How to Support Teaching and Learning in Higher Education

The aim of the course is to support international doctoral students of the Charles University who are relatively new to university teaching but they are expected to teach within this academic year. This course will provide basic understanding of the principles of learning and offer practical teaching strategies in various settings. Topics and working methods will contribute to the participant´s teaching self-efficacy and support the achievement of the following learning outcomes

Course description:

I. Official welcome. Introduction, expectations, course objectives. Learning needs and expectations (online). Introduction of lecturers and participants. Objectives of the program, setting of participation and communication.

II. Quality of teaching at the university: What does characterize quality of teaching? Personal reflection of the quality of teaching. Research on the quality of teaching, categorization of the concept of teaching and the role of the university teacher. A tool for measuring the quality of teaching at universities, indicators, and examples of good practice.

III. Effective teaching at university: How do we learn? The art of explaining and the art of showing. Principles of learning, attention, and memory. Didactic ways of comprehensible explanation. Learning from practice, reflection of practical experience.

IV. Providing a safe environment for learning: How to ensure it and why it is important? Psychological safety and social relations in higher education. Respectful communication analysis, research findings and examples.

V. Q&A. Reflection on lessons learned. What have we learned? What was the most important for my understanding? What needs some more clarification? What would I like to implement in my own practice?

VI. Motivation: What motivates students to learn and how can we support it? Types of motives, self-determination theory. Various didactic ways of supporting student motivation.

VII. Active learning: Why and how can we support the involvement of all students? Research findings supporting active learning. Types of interaction in teaching and methods increasing students´ activity and effective discussion. Flipped classroom. Feedback and key role of questions, formative assessment in college.

VIII. Higher order thinking skills, deep learning: How can we support connecting information? Bloom’s taxonomy. Research-validated indicators and examples of teacher activities that support deep learning. Socratic questions. Consistency between course objectives, teaching and learning and the assessment of student learning outcomes.

IX. Q&A. Reflection and course evaluation. What have we learned and how can we use it further?Summary of key knowledge and skills, and planned impact on the teaching practice of the participants. Reflection and evaluation of the program from the perspective of participants, final colloquium of participant presentations.

Learning outcomes:

By the end of the course, the participants will:

• reflect on own teacher’s conception of good quality teaching,
• understand basic researched-based principles of learning and consequences for teaching,
• understand the importance of a growth mindset, relationship to students and a safe climate,
• explain several types of motivation and analyse didactical ways of supporting it,
• apply various teaching strategies to support active learning,
• understand the process of deep learning, provide examples of good quality questioning.

Competences developed in the course:

The course develops competences falling under Pillar 1 (Learning and teaching planning and design) and Pillar 2 (Managing the learning and teaching process) of the Framework for Effective Teaching at CU.

The course is designed for those with English language proficiency at B2 level or above.

Lecturer:

Ing. Karolina Duschinská, Ph.D.

Specialises in general didactics, andragogy and professional development of teaching staff. Graduated from the Faculty of Chemical Engineering of the University of Chemistry and Technology and from the Charles University Faculty of Education. She now works as an assistant professor at both these institutions and, besides teaching and researching general didactics, also mentors beginning teachers. She conducts a didactic skills course for doctoral students and university teachers.

JUDr. Mgr. Michal Urban, Ph.D.

He graduated from the Faculty of Education of Charles University (English language and social sciences) and the Faculty of Law of Charles University and since 2009 he has been teaching didactics, especially didactics of law. At the Faculty of Law and Faculty of Education of Charles University, he teaches a courses on the basics of didactics of law for master’s and doctoral students, and as part of the Street Law programme he supervises student internships in selected secondary schools (see more at www.streetlaw.eu). His experience in teaching, setting up courses and supervising students comes from a wide range of social science courses (including sociology, media training and law). In addition to professional literature, he also gets inspiration from colleagues abroad, especially from the UK and the USA. He regularly teaches didactic skills courses at other universities in the Czech Republic and abroad, and also provides training in artificial intelligence tools.