This article describes a narrative study exploring the challenges that international teaching assistants (ITAs) encounter when using humor in North American university classrooms. Twenty participants were recruited from twelve teaching fields. Each ITA participated in two interviews and a videotaped teaching observation. The participants talked…

This study highlights how teaching a research methods course to undergraduate students can be a successful endeavor when active learning is the main method of learning and teaching. In this study, the effectiveness of using active learning in the experimental group to achieve the learning outcomes and final product of a freshman-year writing and…

The design of assessment in undergraduate history courses, as university populations grow and change, must adapt to meet and serve a range of new pedagogical imperatives and student constituencies in order to ensure both disciplinary integrity and the development of employability skills transferable to work in other fields. In delivering an…

Interest in service learning has increased in the past two decades, partly due to recent accumulation of knowledge about its beneficial outcomes to participants and society. This manuscript describes a small group basic communication course taught in a service learning format at a small liberal arts college. Qualitative comments as well as…

University teachers work in a highly complex environment, meeting the multiple and sometimes competing demands of striving for high quality teaching and research. While a growing body of research focuses on the relevance of schoolteachers' sense of responsibility and its outcomes for teaching and student learning, teacher responsibility has been…

Every class has a first day, yet many professors only read the syllabus to students rather than more intentionally leveraging the day to set up understandings that enhance learning and classroom management. Logic, experience, and research indicate that it is not just content expertise that matters to student experience and learning: it is also the…

In this paper, it is argued that education, especially in the online learning setting, should be viewed as a complex, dynamic endeavor. Design and evaluation grounded in systems thinking principles of relationships and connectedness, as well as complexity theory concepts such as self-organization and emergence, prove valuable tools for…

To address the recent calls for integration between liberal arts education and the business curriculum, we designed the team-taught interdisciplinary course, How to Cell: Marketing Meets Microbiology. The course blended multiple introductory courses, focused on environmental issues involving microbiology, and addressed how they were being…

Peer tutoring in undergraduate education can provide many benefits to students and instructors. However, the roles and responsibilities of peer tutors can be complex and varied, even within a single program. In particular, navigating between students and faculty can challenge peer tutors' sense of purpose and role clarity. In order to bring the…

Learning child protection requires more of students than simply understanding 'what to do' in legislative and policy terms. Students must reflect on their implicit belief systems to effectively respond to child protection concerns as future professionals. This is an instructional article describing a scenario-based survey methodology to increase…

Existing research on student acceptance of the flipped classroom in higher education is somewhat equivocal: some students appreciate the opportunities for active learning that a flipped classroom affords, whereas others expect their learning to occur via in-class lectures. The current study sought to disentangle some of these mixed results by…

The process toward academic literacy aims at developing academic reading and writing together with higher academic competences of increasing relevance for undergraduate students as future teachers and researchers. Such a process is even more complex in ELT vocational courses where non-English speaking trainees study English as a system while they…

This research provides an analysis of disciplines and disciplinary differences regarding the pedagogical value and content of post-graduate teaching certificates in higher education. Findings and recommendations are based upon a survey (N = 450) of department heads and doctoral students at Canadian research-focused universities. Participants were…

This study examined English Learners' (ELs) self-efficacy beliefs in a U.S. university setting by using a survey, interviews, and focus group discussions. The results identified that ELs from different disciplines had positive self-efficacy beliefs about their overall English learning, and self efficacy was related to ELs' age, years of English…

Learning activities to develop interprofessional collaboration align with goals for professional preparation to improve health outcomes. A problem-based case study approach can offer formal and informal learning interactions that promote information exchange and collaborative practice. The purpose of this instructional article was to describe a…