Cohort 1 Virtual Activities

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Winter/Spring 2018 Virtual Activities

These virtual activities are open only to SAGE 2YC Cohort 1 Change Agents.

Dates and Times

Our virtual meetings will take place on Fridays. The links below will take you to the pages for these events in our private workspace, with connection information and notes from each meeting.

We will record and post the discussions for Change Agents who have to miss one or more meetings. We will also have opportunities for everyone to participate in asynchronous discussions before and after each meeting.

Developing Your Students' Science Identity

We will consider ways in which our courses and programs support building a student's science identity. This topic is especially important for students who traditionally have not seen themselves as being represented in STEM professions, including women, underrepresented minorities, people with disabilities, and first-generation college students. There will be asynchronous work in preparation for our virtual meetings.

Book Club: Whistling Vivaldi, by Claude Steele

Our book club group this spring will read and discuss Claude Steele's Whistling Vivaldi: How Stereotypes Affect Us and What We Can Do. The goal of these meetings will be for each participant to find strategies that they can implement. The book has many practical recommendations, all of them based on extensive research on stereotype threat. Before each meeting, each participant will write a brief email about the reading for that session, to prime the pump for discussion.

We will purchase a copy of the book for each participant.

Fall 2017 Virtual Activities

Dates

Our virtual meetings will take place on Fridays. The links below will take you to the pages for these events in our private workspace, with connection information and notes from each meeting.

We will record and post the discussions for Change Agents who have to miss one or more meetings. We will also have opportunities for everyone to participate in asynchronous discussions before and after each meeting.

Teaching Circle: Blooming Your Course

The goal of this activity is to work through the process of "Blooming" one of your courses and get input from the other Change Agents as you go. "Blooming" your course means aligning your learning goals for students, your classroom assignments and activities, and your assessments of student learning in terms of the level of cognitive work you expect from students relative to Bloom's taxonomy. Before each meeting, each participant will share an assignment, in-class activity, or assessment question from one of their classes. Classifying these shared activities and assessments according to Bloom's taxonomic level will provide the foundation for our discussions.

Book Club: Whistling Vivaldi, by Claude Steele

Our book club group this fall will read and discuss Claude Steele's Whistling Vivaldi: How Stereotypes Affect Us and What We Can Do. The goal of these meetings will be for each participant to find strategies that they can implement. The book has many practical recommendations, all of them based on extensive research on stereotype threat. Before each meeting, each participant will write a brief email about the reading for that session, to prime the pump for discussion.

We will purchase a copy of the book for each participant.

Spring 2017 Virtual Activities

These virtual activities are open only to Change Agents. The links below will take you to the pages for these events in our private workspace, with connection information and notes from each meeting.

Dates

Our virtual meetings will take place on Fridays:

  • Teaching circle: Feb. 10, Feb. 24, and March 10.
  • Book club: April 14, 21, and 28.

We will record and post the discussions for Change Agents who have to miss one or more meetings. We will also have opportunities for everyone to participate in asynchronous discussions before and after each meeting.

Teaching Circle: Teaching geoscience in an online or hybrid format

The goal of this activity is to share strategies and receive feedback from the other Change Agents. Before each meeting, each participant will write a brief email answer to at least one of the following reflection questions. These reflections will serve as the basis for the discussion that follows. This group will meet 3 times, and will then have the option of continuing if enough participants are interested in doing so.

Reflection questions:

  • In the past two weeks, what have you done in your online or hybrid course that worked particularly well? In retrospect, why do you think it was so successful?
  • In the past two weeks, what have you done in your online or hybrid course that didn't go as well as you had hoped it would? In retrospect, why do you think it was less successful than you had thought it would be?
  • What are you planning to do in your online or hybrid course in the next two weeks, that you would like feedback or suggestions on from the other Change Agents?

Book Club: Small Teaching, by James Lang

Our book club group(s) this spring will read and discuss James Lang's Small Teaching: Everyday Lessons from the Science of Learning. The goal of these meetings will be to distill the material presented in this book and implement strategies appropriate for 2YC teaching and learning. The book is organized into three parts:

  • Knowledge: how students learn course material,
  • Understanding: how students use course material in their thinking, and
  • Inspiration: how students think and feel about their learning.

The chapters highlight specific actions that have been shown to improve student learning. The ideas in the book are not new, but are examples of small modifications that we can make to our course design and teaching practices that don't require a complete overhaul of a course. Most of the strategies suggested in the book are meant to take up less than 10 minutes of class time, often just 1-5 minutes.

Although the author is not a geoscientist, his examples are ones that would fit almost any discipline. We will read one part of the book for each of the 3 book club meetings. Before each meeting, each participant will write a brief email answer to at least one of these two questions, which will serve as the basis for the discussion:

  • What have you tried in your teaching this past week that you have not done before and that was inspired by the reading?
  • What are you planning to try in your teaching this coming week that you have not done before and that was inspired by the reading?

We will purchase a copy of the book for each participant.

Fall 2016 Virtual Activities

Dates

October 21, 28 and November 4, 11 (see times below)

The links below will take you to the pages for these events in our private workspace, with connection information and notes from each meeting.

Book club: Saundra McGuire's "Teach Students How to Learn"

The goal of this activity is to distill the material presented in this book and implement strategies derived from the book appropriate for 2YC teaching and learning. Participants will purchase their own copies of the book (or order a copy from your library). We will meet 3 times for reading discussions followed by one meeting for an implementation discussion (a total of 4 meetings). The leadership team will provide guiding questions for each meeting based on sections of the book. Following the initial meeting, Change Agent leaders will lead discussion sessions and will provide expectations for the group meetings.

Shared Reading Group A: 11:00 Pacific, 12:00 Mountain, 1:00 Central, 2:00 Eastern

Members: Bryn Benford, Pete Berquist, Daina Hardisty, Mel Johnson, Lynsey LeMay, Elizabeth Nagy-Shadman, JoAnn Thissen, Dave Voorhees

Shared Reading Group B: 12:00 Pacific, 1:00 Mountain, 2:00 Central, 3:00 Eastern

Members: Kristie Bradford, Bridget James, Karen Layou, Adrianne Leinbach, Gretchen Miller, Eriks Puris, Cheryl Resnick, Keith West

Implementation of active learning strategies in your courses

The goal of this activity is to discuss the use of active learning pedagogies that you implement, or are planning to implement, in your geoscience courses. Participants will share strategies and receive feedback from the other Change Agent participants. You will post your ideas concerning your implementation plans prior to virtual discussion meetings. The group participants will read through those plans, then share thoughts and questions about your plans, or following implementation you will report back to the group on how the implementation went. Following the initial meeting, Change Agent leaders will lead the discussion sessions. This group will meet a total of 4 times.

Active Learning Group: 1:00 Pacific, 2:00 Mountain, 3:00 Central, 4:00 Eastern

Members: Karen Braley, Daina Hardisty, Chris DiLeonardo, Andy Hilt, Dave Mrofka, Sean Tvelia, Becca Walker, Debra Woodall