Cross-posted from the Digital Union blog.

A few weeks ago I facilitated a workshop on teaching with portfolios for Learning Technology. As much as we talk about the technology supporting e-portfolios, it’s good to step back and take stock of the pedagogical approaches behind them. (more…)

How can I help students take better advantage of peer assessment?

Many instructors are familiar with peer assessment–and the frustration with students who don’t offer substantive feedback during the process or even grasp requisite writing standards. To maximize the benefits from peer assessment, take a few minutes to teach students how to offer constructive feedback to each other. It can be a great way for students to reflect on and develop their writing, discuss course content and form a classroom learning community. It can produce multiple points of critique and lighten your assessment workload–all this for a relatively small investment of time. (more…)

How can I respond to and grade student writing at the end of the quarter without getting overwhelmed?

End-of-the-quarter grading can be a difficult task after putting so much energy into teaching. It’s easy to feel overwhelmed with a pile of papers to grade that need a quick turn around, especially when you have a number of students graduating. Thankfully, there are a variety of ways to make grading less time consuming that can be instigated as you wrap up your class, during finals week, and as you plan for next quarter of teaching. Check out the following tips to learn more about how you can make your end-of-the-quarter grading process more efficient. (more…)

Question: How might I fix the kinks in my writing assignments this quarter? What has worked for my colleagues?

Activity Idea: Take some time at the end of this quarter to think about what writing assignments worked well and reflect on some of the challenges you faced teaching writing. Your colleague in the office down the hall might be your best resource for this, and you might be hers as well. In our work in WAC, we have the privilege of talking to Ohio State’s most creative and resourceful teachers every day. For this tip email, we’ve collected a few approaches from three instructors we’ve worked with this quarter that have really inspired us: (more…)

How can I find out more about what exactly my students are learning throughout the quarter?

Evaluating student responses to formal assignments alone only tells us so much about what students are learning, and usually tells us very little about how they are learning. Informal, reflective writing can give you a window into student learning: how they go about tackling a problem or question, what challenges they face in an assignment, and what about their work sparks their personal interests and passions. (more…)