Course Materials

Semester to semester, many of us copy-paste ever-growing lists of policies and resource recommendations for our syllabi. When we’re down to the wire the Friday before classes start, it can be tempting to recycle old materials after a quick skim, rather than closely rereading and analyzing our choices. But of course, syllabi set the stage in important ways for the work your students will do in your course. Crafting a syllabus is an excellent time to assess the scaffolding and support you provide to students in your course.

In March, our Teaching with Writing Blog addressed the complexities of documenting how Generative AI might be used in students’ writing processes. It provided suggestions for creating an Acknowledging AI assignment for courses where AI use is allowed.

When they imagine students using AI, faculty might picture a student plugging an assignment prompt wholesale into ChatGPT and submitting the output with minimal or no editing. But students—who are far more prolific users of AI than faculty—report that this approach to AI use is relatively uncommon. AI tools are more often leveraged as collaborators that enhance students’ writing, rather than replacing their efforts wholesale.

The Provost’s Office and the Senate Committee on Educational Policy at the University of Minnesota provided strong early guidance for instructors on student use of ChatGPT and other GenAI technologies in classrooms (Embrace, allow, and prohibit). Since the publication of those original policies, the landscape of GenAI tools and the quality of GenAI outputs has changed dramatically.

With the start of the fall semester, campus sidewalks and bike lanes are flowing, once more, with humanity—welcome back! In these early weeks of the term, there is plenty to navigate, and not just physically. For students entering new courses and new fields of study, there will be plenty of questions about location, schedules, course policies and procedures. Amidst the effort to get oriented to new terrain, students might not be thinking yet about other questions they have about writing or about writing processes and practices that will support their learning.

Last month’s Teaching with Writing blog focused on strategies instructors can use when providing students with feedback on their writing. This month’s blog turns the tables by describing tools students can use when providing instructors with feedback on their writing instruction. Yes, this sort of feedback is routinely gathered at the end of the semester, but getting it at a semester’s midpoint is even better.

In recent years, instructors have heard a great deal about the benefits of fostering a positive classroom climate. Not only does a positive classroom climate help boost students' performance in their assignments and assessments, but it can also encourage students' persistence with challenging courses and topics.

When students recall the definition of a concept or apply a formula or principle to a problem, we are presented with a challenge. While their answers may be correct, how do we know whether they have a developed sense of the concept or can simply provide solutions in clearly defined contexts? Similarly, while students may recall learning about a concept, method, or tool in a prior course, is remembering a topic the same as conceptual understanding?

In previous years, August blog entries have focused on using syllabus descriptions to clarify purposes, tasks, and audiences for student writing, describing writing expectations in your field, and fostering academ

The arrival of ChatGPT has sent shockwaves through popular media and higher education circles. Headlines have suggested that artificial intelligence could render some familiar genres and technologies obsolete (including the college essay and Google).