1. Issue 24 of SaMnet’s monthly newsletter
This month's question:
Have you found a helpful recent article in the
area of The Scholarship of Teaching and
Learning? For the next few months or so, Emma Bartle will be a guest editor,
helping SaMnet to collate and share relevant articles for the community. Send
articles to Emma,
or SaMnet
and they may be shared in an upcoming newsletter.
2. Conferences & publication
Themes include transformative
innovation and change in higher education and the impact of technological
developments on learning and teaching.
Australian
Conference for Science and Mathematics Education – Share
your work with the Science & Maths Education community. 29th of
September to 1st of October, 2014. Abstracts, papers and ideas
exchange submissions close June 6.
Hong Kong Baptist University, 7-10
July 2014. Proposals past due, 7 March 2014.
Are you interested in improving
science experiments and lab experiences for your students? Maybe you know high
school teachers who are also in this category? EOIs for
submission of experiments are due 30 May 2014. Registration due June 14.
Match up:
There have been some replies,
but we are still looking for experienced SaMnet Scholars willing to support
newcomers.
Register your areas of specialty with SaMnet
HQ (samnetaustralia@gmail.com). Or, request a critical friend – same way –
identify the area of focus where you desire support, e.g., second-year
tutorials in chemistry.
4. SaMnet activity
The SaMnet community is growing as a true network.
We are working with academics by including inviting more contributions to the
newsletter from the readers and connecting experienced SaMnet Scholars to
emerging SaMnet Scholars.
SaMnet HQ is progressing with disseminating
the SaMnet model to a wider audience through publications. We look forward to
sharing these with you later this year.
5. Scholarship of Teaching and Learning
(SoTL)
Two
articles this month about learning attitudes:
Brief
produced by University of Minnesota Office of IT
Intellectual curiosity describes the impulse of
a person’s drive to “pursue, enjoy and engage in learning opportunities”. This
study reveals how, like cognitive ability and effort, intellectual curiosity
positively associates with academic performance.
Rick
Reis on a chapter 7 of the book, The New Science of Learning: How to Learn in
Harmony With Your Brain by Terry Doyle and Todd Zakrajsek.
Your view of yourself as a learner
changes how you learn, even how you read this excerpt. How do your students
view themselves as learner? What does this mean for how effective your teaching
can be received?
6. Leadership insights
Two articles for you if you lead a team:
Baird
Brightman
Do you experience aggressiveness, narcissism,
disorganisation, reluctance to change in people you work with? Maybe the words
aren’t that strong – but how can you manage people with regards to toxic behaviour.
Judith
Sherven
“Isn’t one of the payoffs expected
from achieving leadership status the freedom to no longer have to do the ‘daily
grind’ work... the ‘tedious phone call’ work?” WHY then do you find it so hard
to wean yourself from doing the task yourself?
7. Initiative in Focus: This month – More active lecture approaches
in science and mathematics |Manju Sharma (Contact: Helen Georgiou)
A key paper published in
PNAS this week asserts that the evidence for taking Active
Learning approaches (rather than ‘traditional’ ones) in science education is so
strong, that were it a medical intervention trial, the existing treatment would
be stopped.
This fellowship involves the description
and development of models in which evidence-based recommendations from research
–such as Active Learning approaches –may be more efficiently and successfully
implemented to achieve better learning outcomes and experiences.
They key elements constituting the
work include the description or showcasing of practices in undergraduate
science lectures across the country to highlight innovative techniques, and it
also involves the provision of support to evaluate practices for individuals
and groups that are enacting change in their institutions. Participating
institutions have engaged in the administration of concept surveys in physics
and chemistry, mentoring programs and have provided interviews. Additional
updates will be provided later in the year.
7b. Project in Focus: National
project sets standard for agriculture education
The AgLTAS (Agriculture
Learning and Teaching Academic Standards) project began in August, with the aim
of developing a learning and teaching academic standards statement - outlining
what an agriculture student should know, understand and be able to do upon
graduation from a bachelor degree. The national project, OLT funded until
mid-2015, is led by the UTAS, with the Uni of Adelaide, UWS and CSU.
Following eight months of an
extensive consultation process with academic, students and industry, the project
team finalised the Statement on the Nature and Extent of Agriculture and
associated TLOs in late March. Project Leader, Dr Tina Acuna says that input
from a range of stakeholders was a vital aspect of the project, “it was
important for us to engage with a wide audience to ensure we created a document
that truly reflected the views of all of our stakeholders”.
In April, the document received
the support of the Australian Council of Deans of Agriculture (ACDA) – see http://www.agltas.edu.au/. The full version,
which includes an introduction, explanatory notes, benchmarking against the AQF
and acknowledgements will be submitted to the ACDA at the 2014 spring meeting.
8. Classifieds
Two section sevens? This is because we received
a great update from the AgLTAS team. We will continue to share the Fellowship in Focus but if you have
other updates to disseminate, continue to send them to samnetaustralia@gmail.com
