There has bee a big push in the last several years at Queen’s to raise awareness of mental health issues. One key component, however, is still getting those who need help in the hands of mental health professionals. Whether we’re…
Your connection with Grad studies at Queen's
Active Learning in Your Classroom
In a time where alternate and free means of learning (Khan Academy, Coursera, etc.) are proliferating with exciting fervour, university instructors more so than ever face of the challenge of providing students with meaningful learning opportunities that cannot be accessed…
Posted in General, Professional Development, Student Perspective, Teaching, Uncategorized Tagged with: active learning, pedagogy, student-centered learning
Live and learn
As a TA, sometimes you get a lot of say in what your students do, and sometimes you don’t. For the most part, I have been a TA for courses where I was told exactly what to do and when…
What makes your best big class?
Keeping on our teaching theme, this is one for the Teaching Fellows and TAs out there, and those aspiring to teach. At the beginning of a course I do a “best & worst classes” exercise where the students have the opportunity…
Posted in Professional Development, Teaching Tagged with: adjuncts, big class teaching, classroom mood, pedagogy, SOTL, TAs, teaching, TFs
Being on Both Sides of a TAship
I have been a grad student for more than six years. That’s bought me a lot, and as I’m approaching the end of this stage/journey/self-imposed sentence/dream (all of above), one of the things I’ve recently realized I’ve picked up is…
Posted in General, Jobs and Careers, Student Perspective, Teaching Tagged with: Graduate, Managing, post-doc, TAship, Teaching assistant
Getting Started on Teaching Dossiers
Happy New Year and welcome back to what finally feels like a Canadian winter. This time of year generally accompanied by a sense of a fresh start, a new beginning, resolutions to keep. While it’s likely that most resolutions will…
Posted in All, General, Professional Development, Teaching, Uncategorized Tagged with: Centre for Teaching and Learning
Responding to attitudes of academic entitlement – what grad students can do
We’ve all heard it. “I deserve a better grade than that.” “I tried hard and my mark doesn’t reflect how hard I tried.” And the especially common in Biology “I am applying to medical school and I got an 87%.…
Posted in All, General, New Students, Student Perspective, Teaching Tagged with: academic entitlement, grading, marking, teaching and learning
Addressy Occasions: On Greetings and Titles in Email
Happy end-of-classes to those of our readership who are teachers, students, and both at the same time! As you know, we always take a couple of weeks off around the Winter holidays each year, so look forward to another post…
Managing RAs: Helping Them Help You
At Gradifying we try to reach everyone on our topics. This month there have been different variations on the theme of the supervisor-supervisee relationship and congeniality, and how to hone it so that it works for you. I’m going to…
Posted in General, Professional Development, Uncategorized Tagged with: communication, leadership, managing relationships, organization, Research assistants, screening