New Superheroes/Villain Characters for Teaching Engineering Materials Selection

Superhero themes have been increasingly used in the teaching of a range of topics including business, humanities and science in recent years. Typically, characters from existing popular media are adopted for the teaching activities. On the other hand, customised characters that are developed from scratch allow the educator to have more control of the characters’ features so that the learning objectives can be achieved more effectively. In this work, new fictitious characters have been created as cases for students to perform their engineering materials selection assignment. The motivation for using the superhero theme was to increase the students’ excitement in the assignment. This paper shares the approach taken and the teaching experience after running the superhero theme with two cohorts of students.

Gen Z Students Are Filling Our Online Classrooms: Do Our Teaching Methods Need a Reboot?

Generation Z students are described as being our first “digital natives” who have grown up typing with their thumbs on smartphones and tuning out school-based interactions that do not capture their short attention spans. As Gen Z students occupy more post-secondary rosters for web based courses, they seek instructional models that combine world-class online learning environments with in-person engagement. Based on student feedback generated on principles consistent with the aims of SoTL, this article addresses the core characteristics of Gen Z students in higher education settings and offers relevant, useful strategies for meeting their needs within an online platform.

Team Charters in Business Education: The Importance of Perceived Level of Working Well Together

Schools of business aim to help students develop employer-valued skills, which include communication, teamwork, critical thinking, and application of learning. This can be achieved through team assignments and community-based learning. Such approaches help students apply the concepts they are learning, collaborate with others, develop managerial skills, and solve real-life workplace issues. Teamwork is commonly thought to be enhanced when students establish a team charter outlining their goals, norms, and processes. Research on the value of team charters in business education, however, is limited. This study examined the role of team charters on student perceptions of working well together. Data was collected and analyzed from a mid-term team evaluation and a final team charter assessment. Findings indicated that perceived value of team charters differs across the year in school and tends to be higher for less experienced students. The provision of a structured project roadmap clarified team member roles, responsibilities, personal accountability, and team vision.

Developmental Relationships: An Examination into the Perceptions of Students on Their Relationships with Faculty Members

The purpose of this study was to investigate the perceptions of students on the importance of developmental relationships related to teacher satisfaction and retention. It involved the use of a 20-question survey that was focused on perceptions of on-ground undergraduate students on components of The Developmental Relationship Framework from the Search Institute. Cronbach’s Alpha, T-tests, and a Mann-Whitney U test were used to analyze the data. Independent T-tests and the Mann-Whitney U Item Analysis discovered no significant differences in mean scores of survey questions and the demographic variables. While the statistical results were not significant, areas for further research were identified.

Asynchronous Online Discussion Forums: Effective Undergraduate and Graduate Course Approaches

Asynchronous online discussion (AOD) can provide an interactive educational experience through formation of learning communities that enable students to develop professional knowledge and critical thinking skills as they engage with colleagues and instructors. We find significant differences between undergraduate and graduate student perceptions of the efficacy of AOD. In this paper, we explore the pedagogical benefits of AOD and describe considerations that guide how they are designed and managed effectively and efficiently. Additionally, we report the results of a survey that measures student perceptions of the extent to which AOD provided a positive educational experience and contributed to their learning.

Exploring the Transformative Impact of Language Teachers’ Autoethnographies in a Teacher Education Course

Benefits of teachers’ autoethnographies are well-documented in current research. This study adds to the research literature by directly analyzing how the insights gained through writing autoethnographic essays may impact second language (L2) teachers’ classrooms. To collect the data, the study incorporated autoethnographic essays into a graduate course for language teachers and asked the participating teachers to design lessons that reflected the insights they gained about themselves through this project. Adopting the transformative learning theory (Mezirow, 1978, 1997) that scaffolds teachers’ self-reflection, this paper explores the transformative potential of teachers’ autoethnographies through tracking qualitative changes in the teachers’ narratives and practice across one academic semester. The results show that as a learning tool, autoethnographies can facilitate teachers’ developing more empowering teaching identities and have a potential for enhancing their teaching practices. The paper adds empirical evidence and a new perspective in the investigation of teacher learning. It concludes with pedagogical and research implications for L2 teacher education.

The Impact of Academic Freedom Policies on Critical Thinking Instruction

Critical thinking enjoys almost universal support, except when applied to controversial topics. Yet it is these topics that are often the most effective initiators of critical thinking exercises that improve students’ rational approaches to challenging problems. The use of controversial issues to promote critical thinking requires an institutional commitment to academic freedom in order to survive. In some institutional contexts, the most crucial need for critical thinking is the very condition under which it is least likely to be applied. Instead, avoidance of controversy seems to be the predominant policy of institutions fearful of expensive lawsuits or damaging public relations. Several trends are decreasing the likelihood that critical thinking is applied in the classroom to challenging topics: demands for increased accountability from legislatures; scrutiny of adopted content standards; oversight of Internet and other intellectual work of professors affiliated with the universities; student challenges to faculty instruction; and attempts to curtail ideological diversity. This paper describes these current dynamics which erode academic freedom and thus the ability to apply critical thinking to controversial topics. The paper also recommends that institutions and faculty adopt clearly delineated policies related to academic freedom in order to ensure faculty freedom to promote critical thinking. Awareness of how these trends impact the instructional climate enables teachers to design instruction and be more proactive in guaranteeing that critical thinking about controversial topics is able to flourish under academic freedom.

Thinking Critically about Critical Thinking: Integrating Online Tools to Promote Critical Thinking

The value and importance of critical thinking is clearly established; the challenge for instructors lies in successfully promoting students’ critical thinking skills within the confines of a traditional classroom experience. Since instructors are faced with limited student contact time to meet their instructional objectives and facilitate learning, they are often forced to make instructional decisions between content coverage, depth of understanding, and critical analysis of course material. To address this dilemma, it is essential to integrate instructional strategies and techniques that can efficiently and effectively maximize student learning and critical thinking. Modern advances in educational technology have produced a range of online tools to assist instructors in meeting this instructional goal. This review will examine the theoretical foundations of critical thinking in higher education, discuss empirically-based strategies for integrating online instructional supplements to enhance critical thinking, offer techniques for expanding instructional opportunities outside the limitations of traditional class time, and provide practical suggestions for the innovative use of critical thinking strategies via online resources.

Using Self-Experimentation and Single-Subject Methodology to Promote Critical Thinking

Critical thinking is often absent from classroom endeavor because it is hard to define (Gelder, 2005) or is difficult to assess (Bissell & Lemons, 2006). Critical thinking is defined as application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation (Browne & Minnick, 2005). This paper shows how self-experimentation and single-subject methodology can be used to promote many levels of critical thinking in an Applied Behavior Analysis course. Two classroom assignment examples of this process and a grading rubric are provided.