MRU Institute for SoTL

6th meeting of the SoTL Journal club

Hello people who are interested in discussion of SoTL (and related) research!

Margot Underwood and Stephanie Zettel will be presenting our next paper on March 23rd at 11am:
Miller-Young, J., Dean, Y., Rathburn, M., Pettit, J., Underwood, M., Gleeson, J., Lexier, R., Calvert, V. and Clayton, P. (2015). Decoding ourselves: an inquiry into faculty learning about reciprocity in service-learning. Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, 22(1): 32-47.
Here’s a finely-crafted link (that should even work off-campus) to the paper
Warmly,
jon
Full SoTL Reading Group W17 Schedule:
Jan 9th, 3:30pm (Presenter: Jon Mee)
Jan 20th, 12:00pm (Presenter: Margy MacMillan)
Feb 3rd, 12:00pm (Presenter: Sally Haney)
Feb 15th, 11:00am (Presenter: Melanie Rathburn)
March 10th, 12:00pm (Presenter: Ana Colina)
March 23rd, 11:00am (Co-presenters: Margot Underwood and Stephanie Zettel)
April 4th, 11:30am (Presenter: Michelle Yeo)
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Fifth meeting of the SoTL Journal Club

Our reading group last met on Feb 15th (just before the reading week), and we had a great discussion led by Melanie Rathburn. Thanks Melanie!
Ana Colina will be presenting our next paper on March 10th at noon (note the time change relative to the previously-distributed schedule):
Beck, C., Butler, A., & da Silva, K. B. (2014). Promoting inquiry-based teaching in laboratory courses: are we meeting the grade? CBE-Life Sciences Education, 13(3), 444-452.
As usual, we will be meeting in the Faculty Centre meeting room #1.
Here’s a finely-crafted link (that should even work off-campus) to the paper
Warmly,
jon
Full SoTL Reading Group W17 Schedule:
Jan 9th, 3:30pm (Presenter: Jon Mee)
Jan 20th, 12:00pm (Presenter: Margy MacMillan)
Feb 3rd, 12:00pm (Presenter: Sally Haney)
Feb 15th, 11:00am (Presenter: Melanie Rathburn)
March 10th, 12:00pm (Presenter: Ana Colina)
March 23rd, 11:00am (Co-presenters: Margot Underwood and Stephanie Zettel)
April 4th, 11:30am (Presenter: Michelle Yeo)
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Fourth meeting of the SoTL journal club

We had another great discussion on Friday. Thanks to Sally Haney for presenting last week’s article.

Melanie Rathburn will be presenting our next paper on Feb 15th at 11am in Faculty Centre Rm 1
McLean, A.J., Bond, C.H., and Nicholson, H.D. 2015. An anatomy of feedback: a phenomenographic investigation of undergraduate students’ conceptions of feedback. Studies In Higher Education 40(5): 921-932.

Here’s a finely-crafted link (that will even work off-campus) to the paper
http://library.mtroyal.ca:2048/login?url=http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03075079.2013.855718

Warmly,
jon

Full SoTL Reading Group W17 Schedule:
Jan 9th, 3:30pm (Presenter: Jon Mee)
Jan 20th, 12:00pm (Presenter: Margy MacMillan)
Feb 3rd, 12:00pm (Presenter: Sally Haney)
Feb 15th, 11:00am (Presenter: Melanie Rathburn)
March 10th, 9:00am (Presenter: Ana Colina)
March 23rd, 11:00am (Co-presenters: Margot Underwood and Stephanie Zettel)
April 4th, 11:30am (Presenter: Michelle Yeo)

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Third meeting of the SoTL journal club..

Sally Haney will be presenting our next paper:
Knudsen, S. (2014). Students are doing it for themselves – ‘the problem-oriented problem’ in academic writing in the humanities. Studies in Higher Education, 39(10), 1838-1859. doi:10.1080/03075079.2013.806455

Here’s a finely-crafted link to the paper: http://library.mtroyal.ca:2048/login?url=http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03075079.2013.806455

From Sally:
“I invite the group to reading this article about the problem with problems. In it, the author makes an interesting argument about the lack of scaffolding many educators provide when asking students to contemplate a problem in the problem-based learning paradigm. For discussion, I would ask participants to come to the table with some thoughts about how problems are discussed/framed/scaffolded in their disciplines, and what, if anything, they might do differently as a result of this particular reading.”

When
Fri Feb 3, 2017 12pm – 1pm Mountain Time – Edmonton

 

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Second meeting of the SoTL Journal group

Sorry I missed last Monday’s stimulating discussion.
I’ll be presenting the next paper on January 20th at noon in Faculty Centre room 1. (full schedule is below).
Here’s the reading and some background – looking forward to our meeting,
margy

Marton, F. (1975). On non‐verbatim learning: 1. Level of processing and level of outcome. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology, 16(1), 273-279.

The article I’d like to discuss is, as far as I know, the first one describing phenomenography as a method. The tricky part about selecting this reading is that MRU doesn’t own it. So I’ve arranged for permission for 15 copies. If you want to come to the article discussion, email me (margy – mmacmillan@mtroyal.ca) and I’ll send you one.(alternatively, if you have access to library privileges elsewhere, UofC has it).

Phenomenography is at its simplest the study of variations in experience of a phenomenon, and it’s used a fair bit in studies that cross the boundaries between SoTL and my field, information literacy.

The early work with this method was done by Ferenc Marton and the Gothenburg school in the 1970’s who started with the questions why do some students succeed and others not – classic SoTL. It laid the foundation for understanding surface and deep approaches to learning taken up by Biggs and others.

If you want to read up on phenomenography, a great place to start are the intro and first 3 chapters of a book that IS accessible
http://www.ed.ac.uk/institute-academic-development/learning-teaching/research/experience-of-learning

Marton, F., Hounsell, D. and Entwistle, N., (eds.). (2005). The experience of learning: Implications for teaching and studying in higher education. 3rd (Internet) edition. Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh, Centre for Teaching, Learning and Assessment.

And there’s solid background in an article by Louise B. Limberg here
http://library.mtroyal.ca:2048/login?url=http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781412963909.n316
note – Click on Sage Knowledge

SoTL Reading Group Schedule:
Jan 9th, 3:30pm (Presenter: Jon Mee)
Jan 20th, 12:00pm (Presenter: Margy MacMillan)
Feb 3rd, 12:00pm (Presenter: Sally Haney)
Feb 15th, 11:00am (Presenter: Melanie Rathburn)
March 10th, 9:00am (Presenter: Ana Colina)
March 23rd, 11:00am (Co-presenters: Margot Underwood and Stephanie Zettel)
April 4th, 11:30am (Presenter: Michelle Yeo)

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Preliminary meeting – SoTL Reading Group

In an effort to further strengthen our community of SoTL at MRU, I invite you to participate in a SoTL reading group.

The (vaguely defined – subject to your input) vision for these scholarly meetings is to bring together people engaged in SoTL to talk about recent and/or important contributions to the field.

Our first organizational meeting will take place on December 6th 2016 at 12:30pm in EA3003 (the “Knuckle”). We will discuss the format and schedule of future discussions (to be held in 2017).
Margy has offered to bring dessert-y treats!

Please feel free to circulate this email and invite others. The present email list was compiled from the list of past and present Nexen and TransCanada scholars, supplemented with other people we knew to be engaged in SoTL. Please let me know if you never want to hear about this again!

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Update – 2017 TransCanada Collaborative SoTL Inquiry Grants

Applications for the 2017 TransCanada Collaborative SoTL Inquiry Grants are due January 16, 2017. To apply, Principal Investigators must use the Office of Research Services web-based application through ROMEO (see https://mtroyal.ca/Research/romeo ). The information required for the grant application is listed in the ROMEO system.

The Institute for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning at MRU is pleased to sponsor a call for applications for the 2017 TransCanada Collaborative SoTL Inquiry Grants. These grants are designated for collaborative teaching and learning inquiry projects which go beyond an inquiry about teaching and learning in a single class. Note that while the Nexen Scholars Program is designed to support scholars in developing a project, the TransCanada grants require a complete research proposal including literature review, research question, methodology, data collection, and dissemination plans. (If your proposed work does not align well with this structure, please include a clear statement of theory and methods that are aligned with the proposed project.)

The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning is inclusive and unified by its potential to have impact in the classroom and to deepen our understanding of student learning, but diverse in discipline, theory, methodology, and method. Eligible projects must propose systematic, evidence-based study of teaching and learning and meet principles of good practice in SoTL (Felten, 2013):

  • focused on student learning in higher education,
  • situated in the existing literature and grounded in a teaching-learning context,
  • methodologically sound,
  • conducted in partnership with students, and
  • appropriately public.

Collaborative SoTL projects are expected to be in the range of $5,000-$10,000 for a single year (bigger than what an internal research grant would reasonably support) and may be conducted over one or two years. Multi-year projects are subject to annual reporting and adequate progress in order to carry forward funds. For multi-institutional projects, a fulltime MRU faculty member must be the principal investigator on the project and paid research assistants must be MRU students (unless the project is co-funded). Note that support for smaller SoTL inquiry projects is available through the Internal Research Grant Fund.

For additional information please contact the Institute for Scholarship of Teaching and Learning through Anne Johnston at ajohnston@mtroyal.ca. These grants are funded in their entirety by the TransCanada Research Program for Learning Innovation and Collaborative Inquiry.

For more information on criteria and eligible expenses, please click Continue reading

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