IN THIS ISSUE

Teaching & Learning Announcements and Events

Important Deadlines

What’s New in Teaching & Learning at Laurier

EVENTS

Congratulations to

Carol Duncan on her 2014

3M National Teaching

Fellowship! Join us to honour

Carol on this recognition of

her exceptional teaching and

educational leadership.

March 12, 2014 | Hawk’s Nest Fred Nichols

Campus Centre, Third Floor, 3:30 p.m.

Faculty are invited to Laurier’s Annual 3 Minute

Thesis (3MT) Competition. Drop in throughout

the morning to cheer on our graduate students.

March 4, 2014 | Paul Martin Centre.

A NEWSLETTER FROM THE TEACHING AND LEARNING COUNCIL WINTER 2014

WELCOME MESSAGE from DR. PAT ROGERS

As Chair of Laurier’s Teaching and Learning Council, I am

pleased to bring you this inaugural issue of our newsletter,

Teaching and Learning at Laurier. Each term the

newsletter will feature news, events, deadlines and

opportunities for professional growth and learning. We will

highlight significant issues affecting the teaching and learning

environment and raise awareness of what our very talented

teaching body is doing and thinking about. So, we need to

hear from you! Have you been trying (or heard about)

something particularly effective or innovative? Do you have

concerns about a particular teaching or learning issue? Have

you discovered a really useful resource, book, website, idea or

program? Teaching and learning is a community enterprise

and we would love to fill each newsletter with articles written

by faculty, teaching assistants and other teaching professionals

at Laurier.

Two centres at Laurier are dedicated to working with

students and faculty to enhance the learning experience:

Teaching Support Services (TSS) and Learning Services (LS).

Each has been renamed recently to more adequately highlight

the important role they play in furthering Laurier’s teaching

and learning mission. TSS becomes the Centre for

Teaching Innovation and Excellence (CTIE) and LS becomes

the Centre for Student Success (CSS). Both centres work with

faculty and educational professionals in designing experiences

and spaces that stimulate students’ imaginations and learning.

Much of the content in this issue of the newsletter is related to

their work – we hope to hear from you in the next issue!

at Laurier

DID YOU KNOW?

Community Service Learning (CSL) has moved! CSL is now a department within the Centre for Teaching

Innovation and Excellence. Managed by Gail Roth, CSL is offered

in 15 different courses across the Waterloo and Brantford

campuses this semester. CSL integrates meaningful community

service with classroom instruction and critical reflection to

enrich teaching and learning experiences while strengthening

communities. Ever thought about offering CSL in one of

your courses? more information

EVENTS continued…

Foundations in University Teaching

(for doctoral students and post-docs)

April 8 - May 1, 2014

Tuesdays and Thursdays at 1 - 4 p.m.

Waterloo | BA208

more information/register

Designing Curricula for Effective Writing

with Scientific and Quantitative Data

April 29 - 30, 2014 | Waterloo

more information/register

Integrated & Engaged Learning Conference

May 7 - 9, 2014 | Waterloo

more information/register

ANNOUNCEMENTS

The Centre for Teaching Innovation and

Excellence welcomes Matt Farrell, who

joins the centre on March 3, 2014 as an

Educational Developer at Brantford.

GET INVOLVED

Integrated and Engaged Learning Conference Join us for our upcoming conference in May 7 - 9. With three

keynotes and six concurrent sessions, the conference promises

to be a wonderful opportunity to showcase and share our

collective experience, innovation and achievement in improving

the quality of post-secondary education. Session proposals

have been received from many Laurier community members

as well as colleagues across Canada (Northern BC to

Newfoundland) more information/register

Designing Curricula for Effective Writing with

Scientific and Quantitative Data Join us on April 29 for a day-long event consisting of a

keynote address by Dr. John Bean, an expert in writing

pedagogy from the University of Seattle, an informal ideas

exchange over coffee and a hands-on workshop. In addition,

Dr. Bean will meet with various academic programs on the

morning of April 30 to discuss how to promote and support

student writing at the course and program level. This event is

a collaboration between Educational Development and

the Writing Centre. more information/register

DEADLINES

2014/2015 Laurier Teaching Fellows

Applications:

April 14, 2014

more...

OCUFA Teaching Award

Nominations:

May 23, 2014

more...

3M National Teaching Fellowship

Nominations:

August 31, 2014

more...

ANNOUNCEMENTS continued…

Congratulations to our 2013 Teaching Award

Winners! Laura Allan, Business & Economics,

Quincy Almeida, Kinesiology, Duane Heide,

Education, Colin McLaren, Kinesiology,

Sara Matthews, Global Studies, Rob Milne,

Geography and Environmental Studies,

Jane Newland, Languages and Literatures,

Jason Roy, Political Science, Susan Shaw,

Mathematics and Kevin Swinden, Music.

Congratulations to our inaugural

2014 Laurier Teaching Fellows!

more...

Stephen MacNeil

Chemistry

Mercedes Rowinsky-Geurts

Languages and Literatures

Congratulations to one of our

Athlete

Academic Mentors, Bree Chaput, a

recent recipient of the McGraw-Hill

Ryerson Scholarship!

DID YOU KNOW? continued…

Intercultural Development Office (IDO)

The IDO jointly reports to the Centre for Teaching Innovation

and Excellence and the Centre for Student Success. Through

the IDO, Nadine LeGros offers workshops (e.g., Communication

in the Internationalized Classroom and Teaching in the Canadian

Classroom) and resources (e.g., Using Language Resources to

Develop and Refine Your Academic Language and Top 10 Ways

for International Students to Succeed) designed to enhance the

conditions of success for international and immigrant students,

contribute to the development of intercultural communication

competencies at Laurier, and support Laurier instructors who

wish to internationalize their curricula at the course and

program level. more information or contact Nadine LeGros.

Online Research and Learning Strategies Support Do your students struggle with research or need help with

learning strategies like critical reading? Online Research SI

is a program created by Centre for Student Success and the

Library to help students improve research skills and learning

strategies. Online Research SI is a series of MyLearningSpace

content modules, each with online videos, activities

that allow students to apply the skills they learn while

helping them complete the course’s major assignment,

and grading rubrics. Faculty can import modules into their

MyLearningSpace course, choosing the ones most

relevant to their course outcomes or assignment. If you wish,

students can be awarded grades for completion of the

modules (typically 5% - 10%). Tracking of module completion

and student questions can be done by the instructor or by

CSS using a trained student mentor. Modules include

research organization, critical reading and note taking,

critical thinking, choosing and focusing a topic, finding

scholarly sources, evaluating sources, citing sources, using

sources in arguments and creating an annotated bibliography.

Online Research SI is being piloted in the 2014 winter term.

To participate next fall contact Michael Lisetto Smith or

Joanne Oud.

WHAT’S NEW?

WHAT’S NEW? Continued…

MyHelpSpace: Online Academic Support for

Students

Many academic support services exist at Laurier to help

improve student success, but students and faculty may not be

aware of them. MyHelpSpace is an online one-stop portal that

makes academic support services more accessible and visible.

It gathers Centre for Student Success and Library support

resources into one spot in MyLearningSpace to provide 24/7

on-demand access for undergraduate students. Faculty can

view content by logging into MyLearningSpace using

myhelpspace.guest/happyfish and can use a pre-prepared

PowerPoint slide to promote MyHelpSpace to students.

For further information contact,

Melodee Martinuk, Anne Marie Wetter or Joanne Oud.

LAURIER’S TEACHING AND LEARNING COUNCIL

Past members include: Tom Buckley, Mary-Louise Byrne,

Susan Cadell, Ruth Cruikshank, Lesley Cooper, Michel

Desjardins, Mark Duffie, Orna Duggan, Gail Forsyth, Shohini

Ghose, Sandy Hughes, Donna Kotsopoulos, Stephen MacNeil,

Jeanette McDonald, David McMurray, Charles Morrison,

Joan Norris, Joanne Oud, Mercedes Rowinsky-Geurts, Michael

Steeleworthy, Andrew Welsh and Colleen Willard-Holt.

The council is chaired by Pat Rogers and was originally

established and chaired by Deborah MacLatchy in 2010.

If you would like to join the council, please contact Pat Rogers.

more...

ANNOUNCEMENTS continued…

Introducing our Academic Integrity Officers!

For issues surrounding Academic Integrity

contact:

Brantford, Judy Eaton or

Kitchener/Waterloo, Lea Caragata

more...

The Centre for Teaching Innovation and

Excellence offered a new University

Teaching Certificate (UTC) Program for

graduate students (full-time and part-time)

and post-doctoral fellows, launched in the

fall of 2013.

more ...

Continuing Studies and the Faculty of

Education have partnered to launch a new

certificate for K-12 teachers, “Mental Health

Issues in the Classroom.”

more...

SOMETHING TO SHARE?

Do you have an idea, an upcoming event,

workshop or a research project that you

would like to share? We would like to hear

from you! Submit your ideas to Connie Davison

by March 31, 2014.