Archive

Faculty Development

  1. How Faculty Can Apply a Growth Mindset To Their Teaching

    Video: Cal Poly’s Laura Freberg on the value of constantly looking for opportunities to learn and grow

  2. Course Design For Agile Teaching: 5 Ideas To Try

    Rote learning has become passé. So has passive teaching. These days, top educators are thinking about being agile and engaging, and that…

  3. How and When To Make A Course Correction While Teaching

    A “course made good” in teaching is like steering a ship—work out where you are, where you’re pointing, and how to change direction…

  4. How to Succeed at Course Transformation in a Big Class

    There is a metaphor that postsecondary educators fall back upon when talking about a well-worn course: it’s like a house. Sometimes it…

  5. Top Hat in Action: High Expectations from Engineers

    David Cereceda is Assistant Professor in Mechanical Engineering at Villanova University, near Philadelphia, PA. Here, he shares how…

  6. Why It’s Important to Approach Teaching With a Growth Mindset

    If you want to become a better educator, the first step is to embrace a growth mindset. We expect it of our students, so we should expect it…

  7. The Possibilities of An Agile Classroom: Sir Ken Robinson

    His TED talk “Do Schools Kill Creativity?” is the most watched TED Talk in history.

  8. STEM Education Needs to Embrace Active Learning

    Undergraduate STEM education still has a long way to go before it catches up with modern teaching techniques such as student-centered…

  9. Engage 2018: What to do in Chicago

    For attendees at Engage 2018, Top Hat’s Conference for Higher Education Innovators, Chicago made for a great city to explore. Here…

  10. Why the First Five Minutes of Class Matter So Much

    There is no need to transform, overhaul or tear down and rebuild the way you teach, according to education expert James Lang. You simply…

  11. Why Academic Careers Shine Outside of the Meeting Room

    Professors most readily learn from each other and by attending off-site conferences, while deeply distrusting departmental meetings,…

  12. 11 Teaching Quotes to Inspire Educators in 2018

    From Comenius to Montessori, here are some teaching quotes for the modern educator—all about letting your students challenge their…

  13. What Happens in a Top Hat Certification Class

    If you’re just getting started with Top Hat and wondering how to use it to its full potential, help is at hand. At Top Hat, we run regular…

  14. Passive Learning is a Problem For Fun Professors: Jacques Berlinerblau

    Professor Jacques Berlinerblau—who shared his insights about the problems with higher education in a Top Hat webinar—takes passive…

  15. What is An Adjunct Professor? How To Solve Career Isolation

    What is an adjunct professor? An adjunct professor, a term most often used in the U.S., is a temporary, part-time appointment brought in by…

  16. Hurricane Preparedness and Recovery: What Faculty Should Do

    In late August and early September, Hurricanes Harvey and Irma wreaked havoc not only on homes and businesses, but on post-secondary…

  17. Lecturer Career Ideas: 4 Ways To Get Ahead

    If you’re a lecturer waiting for your administration to send you on a training course, you could be waiting a long time. Taking the first…

  18. Steven Sloman Challenges Everything You Know

    People are more ignorant than they think they are. That’s the premise of Steven Sloman’s new book, The Knowledge Illusion: Why We Never…

  19. The 3 Career Stages of Academic Stress

    In researching her book Helping Faculty Find Work-Life Balance: The Path Toward Family Friendly Institutions, Virginia Commonwealth…

  20. Small Changes in Teaching: The Last 5 Minutes of Class

    Imagine what a difference we could make if we all took five minutes — even just a few times during the semester — to offer students the…