Conference Theme: 
Navigating the Ever-Changing Classroom Landscape

The Ramapo College FRC and IDC are co-sponsoring the 3rd Annual Faculty Teach & Share Conference to be held virtually on Monday, May 16 and the morning of Tuesday, May 17. We will collectively share what we have learned this year as we experienced yet another version of the teaching environment. We will share best practices, create a space for dialogue and discuss relevant issues in effective teaching and learning. Join us to be part of this important conversation. Please register below with your Ramapo email address.

Register for Day 2

Day 2 Schedule – May 17

Moderators: Tammi Redd, FRC Director; and Michael Bitz, IDC Director

10-10:30 a.m.

Make Grading Fairer, Faster, and More Transparent with Gradescope

(Attend this session and get a free trial of Gradescope Complete in Fall ‘22!) Gradescope is a cloud-based grading tool designed especially for STEM disciplines, but useful for others too. Gradescope allows instructors to grade hand-written or typed student work by consistently applying rubric items, in a different and much more powerful way than Canvas Speedgrader. Instructors can use AI-assisted answer grouping to group similar answers and assign a grade to the entire group, streamlining the grading process. Your rubric items and free-form comments can contain mathematical notation, computer code, and other formatted text, and changes to the grading scheme propagate retroactively. I’ve been using Gradescope for a few years, for assignments including in-class paper exams, handwritten work and typed lab reports submitted by students, and coding assignments, with and without auto-grading. With Gradescope, student work and instructor feedback are easily accessible online. This provides greater accessibility (students can’t lose their returned exams), transparency (as students can see the grading rubric and auto-grading test suite, understanding of why they earned the score they did, and where their work fell short) and security (as the instructor retains an unaltered digital copy of student exams). I’ve been awarded a TLTR Grant to use Gradescope this Fall, including money to fund other instructors who’d like to try it out. Come see what Gradescope is all about and whether it might streamline your grading workflow, as it has mine. (No, I don’t get kickbacks from Gradescope – I’m just a satisfied customer!)

Presenter: Debbie Yuster (TAS)

10:30-11 a.m.

Writing Reflections for Meta-Cognitive Thinking

In a liberal arts education, students are encouraged to think critically, but they rarely are offered moments to think about their own thinking. I provide spaces in my classes for this kind of meta-cognitive work through writing exercises, including reflection writing, drafting, portfolio building, and “critical friends” peer-reviewing. Students are required to think about the critical steps they took to arrive at a final piece of writing and be able to communicate those steps to someone else. They not only get immediate feedback on their writing through the peer review process, but reflections on their peer review sessions lead them to analyze other people’s thinking as it applies to their writing, too. All of this thinking about thinking allows students the opportunity to grow both their writing skills and their interpersonal communication skills, as they need to empathize with others and come to learn – and sometimes to overcome – their own cognitive patterns.

Presenter: Brendan Flanagan (HGS)

11-11:30 a.m.

Use of Gaming Applications in the Classroom

The use of gaming applications increases student participation. Many of our students prefer to use their electronic devices to answer questions instead of traditional questions and answers. In my classrooms, prior to using gaming applications, there is about a 10% participation rate. When using gaming such as Quizizz and Kahoot, participation is at 90%- 100%. It also enables the faculty to see if some students have not answered yet, and you can adjust the time so that all students can answer. This enables those that need more time to be able to take their time and answer the questions. Kahoot word clouds, allow the students to answer in free text. If multiple students have the same response the box gets larger. This allows the faculty to see deficits and gaps in learning. There are many options for various question types: Multiple response, multiple-choice, fill in, word clouds, etc. I have polled the students and the feedback for gaming is very positive and they have asked to use gaming. Since a higher number of students participate, the faculty can see the strength and weaknesses of the class and alter the content to address the gaps.

Presenter: Anne Marie Flatekval (TAS)

11:30 a.m.- 12 p.m.

Teaching for Learning

Teaching for Learning provides fellow instructors with information grounded in the academic knowledge base that includes easily accessible, engaging, and practical methodologies. This non-traditional approach highlights and synthesizes proven teaching methods and active learning.

Presenter: James M. Micik (TAS)

Please register with your Ramapo email address.

Register for Day 2