As an undergraduate, I took a seminar dedicated entirely to Ulysses by James Joyce. Joyce’s modernist novel is mystifying, so question marks hung on the ends of students’ contributions. As we ...

The new guidelines instruct faculty to take a “broad and balanced approach” to the discussion and teaching of controversial issues.

One of Kevin Gannon’s favorite class discussion activities doesn’t involve much talking. Inspired by complete-the-story games in which players each write a line of a tale that builds off a previous ...

At some point in their career, every teacher will find themselves having a difficult discussion with their students. My first took place not long after I began teaching. It involved one of my students ...

When I first started teaching, my attitude toward students who remained silent in discussion classes could be summed up with the words of Bernard Hopkins, the fistic sage of Philadelphia: “Bernard ...

When asked to imagine classroom learning, some people envision a teacher at the front of the room, guiding their students’ learning through a series of questions without much connection to the ...

I read with interest Anna Broadbent’s essay on the benefits and pitfalls of class participation grades. From my perch as a provost, former dean and former department chair, I find that the grade for ...

L ectures are boring. Assignments are busy work. And all of that tuition is for this? When Justin Shaffer hears these kinds of complaints from students, he thinks they have a point. He also thinks ...