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Intentional Teaching with Derek Bruff

Welcome to the Intentional Teaching newsletter! I'm Derek Bruff, educator and author. The name of this newsletter is a reminder that we should be intentional in how we teach, but also in how we develop as teachers over time. I hope this newsletter will be a valuable part of your professional development as an educator.

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Universal design for learning (at scale) and undesirable difficulties

Universal Design for Learning at Scale with Tom Tobin Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is a framework for improving learning for all learners based on the science of how humans learn. It involves providing learners with multiple means of engagement, representation, action, and expression. We’ve mentioned the framework on the show from time to time, and I thought it was time to dig in a little deeper. Naturally, I thought of inviting Thomas J. Tobin on the podcast. Tom helped found the...

3 days ago • 3 min read

Surprise! I have another podcast episode for you this week. Usually I release episodes every other Tuesday, but I've been talking to too many interesting people lately! I'm taking the Intentional Teaching podcast weekly for the month of April to catch up on my backlog of interviews. AI-Enhanced Learning with Pary Fassihi This week I have another fantastic interview about teaching with AI. Pary Fassihi is a senior lecturer in the College of Arts and Sciences Writing Program at Boston...

10 days ago • 1 min read

AI-Powered Learning Assistants with Sravanti Kantheti It’s been 16 months since ChatGPT was released and all of higher education had to start figuring out what to do with generative artificial intelligence. One thread of that very lively conversation has focused on the potential for AI to serve as a kind of learning assistant for students. We know that having students go to the free version of ChatGPT and ask it questions about course content can lead to some... inaccurate answers. But what...

17 days ago • 4 min read

Some Research on Generative AI and Student Learning Next week I’m speaking on a panel organized by Colleen Flaherty for an Inside Higher Ed webinar titled “AI and Student Learning: What We Know (and What We Don’t).” It’s scheduled for Wednesday, April 10th, at 1pm Central, and it’s free! I’m excited to share my perspectives on this topic and to learn from my co-panelists, who have been engaged in very interesting AI projects. “a college student studying at a desk surrounded by multiple robot...

24 days ago • 9 min read

Instructional (Re)Design with David Hinson and Shawndra Bowers This week on the Intentional Teaching podcast, I’m excited to share a story of course transformation, a story that leverages the strengths of online learning in service of an onsite course and that involves a thriving partnership between a faculty member and an instructional designer. David Hinson is the faculty member in this story. David is the R. Hugh Daniel professor of architecture at Auburn University, and he teaches a...

about 1 month ago • 1 min read

Spring Break My family and I took a trip to California last week for spring break. We stayed with some friends who live on the Pepperdine University campus in Malibu, and we used that as a base for exploring the Los Angeles area. We visited the La Brea Tar Pits & Museum, we strolled along the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and we took our picture with the Hollywood sign. We also took the Coast Starlight train to San Francisco, which isn't a fast train, but the views along the California coast were...

about 1 month ago • 3 min read

Authentic Audiences and Rhetorical Triangles As part of the current slow ready of my 2019 book, Intentional Tech: Principles to Guide the Use of Educational Technology in College Teaching, I've been sharing a few resources with my Patreon supporters that are on theme for each week of the slow read. This week we're reading chapter seven of the book, which is all about using technology to connect students with authentic audiences. It was only after writing that chapter that I read Creating...

about 2 months ago • 3 min read

The Inclusive STEM Teaching Project The Inclusive STEM Teaching Project is a free, online, six-week course “designed to advance the awareness, self-efficacy, and ability of faculty, postdocs, and doctoral students to cultivate inclusive STEM learning environments for all their students and to develop themselves as reflective, inclusive practitioners.” The course was developed by a team from seven different institutions, and it's running again (for maybe the final time) next week. On this...

about 2 months ago • 5 min read

Sharing Google Docs via QR Codes and Short URLs I often take a birds' eye approach to teaching and learning here in the newsletter, but this week I'm getting down in the weeds. Twice in the last week I have had instructors ask me about ways to share Google documents so that students can collaborate on them in real-time during class. This is pretty easy to do and incredibly useful, but not that intuitive, so I'm guessing there are others out there who could benefit from some simple...

2 months ago • 4 min read

Enhancing Inclusive Instruction Tracie Addy has become a leading voice in higher education for the use of inclusive teaching practices. I’ve been following her work for a few years now, and when I saw that she and her co-authors have a new book out on inclusive teaching, I reached out to see if they could come on the podcast to talk about the project. The new book is called Enhancing Inclusive Instruction: Student Perspectives and Practical Approaches for Advancing Equity in Higher Education,...

2 months ago • 3 min read
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