List of Auxins 2013
Date
26 March
Topic
Getting students to take responsibility for their own
learning through the use of Peer Instruction
CTL contact person
Hanelie
30 April
Involving tutors in their training shows them how to
involve students in their learning
Jean
28 May
Podcasting: How do I use it sensibly?
JP/Sonja/Lianne
30 July
Using a blog to develop students’ writing skills
Karin
27 August
Google Documents (Docs) and Forms: A space within the JP/Sonja/Lianne
learning and research context
Getting students to take responsibility for their own learning through the use of Peer Instruction
The Centre for Teaching and Learning hereby invites you to a lunch hour “padkos session” as part of
the Auxin project. The Auxin Project aims to create growth opportunities for SU Lecturers.
Speakers:
Ed Jacobs, Liezl Nieuwoudt
“I enjoy this section of work and find it very fun the way we are learning it,” and “Lectures are
extremely fun. Interaction helps a lot with learning.”
These are some of the responses of SU students who have been exposed to the use of Peer
Instruction as primary teaching method. We all know hoe notoriously difficult it is to get students to
take responsibility for their own learning. From recent experience, we believe that Peer Instruction
can go some distance towards achieving greater student responsibility. This is supported by the body
of higher educational literature which clearly shows that active, student-centred learning methods
surpass traditional models in terms of effectiveness, cooperative learning methods (especially in
teaching economics) even though these methods are rarely used in higher education (Watts &
Becker, 2008). Amongst the reasons for this reluctance, are the notion that students do not like
group work and the fact that collaborative methods are not always easy to implement. Johnson,
Johnson and Smith (2007) speaks of a gap between “effective implementation of cooperative
learning and causal implementation”. During this seminar, local experts in the use of Peer
Instruction, Ed Jacobs and Liezl Nieuwoudt, will share from their experience. Talking to group work
issues such as group size, group formation and helping students deal with group work challenges as
well as the how to design Peer Instruction questions for use in class, they will share what they did
and why. They will also share their results and student reflections about these methods and will be
able to offer advice for others who are thinking of using Peer Instruction or other collaborative
methods.
Ed Jacobs uses Peer Instruction with low-tech support in an extended degree programme in
Chemistry, whilst Liezl uses Peer Instruction supported by high and low tech means in large class
settings in Economics.
When:
Tuesday 26 March 2013 12:45 - 13:45 (“padkos” will be provided)
Where:
Seminar room, “Skuilhoek”, 41 Victoria Street (directly behind the Conservatoire)
There are only 10 places available.
Please contact Irma Bester at [email protected] or 021 8089258 to reserve your place.
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Involving tutors in their training shows them how to involve students in their learning
The Centre for Teaching and Learning hereby invites you to a lunch hour “padkos session” as part of
the Auxin project. The Auxin Project aims to create growth opportunities for SU Lecturers.
Speakers:
Nwabisa Bangeni
"TELL ME AND I WILL FORGET. SHOW ME AND I MAY REMEMBER. INVOLVE ME AND I WILL
UNDERSTAND." Chinese proverb
“Tutorial” in the academic world describes a planned learning opportunity. Tutorials should serve
more than the purpose to teach under-graduates what they could not learn in lectures. It should
benefit more than the lecturers. Tutorials should also benefit the tutors. The more you help others to
learn, the more you learn. Involving post-graduate and senior students in the learning and teaching
of undergraduates not only eases the burden of lecturers, it also adds value to the experiences of all
the students involved. Involving tutors in their own training means that there is a perspective closer
to the experience of the students whose learning they will be facilitating.
This Auxin will share and open for discussion a three-day tutor-training programme which involves
the tutors in doing and discussing and enjoying their training so much that they asked for more.
When:
Tuesday 30 April 2013 12:45 - 13:45 (“padkos” will be provided)
Where:
Den Bosch opposite “Skuilhoek” 41 Victoria Street (directly behind the Conservatoire)
There are only 10 places available. Please contact Irma Bester at [email protected] or 021
8089258 to reserve your place.
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Podcasting: How do I use it sensibly?
The Centre for Teaching and Learning hereby invites you to a lunch hour “padkos session” as part of
the Auxin project. The Auxin Project aims to create growth opportunities for SU Lecturers.
Speakers:
Mary Nel (Law) & Helena Wessels (Education)
The university is moving towards more integration of technology in learning and teaching. Podcasting
is potentially a useful aspect of such an integrative approach. A podcast is an audio recording of for
example lectures that are available online after class. The fear that many academics have, is that
students will rely exclusively on the recording and lose out on the learning that has taken place in the
lecture hall. How can we avoid this? How can we make podcasts a means to motivate students to
engage with the learning material and still attend class? These are just a few of the questions that
the speakers will be addressing as they share how podcasting has worked for them in reaching their
students and facilitating learning.
This Auxin will share and open for discussion ways in which you can make podcasting more than just
a required capturing of your lectures, and rather capture the imagination and minds of your
students.
When:
Tuesday 28 May 2013 12:45 - 13:45 (“padkos” will be provided)
Where:
Den Bosch opposite “Skuilhoek” 41 Victoria Street (directly behind the Conservatoire – see map
available at web addres: : http://www0.sun.ac.za/webstudies/Images/CTL-DenBosch-Map.jpg)
There are a limited number of spaces available for this session. Please contact Irma Bester at
[email protected] or 021 8089258 to reserve your place.
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Using a blog to develop students’ writing skills
The Centre for Teaching and Learning hereby invites you to a lunch hour “padkos session” as part of
the Auxin project. The Auxin project aims to create growth opportunities for SU lecturers.
Speaker: Theo Broodryk (Law)
The session deals with the use of a blog to develop students’ writing skills.
The writing project of the Faculty of Law functions as a model for the integration of academic literacy
in curricula. One of the components of the writing project is the establishment and use of a blog that
is aimed at developing students’ writing. Theo will share his experience on how such a blog can be
used to improve students’ writing skills. You will have the opportunity to chat to Theo about your
challenges in this regard and how to approach them efficiently.
When: Tuesday, 30 July 2013, 12:45 - 13:45 (“Padkos” will be provided)
Where: Seminar room, Skuilhoek House, 41 Victoria Street (Directly behind the Conservatoire)
There are only 10 places available. Please contact Farrel Kleinsmith at [email protected] or (021)
808 2813 to reserve your place.
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Google Documents (Docs) and Forms: A space within the learning and research context
The Centre for Teaching and Learning hereby invites you to a lunch hour “padkos” session as part of
the Auxin project. The Auxin Project aims to create growth opportunities for SU Lecturers.
Presenters: JP Bosman, Sonja Strydom
The growth of emerging technologies in education provides an opportunity for both lecturers and
students to engage sensibly with tools available on the internet to enhance the learning and research
experience. The Google Suite consists of numerous applications that could be used sensibly in the
learning and research context. Google documents (“Docs”) provides the user with the opportunity to
seamlessly create different types of documents for sharing and collaboration and commenting on
text-based resources. Google Forms creates opportunites where users can develop online feedback
forms for selected participants that could potentially assist in the identification of prior knowledge,
formative and summative feedback, and research.
This Auxin will provide participants with the opportunity to engage in a hands-on session with these
two applications and share in the experiences of other lecturers.
When:
Tuesday 27 August 2013 12:45 - 13:45 (“padkos” will be provided)
Where:
Den Bosch opposite “Skuilhoek” 41 Victoria Street (directly behind the Conservatoire – see map
available at web addres: : http://www0.sun.ac.za/webstudies/Images/CTL-DenBosch-Map.jpg)
There are a limited number of spaces available for this session. Please contact Irma Bester at
[email protected] or 021 8089258 to reserve your place.
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