Penn State University

Tools and Resources

Alphabetical List

Browse through the tools by the title of the resource.

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Cases that can be used for managing difficult students workshops.

One-page handout to evaluate the quality or effectiveness of case studies.

Case study about a TA who alienates his supervising faculty member. Includes reflection questions about ways to avoid this kind of situation.

Brief discussion of characteristics that case-writers should aim for in order to promote students' learning. Traits discussed include realism, alignment with students' needs, complexity, adequate background information, and clear writing.

Case study: An instructor who has assigned a small-group project finds that one group is functioning poorly. One of the members complains that his religious beliefs make it difficult for him to work with another member of the group, who is gay.

This case study would be appropriate for use with faculty or graduate student instructors. It deals, in particular, with issues of inclusivity and students' inability to pay for required texts.

This is a case study appropriate for use with any faculty or graduate instructor audience. It touches on themes including religious differences, inclusivity, difficult dialogues, and class discussions.

In-depth discussion of planning and writing a case study. Key steps discussed include identifying the reason for using a case study; drafting the case; and piloting and revising it.

Concise and useful guide for instructors designing writing assignments for their students. Focus is on four areas of planning: 1) purpose of the assignment, 2) audience the students will be writing for, 3) strategic/logistical issues, and 4) evaluating the students' work.

This is a 2-page flyer provided by the CIRTL Network (Center for the Integration of Research, Teaching, and Learning). It includes quotes from participants about how participating benefitted them. Many are now professors. The second page is focuses on additional benefits for students, faculty, and academic units.

Course instructors and short course/workshop facilitators sign this form to document participants' successful completion of programming that satisfies one or more learning objectives of the Penn State CIRTL Associate-level teaching certificate.

Answers to frequently asked questions about Penn State CIRTL and its teaching certificate process.

This form is for CIRTL participants who are taking a course, short course, or workshop that fulfills one or more of the Penn State CIRTL learning objectives. The instructor or facilitator signs the form, and the participant submits it when turning in their materials at the end of the Associate-level CIRTL process.

List of Penn State CIRTL learning objectives; courses, short courses, and workshops that fulfill them; and contact people for each.

Instructions for completing the CIRTL Practitioner level

Example of classroom observation for peer review.

Example of a classroom observation for peer review.

Class observation format reflecting the Elements of Effective Teaching as described by Penn State Faculty Senate Report, March 2023.

Example classroom observation for peer review.

Example of classroom observation for peer review.

Information about the Technology Classrooms and Student Computing Labs on the University Park Campus and related services.

This document is a 1993 teaching newsletter from Stanford University that addresses the topic of classroom assessments - brief, typically non-graded assignments, that reveals to both teachers and students the extent to which students have the knowledge the teacher expects them to have.

This document provides methods for doing classroom assessment (usually ungraded) to help faculty keep students in large classes engaged and to provide feedback about student knowledge of specific concepts to both faculty and students.

This 2 page handout describes tips for preventing and dealing with classroom incivility and other disruptive behavior.

Creating a sense of rapport can reduce disruptive behavior and promote a sense of community in a course. Instructors have a crucial role in creating rapport, including through their responses to disruptive behavior.

Case study for classroom management

Lam, R. (2010) A Peer Review Training Workshop: Coaching Students to Give and Evaluate Peer Feedback, TESL Canada Journal/Revue TESL du Canada Vol. 27(2, Spring 2010), 114-127.

Richard Felder and Rebecca Brent describe their approach to Collaborative Learning Strategies.

IST's 2010 master assessment plan is a great model for similar programs trying to map their objectives, courses, and assessments.

This book defines assessment, and explains how both teachers and students do it to assess student learning and teaching effectiveness. The book describes assessment practices and best practices for assessment in the college classroom.

An overview of the components of a teaching portfolio based on the administrative guidelines for AC 23 at Penn State. The document describes the each component its function and includes examples from various portfolios.

Elements to consider in productive group work.

Concept inventories or tests are designed to assess student's knowledge of particular scientific concepts. This link goes to a University of Maryland Physics Education Research Group. It provides information about how to access a variety of concept inventories including mathematical modeling, understanding graphs, vector evaluation, Force Concept Inventory, Mechanics Baseline Test, and several other physics concepts.

Concept inventories are designed to assess student's knowledge of particular scientific concepts. This webpage provides a list of concept inventories in existence along with their authors. Some can be linked to via the webpage and others cannot. Topics include engineering, science and math.

This document describes how concept maps can be used as active methods for students to learn course material.

This document describes several active learning methods for helping students learn how course concepts are organized.

From UC Berkeley's Center for Teaching and Learning, Considerations for Large Lecture Classes provides six ways to make lectures in a large enrollment course more manageable and effective. The strategies include communicating explicit learning expectations, not trying to "cover" everything, focusing on analysis of issues or problems, engaging students through active learning practices, providing feedback to students, and using clickers to poll students.

Using Mental Health and Wellness as a Framework for Course Design
Patricia Dyjur, Gabrielle Lindstrom, Nahum Arguera, Haboun Bair
Proceedings of the University of Calgary Conference on Postsecondary Learning and Teaching, Vol. 2, 2017

Abstract
Mental health and wellness is a concern, not only for students, but for instructors in higher education as well. Course design can have a positive or negative impact on both student and instructor wellness, especially around stress and anxiety with assessments, workload, and due dates. Factors of course design such as policies and values, academic expectations, learning environment and learning experiences, student assessment, and reflection and resilience can play an important role in supporting wellness. In this paper we provide examples of how each factor can affect wellness, and offer questions that an instructor can consider when designing a course with wellness in mind.

Official University resource for obtaining copyright approvals for course packets and other publications.

This is a pdf diagram that can help instructors determine whether intellectual property can be legally used in courses under the Fair Use Doctrine. It was developed by Becky Albitz a former Penn State Librarian. Becky is currently the Associate Librarian for Collection Management at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine.

Overview of copyright law as it pertains to higher education. By Becky Albitz.

Presentation from a 2011 workshop by Becky Albitz on legal use of copyrighted materials in the classroom.

Worrisome Student Behaviors: Minimizing Risk

Based on backward design principles, this Course Assessment Plan helps you to align course learning objectives with the formative and summative assessment tools and with the instructional activities that enable students to demonstrate their learning. The document is particularly useful in preparing for course design, course revision, and assessment planning, as well as for curricular and/or accreditation review.

Based on backward design principles, this Course Assessment Plan helps you to align course learning objectives with the formative and summative assessment tools and with the instructional activities that enable students to demonstrate their learning. The document is particularly useful in preparing for course design, course revision, and assessment planning, as well as for curricular and/or accreditation review.

Links to resources for instructors responding to student comments, disruptions, or microaggressions. Also included are SITE faculty consultants' most recommended course norms, discussion guidelines, ground rules, and netiquette.

This file contains a list of six course design models chosen as "favorites" by the POD Network members, pulled from a thread on the POD Network Open Discussion Group. The six models are: Purdue’s Interactive Course Re/Design (ICD) Wheel; Connection-Engagement-Empowerment (CEE); Community of Inquiry (CoI) Framework; Kolb’s Experiential Learning Cycle; Fink’s Integrated Course Design; and Backward Design. Moji Shahvali

This is a faculty peer evaluation form (peer observation, classroom observation). It has a "checklist" format, rather than a scaled rating (Likert scale) format. This form asks faculty peer reviewers to note the presence of teaching activities/behaviors that have already been established as indicative of high-quality teaching. This form is intentionally designed to be shortened by the faculty in an academic unit so that it reflects the unit's teaching values, and the priorities of the unit. It should not be used "as is" because it is too much to expect reviewers to evaluate; fewer items per section will make the form easier to use.

The form was created based on information in: Chism, N.V.N. (1999) Chapter 6: Classroom Observation, Peer Review of Teaching: A Sourcebook. Bolton, MA: Anker Publishing.

Most course observations involve pre- and post-observation discussions between the observer and the instructor. A pre-observation conversation builds trust and ensures that the observer understands the instructional context. A post-observation debriefing should highlight effective instructional practices, as well as collaborative identification of improvements. The following can also be used to guide a written summary by the observer.

For use in course design or revision, this Course Outline assists you aligning course topics with course learning objectives, finding and filling gaps in that alignment, and planning how much class time is necessary for students to achieve the learning objectives. The outline is particularly useful in developing shared learning goals for multiple course sections, integrated courses, and linked courses, as well as for submissions for curricular review and assessment planning.

For use in course design or revision, this Course Outline assists you aligning course topics with course learning objectives, finding and filling gaps in that alignment, and planning how much class time is necessary for students to achieve the learning objectives. The outline is particularly useful in developing shared learning goals for multiple course sections, integrated courses, and linked courses, as well as for submissions for curricular review and assessment planning.

Questions and advice to guide pre- and post-observation conversations for faculty peer review of teaching. These questions can also be used to guide a written observation summary letter.

Creating a Culture of Academic Integrity publication by Herteis. This document includes a definition of plagiarism, facts about the extent of cheating, why students cheat, and strategies for designing written assignments that reduce plagiarism (among other topics)

This webpage includes suggestions that will help faculty to create a safe classroom environments in which all students, regardless of identity, will feel welcomed. The page includes suggestions for how to create inclusive classrooms from diverse classrooms.

This book is a collection of studies from a variety of institutions with undergraduate research programs. The book focuses on key successful elements of each program, and draws conclusions on the impact of these programs on students. Useful for educators and administrators interested in creating and evaluating undergraduate research programs.

The purpose of this resource is 1) to help instructors engage in an informed and practical consideration of barriers to equitable access in the design of their courses and 2) to include those considerations when designing learning activities, selecting and sharing course content, and in approaching the classroom itself.

This document describes the process for creating permanent groups (teams) for collaborative learning.

Inclusive Teaching. This document includes the slides and handouts used in Linse & Weinstein's workshop introducing faculty to specific actions that they can take immediately to make their courses more inclusive. Based on our experience, it is best to provide the Strategies early in the workshop because it addresses faculty members' primary concern--what to do! By addressing faculty needs first, we have found it allows us to have richer discussions about the two most intractable issues to creating inclusive learning environments, Microaggressions and Stereotype Threat.

This document describes the process of question sampling (item banking).

The Critical Teaching Behaviors (CTB) framework offers a holistic means of documenting and assessing teaching effectiveness by including a variety of evidence and perspectives, and a comprehensive feedback and documentation toolkit incorporates more of the instructor's perspective on their own teaching into the evaluation process. Written by Lauren Barbeau and Claudia Cornejo Happel. Available through Penn State's Libraries as an eBook at ezaccess.libraries.psu.edu.

A sense of belonging is students’ perception of social support on campus, connectedness, and experience of feeling accepted, respected, mattering, and valued by the community or people on campus, such as faculty, staff, and peers (Strayhorn, 2012). Based on four domains of sense of belonging that Ahn and Davis (2020) suggest (academic engagement, social engagement, surroundings, and personal space), this resource provides practical guidance for cultivating a sense of belonging in learning environments.

Culturally Responsive Teaching (CRT) is a pedagogical approach that recognizes the importance of cultural diversity in the teaching and learning process. The core emphasis of CRT is the inclusion of diverse cultures in the design of instruction (Addy et al., 2021). Gay (2010) defines CRT as “using the cultural knowledge, prior experiences, frames of reference, and performance styles of ethnically diverse students to make learning encounters more relevant to and effective for them” (p.31). This resource expands on the understanding of culturally responsive teaching and provides practical suggestions for teaching in higher education.

This document is an example of a curriculum matrix, used for learning outcomes assessment (aka program assessment), in which general education program objectives are matched with the courses that address them.

Example of a curriculum matrix or map that is for a business program at Penn State Berks. Development of curriculum maps are important parts of the learning outcomes assessment process.

This is curriculum matrix was completed by the faculty in the Elementary and Kindergarten Education program at Penn State Berks. It is used to determine which program goals/objectives are addressed in the various courses included in the program. A curriculum map is an important step in the process of learning outcomes assessment (program assessment).

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