Author: Donna Ellis

Donna Ellis has supported the teaching development of Waterloo faculty members and graduate students since 1994. In her role as Director, she oversees the development and delivery of all the Centre for Teaching Excellence programming and services, which include individual faculty consultations; events directed at graduate students, new faculty, and established faculty regarding face-to-face teaching, blended learning, and emerging technologies; online resources; curriculum and program review consultations; and research support services. Donna has a PhD from Waterloo’s Management Sciences program and completed her dissertation research on instructional innovations. She also has an MA in Language and Professional Writing from Waterloo, and has taught in the Speech Communication program. Donna, along with her husband, spends time away from work raising three fine boys.

Making Time to Celebrate — Donna Ellis, CTE DirectorMaking Time to Celebrate

It can be so easy to get caught up in our daily tasks that we overlook all that we can celebrate.  I’m the first one to admit that the lure of a concrete task can sidetrack me from taking a step back and celebrating our accomplishments and contributions.  And yet those celebrations are so very important.

Just last month in CTE, we celebrated our move to EV1.  I wasn’t too sure how many people might join us at this event – there were no special attractions, no speeches, no official ribbon-cutting.  It was just an opportunity to come and find us in our new location and join us for cake and coffee.  And yet, we had a wonderful turnout.  It was exciting to welcome our colleagues and encouraging to know that they can now find us more easily another time.  We even had some fun with a trivia contest – congrats to Sandra Keyes from the Library for being able to answer my colleague Mark’s tricky questions!

We celebrated even more broadly by hosting the 6th annual Loving to Learn Day.  In this case, we were celebrating learning.  My thanks go out to all of those who took the time to dream a little about what they would like to learn instantaneously.  And thanks as well to the man behind the scenes – Mark Morton.  CTE also celebrated learning within our own department, participating in a professional development day on February 16th.  We shared what we have learned about various topic areas regarding “communication” and had fun together at the same time.

Do celebrations always have to involve fun?  Perhaps not in the same way as an official celebratory event.  Most recently, I have been spending time discussing performance appraisals with the staff in CTE.  These conversations may not involve cake, and yet they are still celebratory events to me.  We have an awesome team here (and no, I’m not biased!).  When I review their many accomplishments for the past year, I can clearly see how much they all contribute to the culture of teaching and learning at Waterloo.  My thanks go out to each and every staff member who makes CTE a great place to work!

So maybe I’m the only one who needs the reminder, but if you haven’t made the time to celebrate a noteworthy occasion – be it a milestone or the contribution of a colleague – I encourage you to do so.  It may help to renew your energy enough to get you through your next task…

Connecting With Our Students — Donna Ellis

My colleague Monica Vesely recently blogged about connecting with our students by being more transparent in our teaching.  This is solid advice and helps us to think about putting our students and their learning experiences at the core of our teaching.  It fits with a recent e-flyer that I received about the 5Rs that we can use to better “engage” students: relevant learning, research-based approaches to instruction, rationales for course designs, relaxed and participatory learning environments, and relational opportunities and rapport with professors.

I have my own thoughts about how to connect with our students.  I recently delivered a keynote talk at a geotechnical engineering conference on teaching and learning where I was asked to provide my insights on how to promote effective learning in the lecture setting.  Traditional didactic lectures have not been the ideal setting for students to learn deeply – to retain key concepts and apply and connect knowledge across multiple contexts.

In a non-traditional interactive format, I explored principles of deep learning with the participants and then presented a model about making connections in our teaching to promote effective learning:  learner to content, learner to learner, and learner to instructor.

At the core of this model is the learner, not the instructor.  I asserted that our learners need to be at the core of our teaching and provided various strategies for connecting with our students during our face-to-face teaching time.  To connect with the content, we can use compelling questions, discussion via questions, one-minute summaries, concept maps, and narrated modelling (explaining your thinking processes as you solve a problem).  Connecting with other learners can be achieved through activities that have students working together during class time and sharing their thinking.  Making our own connections with students involves using nonverbal strategies (e.g., smiling) and creating trust through sharing information about ourselves and our learning or asking students for their feedback on our course during the semester.

In an effort to connect with my learners in that conference setting, I demonstrated as many of these strategies as I could, and I enjoyed our lively discussion around what they planned to apply in their own settings.

So what about you?  It can be truly satisfying to connect with your students during the few hours of class time you have with them each term.  Being able to witness their learning in class is much more energizing than looking at a sea of disengaged faces.  Why don’t you give it a try?  Remember, we’re here to help.

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The Centre for Teaching Excellence welcomes contributions to its blog. If you are a faculty member, staff member, or student at the University of Waterloo (or beyond!) and would like contribute a posting about some aspect of teaching or learning, please contact Mark Morton or Trevor Holmes.

The Power of Community — Donna Ellis

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what we’re trying to accomplish in CTE (one of those off-shoots of having to prepare for a job interview!) and I keep coming back to building community and building capacity.  While it’s important to build capacity Continue reading The Power of Community — Donna Ellis

How much is enough? – Donna Ellis

As we head into a new academic term, I thought I’d do a little reflecting on some reading I’ve been doing lately (nothing like the end of term office clean-up to uncover a few gems saved up over the term!). One article review that struck me from The Teaching Professor was about how many tests are enough to help maximize student learning. When I consult on course designs, this question often arises. So what does the literature have to say? Continue reading How much is enough? – Donna Ellis

CTE Welcomes Visiting Faculty Members from KSU – Donna Ellis

The next two weeks will be very different ones for the staff at CTE.  We are delighted to be welcoming twenty-five faculty members from King Saud University (KSU) in Saudi Arabia.  They are joining us as of July 12 for an instructional development program developed by our staff members. The first week of the program, entitled “Integrating Technologies into Your Teaching,” comprises a dozen workshops, including “A Survey of Learning Technologies,” “Blended Learning,” “Assessing Student Learning with Eportfolios,” “Facilitating Online Discussions,” and “Creating a Fully Online Course” (the latter workshop is being offered in conjunction with the Centre for Extended Learning). Continue reading CTE Welcomes Visiting Faculty Members from KSU – Donna Ellis

Checking the “list” twice – Donna Ellis

What is it about top 10 lists?  My understanding of cognitive psychology reminds me that our brains naturally try to categorize information, but lists in relation to instructional development just seem too trite, particularly when they focus on the negative.

My grumbles stem from a fairly recent U.S. News & World Report article called “10 Warning Signs of a Bad Professor“.  It was, in essence, a shopping list of behaviours that students should avoid if they experience them early in a semester.  I can certainly empathize with students, but  the top (or should I say “bottom”) 10 ten list format made the points seem overly simplified.  Continue reading Checking the “list” twice – Donna Ellis

CTE and the 6th Decade Plan — Donna Ellis

starI was recently asked to document how well CTE’s activities and services meet the university’s 6th Decade Plan.  At first this seemed like a pretty straightforward task since there is only section in the Plan devoted specifically to teaching.  And yet, as I re-read the Plan, I recognized that our work fits with numerous recommendations as well as the overall orientation of the Plan, which calls for “excellence, pursued and supported in all activities” (p.4).  We are the “Centre for Teaching Excellence” and we take our name very seriously.  We strive to model the highest standards in our programming, resources, and support services. 

So how do we fit with the Plan?  Naturally, we provide programming and support to help faculty members and graduate students develop “enhanced teaching skills” (p.6).  But we do much, much more than that.  Here’s a sampling…

  • We support faculty members who want to commit to and demonstrate excellence in teaching through offering events like the Instructional Skills Workshop and the Teaching Excellence Academy where our own faculty members show leadership by co-facilitating. 
  • Our activities marry teaching and research through our own research work and that of the faculty and staff members in the Teaching-Based Research Group. 
  • We engage in innovation in teaching and support others in their quest to try new ideas with regard to teaching, whether they involve learning technologies or more traditional instructional methods. 
  • We also support the development of aligned, innovative curricula as we work with an increasing number of departments. 
  • We help to celebrate Waterloo’s great teachers through the university-wide teaching programs. 
  • We help provide great learning experiences for students by hiring them into our office, assisting with campus learning projects such as e-portfolios, and supporting internationalization efforts. 

As well, we have an amazing team of staff members who think strategically, collaborate endlessly, and give 110% everyday to help support teaching excellence at Waterloo.

So the exercise of mapping our activities to the 6th Decade Plan clearly showed that we’re on the right track.  But it also reminded me how proud I am to be part of something so good.  As a support unit, we often downplay our contributions.  I see that we really shouldn’t because we have a lot to offer.  If you haven’t checked out how CTE can help you, please view our website, contact one of our Liaisons, or drop by one of our offices.  We’re here to help!