To get the semester started, I wanted to share Beloit College's annual "Mindset List" for the class of 2012 - our entering freshman students. You can access the full list online at:

http://www.beloit.edu/mindset/2012.php

It's good to know who you're dealing with. This year's entering freshman have always been able to file their taxes electronically, understand intuitively that "WWW" means "World Wide Web," and have never been aware of "The Tonight Show" hosted by anyone other than Jay Leno.

http://www.magnapubs.com/issues/magnapubs_ff/5_4/news/601397-1.html?s=FF&p=MFCFEZ

To read the full text of Brantley's article, go to:
http://connect.educause.edu/Library/EDUCAUSE+Review/ArchitecturesforCollabora/46313

- The mean percentage change in the number of classes or presentations provided by academic libraries between fall 2006 and fall 2007 was +20.26%

- Business, psychology, sociology, education and English were commonly listed as one of the top three academic departments requesting library instruction

- Librarians surveyed estimated that nearly one-quarter (23.5%) of their students had not taken any formal IL training and knew just a few essentials of Boolean searching (such as using quotation marks, "or", and "and")

For more information from the report, see Primary Research Group's press release online here.

"Teaching vs. Research: Finally, A New Chapter"

To read this week's tip, go to: http://tilt.colostate.edu/mti/tips/pdf/tip66.pdf.

This presentation, which was given last week by Jeff Niemann of the Civil and Environmental Engineering department, is just one of several "Teaching with Technology" workshops offered by TILT this spring. The web site above also includes links to information about other upcoming workshops.

"...all of us engaged in the teaching enterprise owe it to our students to do two things: Consult experts on teaching and learning, both in print and in person. And talk with each other as much as we can about what works in the classroom, what doesn't, and why."

In the article "An Education in Education," appearing in the "On Course" section, of The Chronicle of Higher Education, columnist James M. Lang, a professor of English, suggests that professors can learn a thing or two from those in the school of education. He makes a case for college instructors perhaps benefiting from an occasional reading of the literature and research on the topics of teaching and learning. Lang's article provides a few suggestions on books for best teaching practices, such as What the Best Teachers Do (2004) by Ken Bain. Books on the list may inspire many faculty members and help them to grow and develop as teachers.

For the article and annotated reading list, go to: http://chronicle.com/jobs/news/2006/07/2006071001c/printable.html

In "Tomorrow's Professor Msg. #39," "The Designated Dozen: Twelve Books Every Science and Engineering Professor Should have on Their Shelf, or in Their Department Office," Rick Reis provides a list of twelve books categorized under four headings:

General References
Preparing for Academic Careers
Succeeding as a Professor
Time-Life Balance

Many of the books on the list would be of interest to those who are teaching in disciplines other than science and engineering such as Rhythms of Academic Life: Personal Accounts of Careers in Academia by P.J. Frost and M. S. Taylor (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1996) and Coping with Faculty Stress by W.H. Gmelch (London, SAGE Publications, 1993).

To view the online list, go to: http://ctl.stanford.edu/Tomprof/postings/39.html.

In a nutshell, UDL is a concept that emphasizes the importance of providing multiple means of:

- Presentation, to offer learners various ways of acquiring information and knowledge,

- Expression, to provide students with alternatives for demonstrating what they know, and

- Engagement, to tap into students' interests, challenge them appropriately, and motivate them to learn.

The video highlights a number of ways that you can incorporate UDL into your teaching - for example, changing a web site, or using iClickers to make learning more dynamic and interactive.

(Thanks to Cathy Cranston for this tip!)

The full post, including a link to the original report, is available here.

"Discipline, creativity, and synthesis — the three cognitive “minds” — develop alongside literacy and computational skills. “Get there early” to cultivate a discipline, said Gardner, who believes in the plasticity of the young mind. “The train moves quickly.”"

Read the full article on Gardner's theory here.

"Discipline, creativity, and synthesis — the three cognitive “minds” — develop alongside literacy and computational skills. “Get there early” to cultivate a discipline, said Gardner, who believes in the plasticity of the young mind. “The train moves quickly.”"

Read the full article on Gardner's theory here.

Think Small! A Beginner's Guide to Using Technology to Promote Learning

The New York Times recently wrote on this topic, as well (specifically, teaching vs. technology disruptions). To see what they had to say, click here.

In relation to the report, it's worth highlighting an article (below) from the July/August 2007 edition of C&RL News. The 2006 NSSE survey included a number of special, one-time items related to information literacy, and Gratch-Lindauer's article discusses findings from those items.

Information literacy-related student behaviors: Results from the NSSE items
C&RL News, July/August 2007, 68(7)
Bonnie Gratch-Lindauer
http://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlpubs/crlnews/backissues2007/julyaugust07/infolitstudent.cfm