Assignments: Make Them Effective, Engaging, and Equitable. At their best, assignments are one of the most important learning experiences for students in a course. Students grapple with course content, ...

Many instructors approach assignment design with a "product" focus—that is to say, the choices they make about their assignments (frequency; genre; difficulty; grading scheme; etc.) are oriented ...

As generative AI becomes more advanced and accessible, it’s helpful to revise assignments in ways that deter unauthorized use while promoting genuine learning. Here are detailed strategies for ...

It is good teaching practice to be clear and transparent about the purpose, task, and criteria for assignments and learning activities. This includes communicating with students about what is and is ...

In education–and particularly with my graduate students in higher education–students occasionally focus on the individual points of an assignment rubric instead of stepping back and looking ...

Travis Grandy is a PhD student in Composition and Rhetoric at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Find him on Twitter @travisgrandy or at his website. I work with a lot of instructors who use ...

Threshold concepts are the core knowledge and disciplinary capabilities that students must successfully transition through to make progress in their majors. The threshold concepts (TC) framework is ...

One of the most robust backward design models developed for higher education is L. Dee Fink’s integrated course design. Fink outlines a streamlined process for designing academic courses, divided into ...

Based on the education statistics, I should never have made it this far. The fact that I have multiple graduate degrees makes me an anomaly. Not because I was raised in poverty (which I was), but ...

Effective course design begins with understanding the process of thinking and learning. These processes are commonly termed "metacognition." Metacognition includes a critical awareness of one’s ...