citizens who cannot properly interpret quantitative data are, in this day and age, functionally illiterate” Quantitative reasoning then should not be reduced to the ability to perform arithmetic functions but must be conceived as “a habit of the mind, competency and comfort in working with numerical data” (AACU 2015). Moreover, quantitative reasoning is essential for the development of higher order level skills such as analyzing, evaluating and creating. In a world, in which data is produced more rapidly than it can be analyzed, employers note that students will need a wide range of high level quantitative skills to complete their work responsibilities regardless of their field choice. For these reasons, quantitative literacy should be incorporated across the curriculum. Students cannot develop quantitative literacy by only taking isolated courses in mathematics or statistics. Students must be constantly exposed to substantive and contextualized quantitative information so they can achieve quantitative competency. This presentation aims at providing sources, examples, and class assignments, as well as assessments on how to incorporate quantitative reasoning across the social science curriculum.

The “Question Bridge: Black Males” is an interactive, transmedia dialogue among a critical mass of black men. The project began in 2012 as a documentary and has since evolved into an interactive website and mobile app in which black males of all ages and backgrounds ask and respond to questions about experiences via a video camera. The project is designed to breakdown the negative perceptions of black males and create a safe space for honest dialogue and healing. Winthrop University Galleries hosted an exhibit of this project in the Fall 2014 semester in conjunction with a larger roundtable discussion on black male identity

This exhibit further evolved into a partnership between the Department of Social Work and the Winthrop University Galleries. During the semester, social work students learned about issues around race, gender, and identity through traditional, classroom-based presentations and through interactions with the Winthrop University Galleries and the "Question Bridge: Black Males” exhibit. This collaboration was the first in an ongoing partnership between the Winthrop University Galleries and the Department of Social Work.

The presentation will explain the step-by-step process in developing a collaboration across disciplines, including strategies and recommendations on how to connect university projects and opportunities into the classroom experience. Included in this talk will be a discussion about the impact of the "Question Bridge" project on broadening students' critical thinking around privilege and oppression.

As part of the presentation, participants will be introduced to the "Question Bridge" and will learn about how this transmedia project can enrich classroom content on issues around diversity and the black male experience. Participants will also learn how creative and innovative partnerships across disciplines can strengthen and enhance the classroom experience. Finally, the presenters will explore the impact of this multidisciplinary collaboration in terms of both engagement and faculty connections.

The delivery of educational materials through an online platform is becoming increasingly prominent among universities worldwide; however, the presentation of this material often deviates from successful pedagogical strategies for online, or hybrid courses that are beginning to emerge. WUtipia!, first introduced to the campus community at the first annual TLC Conference, is an online learning platform that was developed at Winthrop as a collaborative undergraduate research project. This website was designed to provide educators a way to offer electronic video content in a way that promotes student interaction with the content and, consequently, enhance understanding and retention. Since its introduction two years ago, the site has undergone a major transformation that dramatically enhances the visual appeal and the capabilities of the website. This presentation will reintroduce WUtopia!; the main features of the student and instructors views will be highlighted with special emphasis on the steps you can take to try out the site. In addition, the results of the first WUtopia! Study, which explored the effectiveness of the learning platform, will be presented.