Agenda for University at Buffalo Spring 2006 Teaching & Learning Conference

8:30 - 9:00 am -- Continental Breakfast and Registration

9:00 - 9:10 am -- Welcoming Remarks

9:10 - 10:30 am -- Keynote: What the Best College Teachers Do: The Results of a 15-Year Study - Ken Bain, Director, Center for Excellence and Professor of History at New York University and author of "What the Best College Teachers Do"

What do the best teachers do and understand that makes them so successful? How can any of us reach our students more effectively? In this highly interactive session, participants will explore the thinking and practices of highly successful college teachers identified in an award-winning 15-year study of people who have had enormous success in helping and encouraging their students to achieve remarkable learning results.

We will look also at the research on human motivation and insights into the nature and meaning of human learning. Participants should emerge with a deeper understanding of human learning and how best to foster its development. They should emerge also with a better understanding of their own best practices and how to enhance them.

10:30 - 10:45 am -- Break

10:45 - 12:15 pm -- Developing Autonomous Learners: Helping Students Succeed in College

Kelly Ahuna, Ph.D., Director, Methods of Inquiry, University at Buffalo
Christine Gray Tinnesz, Ph.D., Associate Director, Methods of Inquiry, University at Buffalo

The transition from high school to college can be overwhelming for many students as they navigate a culture in which their success is wholly reliant upon their own motivation and effort. By addressing determined strategies and techniques students need to master for college success, this presentation will provide insights faculty can use to facilitate the learning process for students. Once we know what students need to do to be autonomous, how can instructors assist in that process? Through presentation and interaction, this program will generate ideas to help faculty ensure that their students are indeed learning course content.

12:15 - 1:00 pm -- Lunch

1:00 - 2:30 pm -- Group Methods for Enhancing Teaching: The Hidden Group in the Classroom - Dr. Lawrence Shulman, Professor, School of Social Work, University at Buffalo

Every class, even a large lecture, has a hidden group that can be used to enhance student learning; it also may become a major obstacle to learning. The presentation will use examples from the workshop leader as well as examples from workshop participants to explore the following issues:

Issues of authority between the instructor and the students;
Dealing with a difficult student;
Student apathy;
Creating a safe and respectful environment for discussion of sensititve subjects (race, gender, religion, politics, etc.);
Helping students to connect with class content;
Tapping the potential for mutual aid as students help each other in the learning process.

2:30 - 2:45 pm -- Break

2:45 - 4:15 pm -- What the Best College Teachers Do: Creating a Natural Critical Learning Environment - Ken Bain, Director, Center for Excellence and Professor of History at New York University and author of "What the Best College Teachers Do"

How do we apply the ideas about best teaching practices to our own efforts? In this highly interactive and lively session, participants will apply some of the major ideas of a 15-year study of best college teaching practices to the development and teaching of college courses.

Participants should emerge with some concrete plans for improving their courses and the learning environments for their students. We will focus on the development of a Natural Critical Learning Environment and how a promising syllabus and a change in what happens in and out of class can help create that environment.

4:15 - 4:30 pm -- Bringing it all together: Event Reflection - Dr. Jennie Dautermann, Teaching, Learning and Technology Program Manager, SUNY Training Center

Spring 2006 Conference on Teaching & Learning: What the Best College Teachers Do!

Agenda

Spring 2006 Conference on Teaching & Learning:
What the Best College Teachers Do!