Fall 2024 TLC Workshops

Drafting Teaching Statements

September 19th, 4-5:30PM, Zoom
Facilitated by Luke Waltzer

The teaching statement is an important artifact in the academic job search. It can deepen a hiring committee’s sense of who you are as an applicant and show how you enact your values as an educator. In this workshop, we’ll discuss the role of the teaching statement within the application process, explore what makes a strong statement, and discuss how to approach the rhetorical challenge of crafting this document. We’ll examine sample statements from various disciplines, and work through a range of approaches.

Why Do We Grade? Critical Approaches to Grading

October 8, 4-5:30pm, Zoom
Facilitated by Jenna Queenan

What do we grade, and for what purpose? Grading can be a painful experience – for both students and professors alike. This workshop will explore critical approaches to grading and feedback that can foster student agency, transparency, and engagement in learning, including contract grading and ungrading. In these approaches, grading becomes less top-down and more of a conversation between student and professor, which has the potential to deepen relationships and increase transparency about why we grade.

AI Literacy and Game-Based Learning

October 16, 2-3:30pm, In-Person, Room 3317
Facilitated by Zach Muhlbauer

This workshop introduces game-based strategies for teaching with and about artificial intelligence. Participants will learn how to develop students’ AI literacy through interactive storytelling, collaborative problem solving, doodling, and notecard exercises. We will also discuss how to teach methods of prompt engineering by designing—and playing—our own choose-your-own-adventure games. In turn, we will consider how game-based learning can foster critical thinking as well as creative, hands-on engagement with AI tools in the classroom.

Patterns, Places, and Pedagogy

October 23, 4-5:30pm, In-person at the High Line (Rain Date October 30, 4 pm)
Facilitated by Şule Aksoy

Patterns are everywhere—in nature, architecture, social interactions, and even the way we learn and think. Observing these patterns allows us to gain deeper insights into the world and how we relate to it. This workshop will be an opportunity to critically engage with place-based education that uses the local community and environment as a starting point for learning. We will think about how to encourage our students to observe, analyze, and engage with the world in a way that deepens their understanding.

Equity-Oriented Teaching

October 29, 3-4:30pm, In-person, Room 3317
Facilitated by Manju Adikesavan and Kristi Riley

As CUNY Graduate Student Instructors or Adjunct Instructors, we teach students with diverse levels of preparation for and understanding of the public higher education system. This workshop will introduce instructional practices and interpersonal behaviors for crafting a teaching persona and classroom dynamics that center equity and mitigate systemic learning barriers that adversely impact first-generation, low-income, and racially and ethnically minoritized students. Students from all disciplines are encouraged to attend.

Using Archival Materials in the Language Classroom

October 30th, 2-3:30pm, In-Person, Room 3317
Facilitated by Oriana Mejias Martinez

Using archival materials in the language classrooms can help students connect to historical events, better understand the present, and think about language and culture through their own disciplinary perspectives. This workshop is for graduate student instructors that would like to use more archival materials in their language classrooms, as well as those who already use a variety of archives/repositories to enhance language pedagogies in the classroom.

Why We Teach, Who We Teach, and What We Teach

November 6, 2-3:30pm, In-Person, Room 3307
Facilitated by Şule Aksoy and Oriana Mejias Martinez

How can our teaching honestly and openly reflect the world in which our students live and help them envision the futures they want to create? We will consider the “why” behind our teaching, discuss the role of students’ lived experiences in our work together, and think through how to engage with the world beyond our classrooms. Then, we will imagine how to repurpose existing activities or assignments to engage our students in class projects that authentically address complex social, cultural, economic, and political challenges.

Teaching with Social Annotation

November 12, 11am – 12:30pm, Zoom
Facilitated by Cen Liu and Maura McCreight, Manifold Fellows, Graduate Center Digital Initiatives

Social annotation offers an interactive way to “open up” a text, allowing students to contribute highlights, comments, and responses directly in the margins. This transforms the text into a collaborative learning space for deeper analysis, interpretation, and enrichment. This workshop will introduce participants to two platforms for integrating social annotation into their courses: Manifold and Hypothesis on CUNY Academic Commons.

This workshop is hosted by Graduate Center Digital Initiatives.

Assignment Remix

November 13, 3-5pm, In Person, Room 3317
Facilitated by Laurie Hurson

Where can instructors find new assignments to use in their courses? How can an instructor know the assignment will be pertinent to teaching in the CUNY context?

At the Assignment Remix event, graduate student instructors will be invited to share an assignment and work collaboratively with peers to “remix” assignments for use within and across disciplines. Attendees will learn how to apply a Creative Commons License to their remixed assignment and submit their assignment to TLC Assignment Library. The goal of the event is to revisit and remix assignments to ensure they enact inclusive learning approaches and openly license these assignments so they can be used by other CUNY instructors.

There will be a paid honorarium to participate in this event; click here to view the Call for Participation and register.

UDL & Accessibility I: Centering the “U” in UDL & “I” in EDI

November 20, 4:30-6pm, Hybrid (In-Person in Room 3317 and on Zoom)
Facilitated by Janelle Poe

What is UDL (Universal Design For Learning)? Are UDL & Accessibility the same? Does updated software automatically produce accessible documents? Where does EDI (Equity, Diversity and Inclusion) fit into this framework and our teaching? Part of an ongoing series focused on equitable teaching, this introductory workshop offers an opportunity to learn about the updated Universal Design For Learning 3.0 Guidelines (launched July ‘24) and discuss practical ways to increase EDI and Accessibility in course design, delivery, and our classroom communities. Intended for instructors of all levels, across disciplines, a follow-up workshop diving deeper into these topics will be offered in Spring 2025.

Developing a Digital Portfolio

December 4, 3:00-4:30 pm, Online
Facilitated by Laurie Hurson

Developing your own digital portfolio gives you agency over how you are presented online. A digital portfolio allows you to publicize your academic work, report on research, share creative endeavors, and connect with scholars and employers. In this workshop attendees will explore models of academic portfolios on the CUNY Academic Commons and get started on building their own.

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