In their 2001 study of term-long undergraduate group projects Bourner et al. defined “passengers” as an impediment to team functioning, referring to students who made little contribution to group work, choosing to “ride along” on the efforts of fellow students (Bourner et al., 2001). Last winter I also observed this problem as a TA in a second-year history course where term-long group projects, involving some shared team grades, accounted for the majority of students’ evaluation. Poor research skills coupled with questionable perceptions of work expectations seemed to me to be the origin of student disengagement, rather a conscious evasion of responsibility. Continue reading “Passenger” Problem and Internet Use in Undergraduate Group Projects — Danielle Terbenche
Author: Mark Morton
As Senior Instructional Developer, Mark Morton helps instructors implement new educational technologies such as clickers, wikis, concept mapping tools, question facilitation tools, screencasting, and more. Prior to joining the Centre for Teaching Excellence, Mark taught for twelve years in the English Department at the University of Winnipeg. He received his PhD in 1992 from the University of Toronto, and is the author of four books: Cupboard Love; The End; The Lover's Tongue; and Cooking with Shakespeare.
Social Networking (and Peer Tutoring) for Second-Language Learning — Mark Morton
My nephew, who is studying Korean, recently told me about a free website that facilitates the learning of a second language by making use of social networking in the form of peer tutoring. The site in question is called LiveMocha, and it’s like many websites devoted to learning second languages in that it includes content such as flash cards, vocabulary drills, and so on. What makes LiveMocha unique, though, is that its more advanced language exercises require a user to write phrases or sentences in the target language that are then assessed by another user of LiveMocha, one whose first language is the language that you are trying to learn. Continue reading Social Networking (and Peer Tutoring) for Second-Language Learning — Mark Morton
Letting Your Students Do the Work: Student-Generated Exam Questions – Veronica Kitchen
My first year at Waterloo was also my first year teaching my own courses. In mid-November I found myself overwhelmed by the task of writing exams for my large second-year political science course. Since I’d never taught the course before, I had no question bank, no old exams to adapt, and not a whole lot of spare time. I struggled to write enough questions to populate my exam, plus a make-up or two. I mentioned this demoralizing state of affairs to Nicola Simmons at a CTE event. Continue reading Letting Your Students Do the Work: Student-Generated Exam Questions – Veronica Kitchen
WikiTaxi: Accessing Wikipedia When You’re Offline – Mark Morton
Tired of not being able to access millions of pages of information while you’re relaxing at the cottage or stricken with insomnia on an eight-hour flight to Istanbul? Frustrated by your inability to settle trivial disputes because the pub where you and your friends are disputing doesn’t have a wireless hotspot? Those pesky scenarios can now be a thing of the past thanks to WikiTaxi, which allows you to download Wikipedia in its entirety — all three million entries — and access them on your laptop, even when the Internet is nowhere to be found. Continue reading WikiTaxi: Accessing Wikipedia When You’re Offline – Mark Morton
Flow, and how it helped me create a web resource — Mark Morton
I managed to achieve “flow” this morning. This is not, I should clarify, an admission of prostate problems, but rather a celebration of having achieved a cognitive state so engrossing that several hours passed without my noticing. The notion of flow was originated by psychologist Mihály Csíkszentmihályi, but it’s a state of mind that we all (hopefully) get to experience from time to time, either in our work or while we’re engaged in a favorite hobby. The key to achieving flow is “just manageable challenge”: that is, the task we are trying to achieve has to be one that is not so easy that it seems routine nor so difficult that it becomes frustrating. Flow exists at the upper edge of our skill set. Continue reading Flow, and how it helped me create a web resource — Mark Morton
CTE’s New Website Launched – Mark Morton
The Centre for Teaching Excellence launched a new website this week, one that is not only more aesthetically pleasing than our old site, but is also designed to provide more resources, more functionality, and more user-control. Here are some of the enhancements: Continue reading CTE’s New Website Launched – Mark Morton
Twitter and Higher Ed – Mark Morton
You’ve probably already heard about Twitter, a micro-blogging application that appeared in 2006 and which has surged in popularity over the past year. Oprah, for example, is now on Twitter, and CNN offers news updates via Twitter. Posts to Twitter (which are called tweets) are brief — no longer than 140 characters, which is perfect for sharing a quick update about what you’re doing or reading, for disseminating a web address to a useful site, or for asking your Twitter “followers” a question. Universities have also begun to use Twitter to good purpose. Continue reading Twitter and Higher Ed – Mark Morton