No matter how many years we may teach, the chaos of the first day of classes can make us feel like newbies again. And we are all too aware, whether Oscar Wilde said it or not, “You never get a second chance to make a good first impression.” With this in mind, WCTL offers a few thoughts for navigating the first day of classes:   Capture their Imaginations:… Read more →

  Each year in May, the Walker Center for Teaching and Learning hosts their Instructional Excellence Conference. This year’s conference on May 7th-8th featured renowned author and speaker, Dr. Todd Zakrajsek of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The attendance this year was higher than ever before and many of our UTC faculty and guests commented on the helpful teaching strategies they learned from the workshops focused… Read more →

On Friday, March 29 from 11:30-1pm, over 130 community partners and UTC staff and faculty attended the first ever Experiential Learning Celebratory Luncheon in the UC Chattanooga Rooms. The Chancellor, Provost, Experiential Learning Task Force, and many other Experiential Learning partners came together to meet each other, hear Provost Hynd and Chancellor Angle’s remarks about the past, present and future of Experiential Learning at UTC. Linda Bachman, who led… Read more →

Brad Reynolds and Tom Wilson received a Beyond the Classroom ThinkAchieve grant to fund an experiential learning activity in a general education non-laboratory science course.  During fall 2012, students in Bio/ESC 1100 (Conservation of Biodiversity) were given the option to participate in a hands-on field experience and reflection activity in lieu of taking the final exam in the course.  Instead of just listening to a professor talk about conservation,… Read more →

The Seven Principles By: Dawn M. Ford It was in 1987 when Chickering and Gamson wrote about the seven principles for good practice in undergraduate education.  Years later, those principles still hold up, so it’s good to review them every now and again to keep us fresh. Principle one is that contact between students and faculty should be encouraged.  It’s important that students know that faculty care about them. … Read more →

It’s almost that time again – the first day of class.   I have sometimes struggled with what to do the first day; do I dive right in or just cover the syllabus and let the students go?  The literature tells us that the first day of class is important, if not critical, to the success of a course and the students.  The first day sets the tone because students… Read more →