Library Resources

Teaching Center Library Resources
The Teaching Center is pleased to announce that we have a growing collection of resource books on pedagogy for use in the Center. Also with the help of Crystal Knapp, she developed a very useful tool for faculty highlighting the available resources regarding pedagogy that can be found in our library: Pedagogical Resources in the CCP Library
Assessment
Classroom Assessment Techniques: A Handbook for College Teachers (Jossey Bass, 2003). Thomas Angelo and Patricia Cross have compiled a rich array of useful class assessment tools to use in your classes. Many of us have heard of one minute papers. There are so many others! Check them out in this classic.
Effective Grading. (Jossey-Bass, 2009). Who among us loves to grade? If you are among the many who dread this part of teaching, come check out the new edition of the book written by Barbara Walvoord and Ginny Anderson. It is inspiring (really!), practical and helpful.
Effective Grading: A tool for learning and assessment (Jossey Bass, 1998) This book by Barbara E. Walvoord and Virginia Johnson Anderson is immensely readable, engaging practical overview of grading. Few people love grading. Everybody has to do it. Walvoord and Johnson have written the classic book on how to think about grading to maximize student learning while minimizing your aggravation.
Assessment Clear and Simple. (Jossey-Bass, 2004). This short volume by Barbara Walvoord on assessment is targeted for institutions, departments and programs. It is also useful for any faculty member as it has a super introductory chapter on assessment that most faculty will find sensible and faculty-friendly. Think what we do cannot be assessed or the things you really care about will be lost or not captured well in assessment? Think again!
Assessing Student Learning: A Common Sense Guide, 2nd Edition (Jossey-Bass, 2009). Linda Suskie, a vice-president for Middle States, is another big name in assessment and one of the most sensible voices going on the topic. Another book geared towards both the institution and the classroom, faculty will find section on the assessment toolbox particularly helpful. Among the topics covered are writing tests and assessing some of the less objective aspects of learning.
Educative Assessment: Designing Assessments to Inform and Improve Student Performance (Jossey-Bass, 1998). This is Grant Wiggins first big push for changing how we think about assessing what our students are learning: moving from auditive (what did they learn?) to educative assessment (what are they learning and how can they learn it better?) Wiggins is also the author of Understanding by Design.
Course Design
Creating Significant Learning Experiences (Jossey Bass, 2003). An approach by L. Dee Fink to creating courses that integrate all categories of his Taxonomy for Significant Learning. A powerful approach to designing courses so that learning lasts.
Understanding by Design (Association for Supervision & Curriculum Development, 2005) Written by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe, this book on course design offers an approach to structuring courses to enhance student learning, not unlike L. Dee Fink, but with a different emphasis. Check out the material on learning goals.
Designing Courses for Significant Learning: Voices of Experience: New Directions for Teaching and Learning, No. 119 (Wiley, 2009). Has anybody ever really Finkified a class and lived to tell about it? You bet! And a bunch of those folks have written about their experiences in the newest volume of New Directions for Teaching and Learning edited by L. Dee Fink. Quick and easy to read, it is worth looking over these articles about courses that have been redesigned for significant learning. It is inspiring and do-able.
Engagement
Student Engagement Techniques: A Handbook for College Faculty (Jossey-Bass, 2009). Barkley has pulled together a book that speaks to one of the perennial teaching challenges: how to get and keep students engaged in their learning. Filled with helpful and thoughtful strategies and teaching tips, this book is another that will be useful to both the experienced and newer faculty among us.
Learning: Problem-Based, Team-Based
The Power of Problem-Based Learning: A Practical "How To" for Teaching Undergraduate Courses in Any Discipline (Stylus, 2001). Problem-based learning is another well-known teaching strategy, and this collection, edited by Barbara Duch, Susan Groh and Deborah Allen, offers step-by-step guidance on how to use problem-based learning. This is another book with useful information on working with groups effectively and formulating questions to maximize learning.
Team-Based Learning: A Transformative Use of Small Groups in College Teaching (Stylus, 2004). You know about small groups, but do you know about teams? Team-based learning is a teaching strategy being used in undergraduate and professional education to strengthen the power of student learning. In this collection, edited by Larry Michaelsen, Arletta Bauman Knight, and L. Dee Fink, authors explore both the how-to's and experiences with team-based learning. Even if you cannot imagine restructuring a course for team-based learning, a quick read of some of the chapters will offer valuable guidance on forming and working effectively with groups in classrooms from various disciplines.
Mindset: The new psychology of success (Random House, 2006). Stanford psychologist Carol Dweck helps us understand how the brain works and how having a growth mindset-a set of beliefs about the ability of one to improve intelligence and performance-leads to improved our performance in all areas of life. The applicability to learning is obvious. Help students understand how the brain works, and they can better understand how they can influence its capacities, which in turn, can improve their motivation to do the work of learning.
The Art of Changing the Brain (Stylus, 2002). James Zull, Professor of Biology at Case Western Reserve University, has written an engaging book on the connection between learning and the brain. It is sure to change...your brain!
Team-Based Learning: Small Group Learning's Next Big Step: New Directions for Teaching and Learning, No. 116 (Jossey-Bass, 2009). Larry K. Michaelsen, Michael Sweet, Dean X. Parmelee have edited a great resource on team-based learning -- one of the most powerful ways to work with small groups. Widely used in the sciences and professional schools, elements of team-based learning can be adapted to great effect for learning by students in a wide range of classrooms. This edition of New Directions explores some of the possibilities.
Online Learning Resources
The Online Learning Idea Book: 95 Proven Ways to Enhance Technology-Based and Blended Learning (Pfeifer, 2007). Editor Patti Shank has compiled a wonderful array of offerings here, all offered by experienced on-line educators. Course design, activities and assessment are all here. So are suggestions on how to help support learners and self-directed learners. Even if you are not teaching on-line or blended classes, this book is worth a look.
Engaging the Online Learner: Activities and Resources for Creative Instruction (Jossey-Bass, 2004). Teaching an on-line course? Thinking about teaching an on-line course and wondering how all those great classroom dynamics could possibly be created on-line? Check out the collection by Rita-Marie Conrad and Ana Donaldson of inspiring and creative activities for on-line learning.
Promotion
Preparing for Promotion, Tenure, and Annual Review: A Faculty Guide, 2nd Edition (Jossey-Bass, 2004). Thinking about promotion? Have to prepare for tenure? The guide by Robert Diamond will be useful for thinking about the process and the product as you put together your portfolio.
Scholarship of Teaching and Learning
Enhancing Learning through the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning: The Challenges and Joys of Juggling (Anker, 2007). The book by Kathleen McKinney about SOTL will be useful to those currently taking part in the SOTL workshops in the Teaching Center, and those interested in finding out more about what SOTL is all about.
Teaching on Solid Ground: Using Scholarship to Improve Practice (Jossey-Bass, 1995). Robert J. Menges and Maryellen Weimer edited one of the early comprehensive books on how faculty can, and should, link the scholarship on teaching with the learning by their students. Engaging and readable, it is worth a look. Thanks to Joan Monroe for donating this edition.
Teaching Techniques
The Courage to Teach (Jossey Bass, 1998). The reflections of Parker Palmer on the more personal, some would say spiritual, side of teaching.
Tools for Teaching (Jossey Bass, 1993). Another classic! Barbara Gross Davis has compiled tons of techniques for teaching. Accessible, applied and worth a skim.
McKeachie's Teaching Tips: Strategies, Research and Theory for College and University Teachers, 12th edition. (Houghton Mifflin, 2006). This is the most recent edition of a classic! Written by Wilbert J. McKeachie and Marilla Svinicki, with additional chapters by other educators, this comprehensive volume is chock full of useful goodies for both the novice and the experienced instructor. From tips on how to improve lectures and tests, to cheating, discussion and active learning, it is all here. There are also useful sections on "Understanding Students," "Active Learning," and chapters on "Teaching Students how to become more strategic and self-regulated learners," and "Teaching thinking."
What the Best College Teachers Do (Harvard University Press, 2004). Ken Bain's study of outstanding teachers is a thoughtful, provocative and reassuring book about how people identified by students as "outstanding" approach their teaching. Organized thematically (i.e., how they prepare, interact with students, etc.) the book explores what makes effective teaching and learning.
Teaching Tools
The Course Syllabus: A Learning-Centered Approach, 2nd Edition Jossey-Bass, 2009) O'Brien, Millis, Cohen have written the book on writing a syllabus. Whether you have been doing it for years, or you're just starting, their comprehensive book will give you some things to think about (and change!) The syllabus is one of the most important ways you communicate with your students. What does your say...About you? About your course? About what the students will learn?
Engaging Ideas: The Professor's Guide to Integrating Writing, Critical Thinking, and Active Learning in the Classroom (Jossey-Bass, 1996). This guide by John Bean is a super overview of the link between writing, learning, and thinking. We all want our students to be critical thinkers. We don't all know how to get them there. This book can help. Practical and helpful, it will appeal to all.
The Learning Portfolio: Reflective Practice for Improving Student Learning, 2nd Edition (Jossey Bass, 2009). Having students reflect on their learning is a critical component of the learning process. One way to encourage such reflection is with the learning portfolio which is not only for English classes! John Zubizarreta, the name in portfolios, has edited this revised volume which is both how to guide and exploration of the power of learning portfolios. Not sure if they would work for you and your students? Check this book out.