TLI Conference Program 2023

Session A1 • 10:15 – 10:45 AM

Title: An Introduction to the University’s New Course Outline Management Tool: A New SYL-ution for UofG

Authors: Alison Crerar, Aron Fazekas, Clarke Mathany, and Dev Shah

The university is in the process of transitioning to a new course outline tool, SYL, that will support instructors with the organization and development of their course outlines. As a critical component of communication between instructors and students, the SYL implementation team will showcase how faculty can tailor their course outlines in SYL to integrate logistical details from other centralized systems, provide information regarding teaching methods and assessment parameters, and automatically populate University, College, and Departmental policies.

We will introduce you to the new SYL tool and discuss important elements to include in your outline to ensure that it meets accessibility and student needs. Our implementation plan, including the transition of data from the previous system, and future orientation workshops will be discussed. Attendees will have an opportunity to provide feedback and pose questions.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Identify key details regarding the timeline and transition to SYL.
• Describe foundational elements of the new course outline software tool.
• Pose questions and suggestions for the implementation team to consider during the rollout of SYL.

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Session A2 • 10:45 – 11:15

Title: Males Under-Estimate Academic Performance of Their Female Peers in Undergraduate Biology Classrooms

Author: Daniel Grunspan

Women who start college in one of the natural or physical sciences leave in greater proportions than their male peers. The reasons for this difference are complex, and one possible contributing factor is the social environment women experience in the classroom. Using social network analysis, we explore how gender influences the confidence that college level biology students have in each other’s mastery of biology.

Results reveal that males are more likely than females to be named by peers as being knowledgeable about the course content. This effect increases as the term progresses, and persists even after controlling for class performance and outspokenness. The bias in nominations is specifically due to males over-nominating their male peers relative to their performance. The over-nomination of male peers is commensurate with an overestimation of male grades by 0.76 points on a 4 point grade scale, indicating a strong male bias among males when assessing their classmates. Females, in contrast, nominated equitably based on student performance rather than gender, suggesting they lacked gender biases in filling out these surveys.

By the end of this session, participants will:

• Recognize student dynamics that are otherwise hidden from instructors.
• Learn about social dynamics that exist in classrooms and become aware of ways to study them.

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Session A3 • 11:15 – 11:45

Title: Cooperative Learning in the Post-COVID-19 Language Classroom: A Tool for Increasing Student Motivation and Sense of Community

Author: Enrica Aurora Cominetti

The effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on student motivation and sense of community still lingers on in our classrooms. Indeed, the dramatic increase in academic misconduct we are currently witnessing may be related to the students’ feeling of being removed from classroom dynamics ensuing the COVID-19 shift to online instruction. This is all the more true when considering the challenges language learners have had to face, as traditionally language teaching heavily relies on face-to-face interaction. 

My presentation aims to analyze how various cooperative learning techniques can be integrated with motivational theories to increase language learners' motivation and sense of community. The analysis will consider, on the one hand, the theoretical foundations on which group learning techniques are based and their related effects on student motivation and sense of belonging. On the other hand, it will illustrate how said effects can be further enhanced in the language classroom by adopting motivational strategies. 

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Identify the theoretical foundations on which cooperative learning techniques and motivational theories are hinged.
• Understand the extent to which the integration of cooperative learning models with motivational strategies can positively affect language learners' motivation and sense of belonging.

Session B1 • 10:15 – 10:45 AM

Title: The Arts and Sciences Conference: Embedding Career Preparation in the Curriculum

Authors: Donald Bruce and Nicola Edwards 

A Team of Career Specialists and Academics has now done five iterations of the Arts and Sciences Conference over three years using the BAS program as a pilot. The aims are: to embed career preparation in the curriculum; to link transferable skills and knowledge acquired in the classroom to career pathways; to empower students to make informed decisions about their own career pathways post-graduation. 

Starting in 2020, we built a team to launch this conference using the BAS program (approx. 500 students). The key issue was to embed career planning as part of the actual curriculum and to link transferable skills acquired in BAS core courses to career pathways. 

All BAS students are required to engage in at least three of six online sessions and write a graded reflection text analyzing what they have learned. The sessions (eg: alumni panels, employer panels, keynote speakers, professional career specialists) vary in each iteration and have included topics such as, EDI, LinkedIn, and career-navigation; 26 of the 30 sessions are archived and available. 

Student / Instructor reactions have been very favourable. We are planning a research project on the pilot.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Understand the value of including career preparation as part of the actual curriculum.
• Understand the structure and operation of the Conference that has been built.
• Identify ways of using our model and resources for adoption or adaption into their own programs.

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 Session B2 • 10:45 – 11:15 AM

Title: Applying an Authentic Assessment Evaluation Tool to Assessments Across Multiple Disciplines

Authors: Ashley Fisher, Tina Hobbins, and Kerry Ritchie

Authentic assessment (AA) is often thought to support critical thinking, the development of transferable skills, and bridge the gap between the classroom and real-world. Previously, the Ritchie Lab developed the AA tool, which is used to evaluate assessment authenticity. This tool was applied to a complete inventory of assessments in a health science curriculum, and results demonstrated that AA generally increased with academic year, and certain types of assessments were more authentic than others. Previous literature has highlighted differences in teaching and learning structures across academic disciplines, suggesting AA and trends in AA could vary by discipline. To address this gap, I used the AA tool to evaluate 165 assessments from 15 representative business, humanities, and applied science courses. This validated the previous assumption that the AA tool could be used to evaluate the authenticity of assessments beyond a health science curriculum. My preliminary data highlights discipline-specific trends and differences in assessment structure and authenticity which could be applied to other disciplines, highlighting the importance of cross-College discussion of best practices.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Understand authentic assessment and how the Authentic Assessment Tool can be used to evaluate assessment authenticity.
• See examples of authentic assessments in each discipline and suggestions of how to increase assessment authenticity.
• Appreciate the differences in assessment structure, type, and authenticity across curricula, as well as the importance of interdisciplinary communication and dissemination of best practices.

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Session B3 • 11:15 – 12:15 PM

Title: Let's Talk About Authentic Assessments: What Are They and Who's Using Them?

Authors: Kerry Ritchie and Justine Hobbins

Authentic assessments (AA) can foster deep learning and strengthen ties between classroom and real-world problems. However, while many institutions highlight a commitment to AA in strategic documents, objective measures of AA are lacking and assessment design remains largely an individual activity.    

In a multi-year project, we compiled an inventory of all assessments across our BSc curriculum and documented their authenticity using a rubric-style tool based on the core dimensions of authenticity: realism, cognitive challenge, and evaluative judgement. This tool has been applied to over 1000 assessments from face-to-face and remote teaching settings, uncovering patterns of authenticity by class size, year level and assessment type, allowing us to better understand student experiences and facilitate discussion between instructors. 

This workshop will share our representative dataset and tool to engage instructors in personal reflection and critical discussion with colleagues. We also present a tangible process that can be adopted at scale to support program-wide reviews. We will discuss practical strategies participants can consider at a course, curriculum, or institutional level.  

By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:

• Discuss the core dimensions of authentic assessment.
• Score assessments using the authentic assessment tool.
• Identify strategies and resources to enhance assessment authenticity in a variety of settings.

Session C1 • 10:15 – 11:15 AM

Title: Assessing Student Participation: Beyond Hands Up

Authors: Andrea Buchholz and Janet Wolstenholme

Have you ever assessed students on something you have not taught them? Us too. Take participation, for example. We expect students to participate in our courses. Indeed, we assign perhaps 10% to 20% of students’ final grade to participation. But do we teach students what participation looks like, or enable them to do so in various ways? Does our assessment go beyond counting the number of times students speak up in class or trying to remember participation at the end of the semester? To foster more and meaningful class participation, we propose that participation-related learning outcomes, classroom activities and assessment be aligned. Together in this hands-on workshop, we will work through an example of how to constructively align class participation. We encourage workshop participants to have a course in mind that they teach/will teach (in person, virtual, blended), and for which participation is assessed.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Develop a clear and measurable participation-related learning outcome.
• Identify classroom activities which will engage students with the action of the learning outcome.
• Begin to develop a learner-centred assessment aligned with the learning outcome.

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 Session C3 • 11:15 – 12:15 PM

Title: Contextualizing COVID-19: An Archive for the Future

Authors: Catharine Carstairs, Kim Martin, Thomas Smith, Anna Tchobanian, and Evie Matyjas

Over the past three years, Kim Martin and more recently, Catherine Carstairs, have been building an online archive of the University of Guelph’s experience of COVID-19, as part of a series of experiential learning courses.  The first of these (Fall 2020) had students write narratives and take photos of their pandemic experiences.  The following year, students shared media objects and their own memories.  In Winter 2023, students conducted oral interviews of faculty, staff, and students in collaboration with a number of community partners including the OAC, the OVC and Student Life.  These projects have been archived on the Canadian Writing Research Collaboratory, an online depository for research about Canada.  In this presentation, we will discuss skills the students gained including: critical reflection, time-management, professional presentation, digital literacy, writing for the web, institutional understanding and connections between the local and the global and the usefulness of the archive for future historians.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Explain what CWRC (https://cwrc.ca/) is and the value of creating a digital archive.
• Appreciate the concrete skills students learned in these experiential learning projects including: critical reflection, time-management, professional presentation, collaboration, digital literacy, institutional understanding and the connections between the local and the global.
• Identify what students, faculty and staff experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic and how it changed their lives.

Session D1 • 10:15 – 10:45 AM

Title: Student Driven Collaborative Learning & Importance of Open Ed

Authors: Shehroze Saharan, Pooja Sankar, Justine Tshinsky, Coral Murrant, Kerry Ritchie, and Ali Versluis

In an age where students are relying more on the internet for accessing material to supplement their learning, the importance of accessible, affordable course content and credible sources is growing immensely. With this, comes the question; just how accessible are educational resources for students? Through the fourth-year advanced research course, HK 4510, students with a keen interest in collaboration, teaching, learning and physiology have the opportunity to work alongside faculty towards the creation of an open educational resource in Physiology. Student-driven, collaborative learning was a fundamental theme throughout the course that ensured a learner-centred approach. This project gave students the opportunity to acquire a new set of skills and competencies including various forms of pedagogy, learning through team building, and understanding various forms of copyright and intellectual property (IP). We will discuss how these skills allowed for the critical evaluation of learning objects and assess their resourcefulness in helping students enrich the learning experience.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Appreciate the collaborative learning approach in creating accessible open educational resources to enrich the learning experience of both the content creators and users of the resource.
• Understand the importance of student-driven learning and the power of different perspectives.
• Consider how to implement different modes of communication to foster the needs of different individuals and their academic strengths and weaknesses.

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 Session D2 • 10:45 – 11:15 AM

Title: Learning with Roleplaying: How Did My Students Become the Cabinet Members of Middle Eastern Countries?

Author: Evren Altinkas

Learning is an interactive process. As a dedicated implementer of interactive learning, my experience shows that the best way for a learner to comprehend a subject is to be a part of the subject. This is extremely relevant in social sciences as well. In Winter 2020, I have applied some of the methods I learned during my EnLITE participation at University of Guelph to a group of 4th year students in Political Science Department. All the students are assigned as cabinet members (President, Foreign Affairs or Defense Ministers) of Middle Eastern countries we cover in the course. Each week, each group has 5 minutes to give a brief description of their policy as the country they represent on the specific topic covered in the course. I will present the results of learning process at the conference as the course will end and grades will be submitted by that time.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• See whether interactive roleplaying works for learning or not.
• Become familiar with roleplaying case studies.

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Session D3 • 11:15 – 11:45 PM

Title: Leveraging Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) into Your Experiential Activities

Author: Ruben Burga

Applying collaborative synchronous communication technology, faculty from four international institutions (University of Guelph, University of Navarra-Spain, IPMI International Business School - Indonesia, and Dominican University- USA) created teams of students (mixing multiple institutions) to explore the innovative aspects of sustainability in businesses. There were approximately 165 students in 22 teams with equal distribution of students from each institution in each team. This experiential activity was conducted in 2023 and required the students to coordinate synchronous meetings across three continents (North America, Asia, and Europe) and interview a local company, analyse their innovations in the context of sustainability and then present a final report and a virtual poster in the Metaverse describing their findings. Pedagogically, we enhanced social learning across cultures and promoted the humanistic aspect of doing business whilst from the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning perspective, we explored the changes in various learning dimensions using the Dee Fink taxonomy of significant learning before and after the COIL experience. In addition, the instructors across all four institutions met regularly prior to the activity, during the activity and post-activity to review the project and process. During the activity the instructors shared the monitoring and assessment duties and corresponded to ensure that we were consistent with our expectations. We will both the pedagogical and scholarly preliminary results of our study.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Apply learnings from conducting a COIL activity with partner institutions.
• Understand that meaningful learning may vary across a cultural context but still be oriented in a humanistic sense.
• Understand the framework and preparation required to successfully conduct this COIL activity.

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Session D4 • 11:45 – 12:15 PM

Title: Flipped Classroom is an Effective Approach in Teaching and Learning Mathematics in Large Classes

Author: Nagham Mohammad

The Flipped classroom is quickly emerging as an exciting new approach that promises benefits for students specifically in large classes (> 200 students). Students first be introduced to course materials before class and then complete individual and/or group learning activities inside the classroom. Video lectures must always be used as the pre-class instructional medium in the flipped classroom approach. 

In this session, I discuss how I run 2 large sections of MATH*1080 Flipped classes, with 5 engaged lab sections in a course of 2200 students while still embedding feelings of care and support. Further, I explain how I engaged all of the students inside the classroom. Finally, how I provided my students with the same experience as in-person but with the Flipped classes. From the course evaluations the students’ reviews were very positive.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Understand how I ran 2 large sections of Math*1080 Flipped classes, and ran 5 engaged lab sections in a course of 2200 students while still embedding feelings of care and support.
• Understand how I engaged all of the students inside the classroom using the student-response system 'Top Hat' to manage classroom discussions and promote active learning with strong academic standards.
• Understand how I provided my students with the same experience as in-person but with the Flipped classes.

Session E1 • 10:15 – 10:45 AM

Title: Mentoring Educational Leadership through Instructor-TA Partnership 

Authors: Stephen Mattucci and Albert Jiang

Senior PhD candidates with academic aspirations need opportunities to further develop their teaching practice, gain experience to showcase in a teaching dossier, and ultimately prepare for a potential future instructor role. This presentation and discussion will explore how a ‘Lead TA' role with increased responsibility can be mutually beneficial for both the instructor and the TA. Themes that will be explored include:  

• Teaching Technologies - e.g. sharing different teaching techniques and technological tools (e.g. tablet functional advantages 
• Assessment Strategies - e.g. multiple perspectives developing and verifying assessments
• In-class Opportunities - e.g. trading duties between solving problems, and circulating the room
• TA Management - e.g. assistance with / experience gained for administrative tasks, additional resource for TA peer support
• Mentorship - e.g. lifting each other up, negotiating philosophical values  

This relationship can be leveraged such that the instructor has an extra perspective to rely upon, and a closer connection between the students, and the TA has a safe space to explore teaching philosophies and approaches. 

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Recognize the mutual benefits to instructor-TA mentorship.
• Compare and contrast with their own experiences to provide avenues for further investigation.

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 Session E2 • 10:45 – 11:15 AM

Title: Preparing Engineering Graduates to be Changemakers for a Just World: Outcomes of a Learning Enhancement Fund Project

Authors: Andrea Bradford, Julie Vale, and Qurat Dar 

The engineering profession has significant power over others, exercised by allocating resources, opportunities, risks, and harms to different social groups. So, it is important to prepare graduates to consider equity in their work and this has been the focus of our project, initiated with support from the Learning Enhancement Fund. The session will showcase a selection of the learning activities that we developed and delivered to target these mindsets and competencies. How do engineering students learn about positionality and intersectionality? Stakeholders and social dimensions of engineering design problems? Different ways of knowing, doing and being? We will share preliminary evidence of effectiveness, based on pre- and post- course surveys conducted in two courses that incorporated new learning activities. Finally, we will explore ways to enhance engagement and learning of different groups of students and consider implications for recruitment and retention.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Describe the intersection of engineering and social justice.
• Identify mindsets and competencies that support engineering for social justice.
• Discuss the potential effectiveness of learning activities that target these mindsets and competencies.

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Session E3 • 11:15 – 11:45 PM

Title: Developing Common Program Learning Outcomes for Biology Majors in Canada

Authors: Sidney Evans and John Dawson 

Canadian Bachelor of Science (BSc) Biology programs vary regarding the knowledge and skills students develop due to institutions' flexibility in determining their curriculum. As a result, not all biology programs equally prepare students for success. 

One way to determine how a program prepares students is to examine its program learning outcomes (PLOs), which specify the knowledge, skills, and values a graduate should obtain. However, some biology programs lack PLOs, putting students, professors, institutions, and employers at a disadvantage. 

In this session, I will share a process I implemented to collect and analyze the PLOs of Biology programs across Canada; this process can be applied to any major. With this method, I identified commonalities in the knowledge, skills, and values being taught and propose standardized PLOs. Implementing common PLOs in Biology programs would simplify teaching and assessment, facilitate transferring between institutions, and help ensure a high-quality, accessible Biology education for all. 

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Understand how implementing common PLOs across Canadian institutions could be used to improve biology programs and enhance biology education.
• Appreciate the developmental process used to establish the common PLO framework.
• Discuss how different institutions implement their PLOs and reflect on how the common PLO framework could be applied to one's own institution.

Session A5 • 2:45 – 3:15 PM

Title: Innovative and Creative Assessments in Analytical Chemistry

Author: Kate Stuttaford 

Recreating a course from scratch to teach virtually for the first time provided an opportunity to experiment with a wide variety of project based individual and group assessments in a third year Instrumental Analysis chemistry course.  Students were required to engage their creativity in unique and exciting ways resulting in a wide variety of submissions.  New sources of discipline specific information were introduced. Short simple rubrics were created for all assessments to allow for quick and easy instructor and peer evaluations.  Descriptions and examples of assessments and rubrics will be presented.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Develop a creativity-based assessment for one of their courses. 
• Develop a short and simple group project that students can share for study purposes. 
• Leave their comfort zone of assessments and consider trying something very different.

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Session A6 • 3:15 – 3:45 PM

Title: Implementation of Innovation Pedagogy in Green Engineering Education: Progressive Labs

Author: Rafael Santos 

The goal of Innovation Pedagogy is to bridge the gap between the educational context and working life, thus providing improved competencies for the students, enabling personal and professional growth. An opportunity to apply Innovation Pedagogy in engineering programs is through a ‘Progressive Lab'. In a Progressive Lab, individual students, or student groups, work on one aspect of a larger project. The results from these individual works is then combined to yield a data set that can be utilized in a subsequent lab or assignment. The progression can have two or more stages, with increasing level of complexity, and can be made within a single course, but ideally between different courses over different terms. Through this exercise, students become strongly engaged in their work as they will realize the importance of their results and observations for the ultimate success of the larger project. This session details the conception and implementation of a Progressive Lab that investigates mineral carbon sequestration for green engineering design. It is concluded: laboratory work has more meaning if the data has a purpose; project work has more meaning if you know who produced the data.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Understand how Innovation Pedagogy can be implemented in existing courses/programs. 
• Re-imagine the delivery of traditional labs and assignments. 
• Find out where to get more details about the conceived Progressive Lab and how it was implemented. 

Session B5 • 2:45 – 3:45 PM

Title: Curricular Integration of Career Education to Cultivate Career Curiosity

Authors: Cara Copeland, Kristina Marrelli, Justine Tishinsky, William Bettger, and Heather Pollock

Career development education plays an important role in preparing students to navigate life after graduation and successfully adapt to an ever-changing workforce. By embedding career content in curriculum, we can ensure that all students have equal opportunity to engage and access this valuable information. 

In this interactive workshop, you will have the opportunity to participate in the Challenge Mindset card sort activity that all students now complete as a component of a first-year biology course.  This activity and related assessment support a shift in student focus from a ‘job title’ mindset to a challenge mindset.

We will highlight how we promote and facilitate this shift through an exploration of the connections between the challenge mindset and your own teaching and discuss ways that all educators can cultivate career curiosity in the classroom.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Highlight successful integration of career education into first-year biology curriculum. 
• Demonstrate a career activity suitable for students in a range of academic programs and majors. 
• Discuss formal and informal strategies to cultivate career curiosity through your teaching. 

Session C5 • 2:45 – 3:45 PM

Title: Pre-Texts: A Roadmap for Arts Integration in Higher Education

Authors: Sophie Brown and Jemma Llewelyn

Pre-Texts is an arts-integrated educational protocol rooted in epistemologies of the South and critical pedagogy. Pre-Texts subverts hierarchical structures and makes space for a plurality of perspectives in the classroom. By using the prompt, "use this text to create art,” students and facilitators co-create a multitude of questions and ideas based on challenging texts. While the majority of educational practices in schools foster passivity from students when faced with a text (Freire 2005; Navarrette et al., 2020), Pre-Texts provides a framework in which students become co-creators (and recreators) of meaning alongside the author.   

Conference presenters Jemma Llewelyn and Sophie Brown were accepted into the Harvard Cultural Agents Internship in Summer 2022. Through this process, we became trained facilitators in the Pre-Texts protocol and partnered with two community organizations to deliver Pre-Texts workshops. We are excited about the possibilities of Pre-Texts in Higher Education, and we are excited about the opportunity to share our learning with the University of Guelph.

By the end of the session, participants will be able to: 

• Implement simple arts integration techniques in higher education settings to allow students to question texts and dismantle textual authority.  
• Participants will experience a framework, not just theory, which can be implemented into their ongoing teaching practice.  
• Participants will learn where to look for further training related to the Pre-Texts Protocol.

Session D5 • 2:45 – 3:15 PM

Title: COVID's Silver Lining: BAS Redesigns Course Delivery to Increase Student Engagement

Author: Donald Bruce 

The large BAS Foundation courses (Asci 1110, 1120, 2020) have been completely redesigned as a result of COVID. Two main principles have guided this: reduce class size (150 --> 50), and use classroom time for engagement activities. Multiple sections of 50 were created in each course, with 10 Teams of 5 in each; content was moved online to CourseLink: lecture videos, other videos, readings, weekly quizzes, etc. Classroom time focuses on teams solving problems related to the week's content and reporting that back in real time class. The instructor and the TAs work with the teams in class to guide and support their activities. Attendance is taken and a larger portion of the grade is based on participation. The TA led Seminar sections allow for further in-depth work on content, and also focus on developing writing and research skills, including in-class writing assignments. Exams have been replaced with end of term Team projects. In addition, the Arts and Science online Career Conference has been included in the curriculum in order to link classroom acquired transferable skills to 'life after university.' Student feedback has been very positive; instructors have been equally positive.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:  

• Understand the goals, methods, and results of the changes which have been made in the BAS program. 
• Use this example, should they choose, to make changes in their own practices. 
• Establish clearer links for students between classroom acquired transferable skills & content and their post-graduation career pathways. 

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 Session D6 • 3:15 – 3:45 PM

Title: Developing and Piloting the Community Healthcare Partnership Program Curriculum in the DVM Program

Authors: Shane Bateman, Lynn Henderson, Lauren Van Patter, Jennifer Reniers, and Brandon Sabourin

The Kim & Stu Lang Community Healthcare Partnership Program (CHPP) aims to ensure that OVC veterinarians graduate with knowledge, skills, and attitudes to identify and address systemic barriers resulting in inadequate access to veterinary care through curricular and extracurricular components in the DVM program.   

This presentation will explain how we designed the CHPP curriculum using a constructive alignment process. Designing the CHPP curriculum involved several steps, including: (a) reviewing relevant literature and consultations with stakeholders; (b) creating five program pillars (Intercultural Competence, Spectrum of Care Planning, Animal Welfare, Vulnerable Animals, and Well-Being) and developing program-level learning outcomes; (c) designing teaching and assessment strategies to integrate the CHPP outcomes into existing DVM courses; and (d) piloting the CHPP curricular components in stages since the 2021/22 academic year.   

We will share some examples of teaching strategies used in the program and student feedback about the curriculum.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Define access to veterinary care within the provincial and national context.  
• Describe the process of constructive alignment and how it can be used to design a curriculum spanning an academic program.  
• Describe effective strategies for incorporating important knowledge and skills related to intercultural competence (or cultural humility) into undergraduate courses.

Session E5 • 2:45 – 3:15 PM

Title: Student Engagement around EDI Principles

Author: Nagham Mohammad 

Finding effective and meaningful ways to engage students where we integrate equity, diversity, and inclusion principles with the development and assessment of learning outcomes is a perpetual challenge. This challenge is felt even more heavily in large classes (>200). 

In this session, I talk about how we support students during “Engaged Mathematics Labs” while maintaining academic standards in a large (~2200 ) Fall 2022 first year calculus I class. Collaboration in labs is fostered through group assignments supported by multiple teaching assistants. Students formed their own groups of 2 – 3 when they arrived. If the students did not have a group to work with, which is very common for first year students, instructors and TAs helped the students to form their groups where we integrate equity, diversity, and inclusion principles. A survey was conducted to collect student feedback regarding the set up and performances of the “Engaged Mathematics Lab” environment.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• First, understand the environment of an “Engaged Mathematics Lab” for completing assignments and how 2200 undergraduate students in five sections of Math1080 Fall 2022 Elements of Calculus I interacted in this environment. 
• Second, understand the student preferences regarding collaboration on assignments within the “Engaged Mathematics Labs” (group, individual, no preference). 
• Finally, know the skills that students identified that they developed when working on a group lab assignment.

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 Session E6 • 3:15 – 3:45 PM

Title: Engaging Students Using an Arts-Based Pedagogy: Teaching and Learning Sociological Theory through Film, Art, and Music

Authors: Linda Hunter and Eleanor Frawley

In this presentation we explore how incorporating an arts-based pedagogical approach, specifically, the use of film, art, and music, into a second-year sociological theory course enhances students’ overall learning experiences of classical theories we will explore in the course. Arts-based pedagogy defined by Rieger et al. (2015) is “a teaching methodology in which an art form is integrated with another subject matter in order to impact student learning” (p.102). Arts-based pedagogy can be further characterized by the integration, reflection, and analysis of arts-based resources to help students engage with and make associations between theoretical concepts and historical examples. We report on data collected from a survey given to students enrolled in this course in 2020. Findings reveal that employing this arts-based pedagogy helps students to sustain an interest in the course material, understand the theoretical course material, engage in a higher level of thinking/analysis, feel more confident in their abilities to write about theories covered in the course, apply theory in the real world, contextualize historical content, and enhance their memory of theories and concepts. Findings are also compared with data collected from a similar survey conducted years before, revealing that the overall favorable responses to arts-based resources have remained consistent over time and that this pedagogy remains an enduring approach that contributes to positive student learning experiences. (This paper was published in Teaching Sociology, American Sociological Association, Volume 51, Issue 1, January 2023)

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Make teaching and learning more interesting by engaging students in lively interactions with one another while discussing the course material in relation to art, film, and music of the time-period. 
• Experience, in an interactive manner, the benefits of using an art-based pedagogy in teaching the often dry and abstract material of classical theory. 
• Apply this arts-based pedagogical approach to many arts and social science courses for both in-person as well as online formats of teaching and learning, because the lecture notes and arts-based content do not have to be viewed synchronously, providing a seamless environment for synchronous and asynchronous delivery of teaching and learning. 
• Explore theoretical concepts or ideas in your courses through three different modalities, which provide students with more of an opportunity to understand the course material, as they may respond more positively to one resource over another, perhaps an art form or piece of music that they are familiar with or enjoy.

*Please note that the poster session abstracts will continue to be updated into late April as poster submissions are currently ongoing.

Title: Does Perception Translate to Action? Understanding Instructor Perceptions of Discipline Disruption and Associated Curriculum Changes

Author: Nida Ansari, Christine Mishra, Nathan Lewis, and Shoshanah Jacobs

Industries today are rapidly changing and evolving at a high rate, in order to accommodate innovative technology, methods, and jobs (Hu, 2019; World Economic Forum, 2016). In regard to adapting to this rapid development via education, it remains unclear if university instructors' perceptions of change in their respective fields directly translate to any change in the courses they teach. We seek to understand a) if instructors' perceptions of degree of change vary by discipline, b) if perceptions of change influence the frequency of course changes, and c) how other external factors may influence these perceptions and behaviours. To tackle these questions, we used data from a survey of 520 Canadian university instructors on their perceptions of their disciplinary field and their curriculum development approaches. The current poster aims to visualize and interpret the relationships between perceptions and actions to better understand how instructors adapt to the world they teach in.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Identify Canadian instructors’ perceptions around the degree of change/disruption in their respective disciplines.
• Understand how these perceptions influence curriculum change in instructors’ university courses. 

(Poster available in EN/FR).

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Title: Developing and Utilizing Primary Healthcare Podcasts at the Ontario Veterinary College 

Author: Tiffany Durzi 

The goal of this project was to create, develop, host, produce, and share clinical podcasts to help support primary care education via an accessible and inclusive learning technology. It is widely recognized that individual learners assimilate and retain information in many ways. Currently, most of the content knowledge delivered to DVM students through their four years takes the form of didactic lectures, laboratory or rotations that involve hands on learning. The main purpose of the developed podcasts was to offer learners an alternate method of assimilating information. As well, the podcasts helped to supplement information in the curriculum and highlight interesting people at OVC and topics that are relevant to veterinary medicine and education. 

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Recognize the inclusive nature of podcasts to promote student learning.
• Understand that podcasts are an easy way to share information.
• Consider that podcasts may be an easy technology for professors to adopt to enhance student learning. 

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Title: Investigating How Undergraduates Process Their E-Mail Inbox 

Authors: Daniel Grunspan, Lea Mascarenhas, and Lauren Maarse 

Upon entering university, students begin receiving e-mails from a variety of university sources that can include information about courses, policies and procedures, and useful resources or opportunities. However, this information is sent without consideration of whether students have effective strategies to process the information sent to their university e-mail inbox. To date, most research and resources related to undergraduate use of e-mail focuses on composing messages, with almost no work centered on managing the inflow of information. To fill this gap, we are interviewing undergraduate students at the University of Guelph about how they process and manage their incoming e-mail. We are particularly interested in the association between inbox management strategies and integration and involvement in the university, where students learn how to process their e-mail, and the positive and negative consequences of successful or unsuccessful management. We will present preliminary results of this ongoing study.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Reframe their understanding of why students may fail to act on information sent via e-mail.
• Understand the importance of students’ perceived value of received e-mails to whether they act on information received, and brainstorm strategies to increase this perceived value.
• Understand barriers students face when trying to act on received e-mails, and brainstorm strategies to help students overcome those barriers. 

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Title: Faculty Knowledge, Experience & Training Related to Autism Spectrum Disorder

Authors: Alyssa Henderson and Jennifer Lasenby-Lessard

Autistic students are increasingly attending post-secondary institutions. Despite the increasing prevalence of Autistic students in post-secondary institutions, previous research has suggested that faculty lack knowledge related to Autism and how to best support Autistic students. The present study intended to understand post-secondary faculty’s knowledge of Autism in the Canadian context, where they have acquired their knowledge or experience, and what training they would like to receive. Analyses were conducted to understand the relationship between faculty’s knowledge of Autism, the college they teach in, and the amount/type of experience they have had with Autistic individuals. Qualitative data were collected to understand the faculty’s experiences and training related to Autism. Results from the present study intended to contribute to our understanding of faculty knowledge of Autism and improve the quality or type of training faculty receive to support an increasingly diverse classroom. The poster presentation will include a summary of the results from the collected data, including implications and future directions for research and faculty teaching Autistic students. 

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Understand what knowledge, experience and training post-secondary faculty currently have relating to Autism.
• Understand the importance of increasing post-secondary faculty's knowledge, experience and training about Autism. 
• Understand the training faculty would like to receive, and what resources are currently available.  

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Title: Laugh and Learn in Classical Theory: Caption that Meme!

Authors: Linda Hunter

How can one bring classical sociological theory and the ideas of classical theorists and philosophers to life in contemporary society? One exciting way is to have students work in pairs in writing a term paper and hear them “laugh and learn” while they create a meme that exemplifies the ideas of classical sociological theorists covered in the course. Students are asked to collaboratively apply the ideas of an historical theorist to a contemporary sociological issue. We then go one step further, by asking students to not only create a meme but to write a commentary on the relevance of the meme, in relation to the ideas of the theorist they are exploring. This humorous aspect of the assignment helps students navigate the often-times dry material of classical sociological theory. This poster will provide some examples of the student's creations of memes, along with their brief analysis.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Incorporate an assignment in your course that connects course material with humour, while students engage in learning the main themes of the course material.
• Incorporate an assignment in your course which relates course material directly to current social and political issues in the world.
• Make teaching and learning more interesting by engaging students in lively interactions with one another while working on course material and assignments. 

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Title: “Where Words Fail, Music Speaks”: Utilizing an Inclusive Topic for Disseminating University Skills

Authors: Alexandria Kellington and Olivia Bebenek

The transition from high school to post-secondary academia can be difficult for many students, particularly for students whose most recent education was accomplished largely through remote learning. However, in the post-pandemic world, it has become more apparent than ever that students require student-centered learning opportunities. We have found that designing a first-year course to prepare students for the rest of their university career was made more successful with the approachable and inclusive topic of music as its foundation. We were able to capture the attention of post-pandemic students by disguising the development of interdisciplinary university skills, such as essay-writing, information literacy, public speaking and presentation skills, within music-related activities and assessments. Through student feedback surveys, we found that students were eager to engage in discussion and debates and were not hindered by their past solitary online learning. Specifically, the opportunity to create in-person connections and be exposed to diverse people and topics augmented learning and fostered a supportive and engaging learning environment. 

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Teaching interdisciplinary university skills disguised in an approachable topic has benefits.
• Post-pandemic students excel through discussion-based, student-led learning. 
• Interdisciplinary topics foster interdepartmental relationships. 

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Title: “DNA at the whim of the water”: Environmental DNA as an experiential learning tool in undergraduate classrooms 

Authors: Kathleen P. Nolan, Erika Myler, Nava Brimble, Daniel Grunspan, and Robert H. Hanner

Experiential learning (EL) promotes learning through applied tasks. In undergraduate biology classrooms, EL involves development and execution of experiments, peer review, securing funds for scientific endeavours, and knowledge translation through scientific communication. Environmental DNA (eDNA) is an increasingly accessible tool for biomonitoring. Three recent EL projects in an upper year undergraduate course used eDNA to address biological questions: 1) a systematic literature review that analyzed eDNA metadata reporting which led to development of best practices for eDNA metadata reporting, 2) biomonitoring of brook trout in southern Ontario using eDNA and quantitative PCR, and 3) evaluating DNA metabarcoding methods for citizen science monitoring of fish communities. Here, we show the novel application of eDNA as an EL tool within the undergraduate classroom and argue that this should be expanded due to student benefit and increasing accessibility of eDNA.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Facilitate experiential learning about an emergent technology that has implications for sustainability and conservation.
• Embed Course-based Undergraduate Research Experiences in courses to promote student learning and generate publication opportunities for undergraduate researchers.
• Create opportunities for students to gain field and lab work experience.   

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Title: Collaborative Learning Communities as Tools for Connection and Reflection 

Author: Kimberly Squires

Communities of Practice (CoP) and Professional Learning Communities (PLC) are types of learning communities that have been used in a variety of different settings and contexts (Blakenship & Ruona, 2007). Though they have similarities in that both involve a group of individuals coming together to learn, they also have some key differences in terms of structure and purpose. This poster session will detail what PLC and CoP are and how they have been used to support professional development. After introducing these concepts, the focus will be on how these learning communities could be used within post-secondary education to better support students’ connections, learning, and collaboration. Examples from two different types of undergraduate courses (e.g., distance education, experiential learning) will be explored in more detail.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Differentiate between a Professional Learning Community (PLC) and a Community of Practice (CoP).
• Explain how a PLC or CoP could be implemented within a post-secondary learning opportunity.
• dentify the benefits of implementing a PLC or CoP within a post-secondary learning opportunity. 

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Title: Remote Learning & Online Fatigue: Exploring the Live and Pre-Recorded Tutorials Impacts on Teaching Effectiveness and Students’ Learning

Authors: Arash YoosefDoost, Hugo Fantucci, Karam Abu El Haija, and Rafael Santos

The presented work aimed to investigate pre-recorded tutorials’ impact on online fatigue and students’ performance. An anonymous survey was conducted to explore students’ note-taking habits, perceptions, and preferences for live or pre-recorded tutorials. Interestingly, results suggest an even split between preferences for live and pre-recorded tutorials, and a diverse range of preferences and potential coping strategies for remote learning. Both formats offer benefits. By incorporating the valued aspects of each format, such as real-time question periods in live sessions and the ability to replay content in pre-recorded tutorials, educators can create a more engaging and effective learning environment. Furthermore, understanding students’ note-taking habits and perceptions can help educators support students in developing strategies to maintain attention and engagement during remote learning. 

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Gain insights into students’ preferences for live and pre-recorded tutorials in the context of remote learning, using note-taking habits as an indicator of attention and engagement, to inform the development of more effective and engaging learning environments.
• Understand the potential influence of online fatigue on students’ attention and preferences for tutorial formats, with the goal of providing recommendations for educational institutions to optimize their course delivery methods and mitigate the effects of online fatigue.
• Identify the key aspects that students value in live and pre-recorded tutorials, using the findings to guide educators and institutions in creating tailored learning experiences that cater to diverse student preferences and support attention and engagement during remote learning. 

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Title: Artificial Intelligence Advancements, New Technologies, and Cheating Concerns: A Positive Fightback through Teaching Effectiveness and Reinforced Learning

Authors: Arash YoosefDoost, Hiral Jariwala, and Rafael Santos

The advancement of computers and information technologies introduces modern threats to the traditional education system and raised new concerns even about academic integrity and cheating incidents. Considering the Dunning-Kruger effect as a potential factor in such disorder, the presented work explores a positive fightback approach to combat intentional academic integrity violations by improving students’ learning experience using active learning and interactive learning to enhance teaching effectiveness. Evaluations of the method through an anonymized survey suggest promising effectiveness in achieving the learning objectives and mitigating the challenges posed by modern technologies in the education system by offering competitive advantages in improving the student experience. 

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Deploy evidence-based methods for addressing the Dunning-Kruger effect in educational settings, resulting in a reduction of cheating tendencies and fostering a culture of academic integrity.
• Implement innovative teaching strategies that combine active and interactive learning techniques to enhance student engagement, optimize learning rates, and promote a deeper understanding of the subject matter.
• Employ best practices and insights on creating a positive learning environment that supports student success, encourages collaboration, and inspires a commitment to honesty and responsibility in the academic community. 

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Title: Unpacking how undergraduate students form beliefs about undergraduate teaching

Authors: Julia Mellary, Tea Marcon, Shanai Shaw, and Daniel Grunspan

Instructors’ beliefs about various aspects of instruction are known to influence how they teach (Henderson et al., 2011; Pajares, 1992). Instructors have indicated that past educational experiences influence their beliefs, but details about these experiences are hard for them to recall (Mellary et al., in prep). Understanding the role undergraduate experiences play in the development of teaching beliefs is important for understanding why faculty teach the way they do. It may also help inform how to improve student buy-in towards different modes of instruction.  
 
We're examining how undergraduate experiences influence beliefs using episodic narrative interviews with first- and fourth-year students. Given a scenario where they're teaching an introductory course, we ask students to indicate their teaching beliefs and experiences that moulded these beliefs. Early results suggest that the impact of student experiences on teaching beliefs is moderated by personal academic ‘objectives’, such as achieving better grades or acquiring job skills. Moreover, students’ beliefs about active learning strategies appear to be unchanged, after their first experiences with this teaching method. 

By the end of this session, participants will be able to: 

• Better understand student beliefs surrounding instructors’ use of active learning pedagogies and how specific instructional behaviours may support or discourage student engagement in active learning classroom