Vat Kam Hou 屈鑑濠 Senior Instructor, Department of Computer & Information Science (DCIS) |
Confronting Cheating: A Legal Primer and Tool Kit |
Cheating strikes at the core of your school’s integrity. It creates an unethical environment among your students, and ultimately diminishes the quality and reputation of your institution.Cheating isn’t new, but it seems to be more pervasive than ever. What’s fueling the cheating epidemic on college campuses? Quite a few things actually, including:
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Learn how to inoculate your college or university against the cheating epidemic in the Magna White Paper, Confronting Cheating: A Legal Primer and Tool Kit. The white paper authored by two experts in the field of academic cheating, will cut through the legalese and give you practical advice on:
This newly released white paper will help you learn how to provide a unified front to combat cheating on campus. You’ll discover how to:
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Building a Culture of Academic Integrity |
As much as we all hate to admit it, cheating goes hand-in-hand with the stressful, competitive environment of higher ed. It could be the loafer looking for an easy grade or the hardworking student who “has to get an A.” It happens on every campus, and it certainly isn’t a new problem.Instead of working to eliminate cheating, colleges and universities can instead focus their efforts on building cultures of integrity. These campus environments organically discourage academic dishonesty and allow schools to harness the learning opportunities in cheating incidents. You can learn how to lead an integrity movement on your campus by following the advice presented in Building a Culture of Academic Integrity. This white paper provides a step-by-step guide to building a culture of integrity and offers strategies to more fully incorporate values and ethics education into curriculum. The white paper is based on an online seminar presented by Tricia Bertram Gallant, PhD., academic integrity coordinator at the University of California, San Diego and the current chair for the Center for Academic Integrity’s Advisory Council. Dr. Bertram Gallant has vast experience in generating campus interest in integrity and ethics, and has worked with students, faculty, and administrators to promote values and ethics education — from policy to practice. |
In Building a Culture of Academic Integrity Bertram Gallant helps you reframe your attitude toward cheating so that you—and your school—can view it as an opportunity for education and organizational change and not as a sign of failure. Specifically, you will learn to:
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Ensuring Online Program Quality with the eQuality Model |
The standards are different for online programs. That’s what everyone thinks, so it might as well be true. Only it isn’t true. Your stakeholders don’t have a separate set of expectations for online programs, and neither do you. Proving it, though, can be challenging without a comprehensive program that continuously monitors and improves quality.You don’t have to secretly worry that the critics are right, or wonder whether your online programs match the quality and integrity of your on-the-ground courses. You can know—and prove with certainty—that any doubters are wrong. What you need, however, is a data-driven continuous process improvement model that uses performance measures and stakeholder feedback to ensure that student success and academic integrity meet institutional requirements. In other words, you need the eQuality Model. The eQuality Model is a highly adaptable program designed to continuously improve the quality and integrity of online and distance education learning. You can learn how to adapt this model and develop your own comprehensive quality program in Ensuring Online Program Quality with the eQuality Model. The eQuality model is based on a four-pillar approach that uses specific tools and strategies to evaluate and improve quality in courses, instruction, support, and administration. By adopting and adhering to the four-pillar model, colleges and universities can maintain academic integrity and rigor while ensuring the best possible student and faculty experience. |
This 38-page white paper explains how to develop and implement a comprehensive quality program at your institution. The report gives you the tools and the insight to gather data, analyze it, and apply it to improve any or all of the four quality components. Specifically, you will learn to:
To further assist you in developing your own comprehensive quality program, this white paper also provides actual examples of eQuality tools used at Florida State College. The valuable resources you can modify and adapt to your institution include the following:
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23 Practical Strategies to Help New Teachers Thrive |
The college classroom can be an isolated place. College instructors can spend many terms without knowing how other instructors handle problems, or if their own approach is the most effective one. When you are new to teaching, you’re even more in the dark because you’re encountering everything for the first time.As a new college instructor, you probably have many questions.
For the new college teacher, it is best to learn from those who have been there. In the latest Magna Publications white paper 23 Practical Strategies to Help New Teachers Thrive, you will discover the tips and techniques that have proven successful for experienced faculty and explore how to use these in your own classes. This 45-page white paper takes a step-by-step look at some of the strategies used by successful college teachers, with examples and take-aways for your own classroom. |
In this white paper, you will learn:
You will also receive a comprehensive list of resources for future reading and study, as well as a sample syllabus to use as a model. Who will benefit?
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How to Effectively Assess Online Learning |
Many familiar forms of assessment don’t work well—or at all—in a web-based format. Assessing students online requires fresh thinking, new ideas, and a willingness to embrace the latest technologies and methods for measuring learning in an online course.At first glance, evaluating students online may seem more difficult and time-consuming. Closer examination, however, reveals an exciting array of assessment possibilities that can actually improve learning while reducing faculty workloads. The social media capabilities of online instruction can even help elevate students from passive recipients of information to active participants in constructing knowledge. In How to Effectively Assess Online Learning John Orlando, PhD explains the potential for dramatically improving learner assessment in online coursework. Readers will discover the newest strategies for designing better online courses by letting assessment goals lead the way. |
This 48-page white paper delivers updated assessment techniques tailored to the strengths of web-based teaching and learning. You will learn:
This white paper also includes a Sample Assessment Rubric and lists of recommended resources. As with all Magna Publications products, this white paper is solution-oriented with a focus on delivering action steps for handling current topics of greatest concern to higher education educators. Our white paper topics are selected based on the intensity of the interest in the topics and the caliber of the information they contain. This new publication is recommended for online faculty members, distance education personnel and faculty trainers. Online assessment offers instructors the opportunity to completely reevaluate teaching and learning strategies. Discover how improved assessment practices can help your school leverage the full potential of online education by investing in How to Effectively Assess Online Learning today. |
Ten Ways to Engage Your Students on the First Day of Class |
The first day of class is nerve-wracking for everyone. Students worry about whether they are prepared, whether they will like the instructor, whether the workload will be too heavy, and whether they will see a familiar face in the room. Instructors fret about presenting enough or the right selection of material, challenging students without overwhelming them, and establishing a respectful and productive classroom atmosphere.You can put all these worries to rest on the very first day of class. With the right strategies and tools, any instructor can get the term off to a productive start and pave the way for student engagement and success as well as positive performance reviews. Discover what you need to know and do on the first day of any course so that you can maximize time spent on instruction and minimize time spent on classroom management in Ten Ways to Engage Your Students on the First Day of Class. This white paper breaks down the first day into simple, discreet steps to set-up your classroom, establish routines, communicate expectations, and present course material. It will help you engage students and establish a classroom atmosphere that reinforces and rewards punctuality, attendance, and participation. Applicable to any subject matter or course description, these tactics put you in control of your classroom climate from the very first moments of the term. |
Ten Ways to Engage Your Students on the First Day of Class delivers easy tips and strategies including the following:
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What Faculty Must Know About Campus Security |
Colleges and universities are not immune from crime. While they remain relatively safe environments, horrific campus shootings have taught us that a single, disturbed student is capable of causing devastating violence.The best way to guard against these rare incidents is not by expanding your police force or updating your alarm systems. What really makes the difference is building stronger relationships between faculty members and students. When faculty know their students personally, they are able to recognize a student in need of intervention. Other students, with access to worrisome information, are also more likely to come forward and share their concerns with a trusted professor. While “low touch” security measures like improved alarm systems and text-messaging alerts can be useful tools for addressing a crime in progress, a far better approach seeks to prevent situations from ever reaching crisis levels. In What Faculty Must Know About Campus Security you will learn why “high touch,” personal approaches to dealing with troubled students are the best way to keep everyone on your campus safe. |
This 42-page white paper draws from the latest reports on campus violence and explains:
What Faculty Must Know About Campus Security is based on a Magna Online Seminar originally delivered by Gary Pavela in 2008. Pavela writes popular law and policy newsletters read faculty and staff at more than 1,000 colleges and universities nationwide. He has been active for over 30 years in managing discipline and student conduct in higher education. He was also a consultant to the Governor’s Task Force on Campus Safety for the state of Wisconsin and addressed Virginia Tech faculty and staff at a symposium sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education. This white paper is important reading for:
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Service-Learning Course Design: What Faculty Need to Know |
More colleges and universities are adding service-learning to their general educational offerings and many faculty members would like to design and teach a service-learning course. It’s no wonder — with its unique mix of academic content, service experience and critical reflection, service-learning is a high-impact educational practice.While conducting a service-learning course is intriguing to faculty, many may lack the know-how of running a successful course. Service-Learning Course Design: What Faculty Need to Know will provide you with the resources and insight you need. This white paper explains the rationale and provides the “how-to” details of designing and teaching a service-learning course. With a service-learning course, students deepen their understanding of course content, mix theory with practice, and increase their understanding of the complexity of social issues – all valuable workplace skills. Community organizations benefit from the surge of new ideas, energy, and assistance as their delivery services are enhanced. Faculty members find it stimulating to explore the connections between their discipline and critical questions facing our global society. |
You’ll be guided by author Barbara Jacoby, PhD. a nationally recognized expert in service-learning and the senior scholar for the Adele H. Stamp Student Union – Center for Campus Life at the University of Maryland, College Park. Dr. Jacoby facilitates initiatives involving academic partnerships, assessment, civic engagement, scholarship, and learning. In this 39-page white paper, you’ll learn:
As a bonus, you’ll receive a list of valuable print and online resources and a comprehensive checklist that will guide you in all phases of design and execution of a successful service-learning offering. Successful outcomes are possible with the aid of a well-designed and well-taught service-learning course. But it doesn’t happen by itself. Whether you’re just getting your feet wet and want to know more about designing a successful service-learning course, or integrate it into a course you’re already teaching, let this white paper guide you to mastery and success. |
Coping with Seven Disruptive Personality Types in the Classroom |
At some point in your teaching career you are going to be faced with a disruptive—maybe even out-of-control—student. When that moment comes, will you know how to keep yourself, and the other students in class, safe?In a perfect world, college students are always eager, well disciplined, and respectful. In the real world, some students come to class late, miss deadlines, or fall asleep during lectures. Others monopolize class time, make insulting or abusive comments, and even physically threaten or intimidate other students and professors. In extreme incidents, there is even the occasional student who poses a dangerous risk to the entire community. Learn the most effective strategies for assessing and managing these and other classroom challenges with Coping with Seven Disruptive Personality Types in the Classroom. This exclusive white paper explains how to recognize typical styles of troublesome behavior and exactly what to do in response. Based on a seminar by renowned college mental health counselor Dr. Gerald Amada, this 52-page white paper covers essential strategies for recognizing and containing a difficult situation in the classroom before things spin out of control. |
This report takes the bewildering array of unacceptable student behaviors and classifies them into seven easy-to-recognize styles, along with recommended approaches suited to each type’s idiosyncrasies. The recommendations are based on Dr. Amada’s approaches drawn from his 30-year career in which he authored of eleven books and more than 100 articles and book reviews on the subjects of mental health and disruptive college students. Coping with Seven Disruptive Personality Types in the Classroom delivers realistic, practical guidelines on:
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The Best of The Teaching Professor |
The Best of The Teaching Professor: Priceless wisdom from the newsletter devoted to the art and science of better teachingDoes thinking of yourself in metaphorical terms help guide you through the challenges of teaching? Perhaps you think of yourself as a gardener, sometimes “tending flowers,” sometimes “pulling weeds.” Dr. Ike Shibley is motivated by the story of encountering two bricklayers and asking them what they are doing. The first tells you he is just laying bricks. The second reports that she’s building a cathedral, a grand structure that will seat 2,000 and enhance the community in many different ways. As teachers, we are doing much more than “laying bricks,” Dr. Shibley says. We are building student confidence, motivation, and intellect that should provide a better quality of life for the individual student and for future generations. Professor Robert G. Kraft likens teaching to coaching. He reminds us that students need to understand the entire game, not just some small part of it, and that we have to let students play the game, not just read about it. Professor Jon Sperling’s analogy of teaching as “fishing story” suggests learning can be more effective when we feel compelled to ask questions. Professors Erin Steuter and Geoff Martin liken colleges and universities to cooking schools, where the faculty are master chefs with expertise in particular types of cuisine, and the students are apprentice chefs who benefit from the masters’ instruction on the basic principles and methodologies of cooking. Professor Zopito A. Marini prefers the teacher as Sherpa guide metaphor. “Learning has striking similarities to mountain climbing in that it requires a sense of adventure, perseverance, and a great deal of plain, hard work,” says Professor Marini. “If learning is like mountain climbing, then teaching can be seen as the process of facilitating the climb. And what better facilitator of mountain climbing than a Sherpa guide.” What’s your favorite metaphor for yourself as a teacher? Whether you think of yourself as a gardener, builder, bricklayer, musician, coach, fisherman, master chef, ringmaster, Sherpa guide or something else, I think you’re going to want a copy of The Best of The Teaching Professor for your personal library. The Teaching Professor, the newsletter devoted to the art and science of better teaching, illustrates innovative, creative ways to reach, motivate and inspire students. Plus, it speaks with authority because it’s based on consistent theoretical research into sound pedagogical practice through scholarship on teaching. Typical topics include assessment and evaluation, engagement of student interest, faculty time management, and the learner-centered classroom. And now we’ve taken the best of the best — 83 articles from first 18 years of The Teaching Professor — and compiled them in one volume: The Best of The Teaching Professor. |
The Best of The Teaching Professor: Priceless wisdom from the newsletter devoted to the art and science of better teachingDear friend and fellow educator, Does thinking of yourself in metaphorical terms help guide you through the challenges of teaching? Perhaps you think of yourself as a gardener, sometimes “tending flowers,” sometimes “pulling weeds.” Dr. Ike Shibley is motivated by the story of encountering two bricklayers and asking them what they are doing. The first tells you he is just laying bricks. The second reports that she’s building a cathedral, a grand structure that will seat 2,000 and enhance the community in many different ways. As teachers, we are doing much more than “laying bricks,” Dr. Shibley says. We are building student confidence, motivation, and intellect that should provide a better quality of life for the individual student and for future generations. Professor Robert G. Kraft likens teaching to coaching. He reminds us that students need to understand the entire game, not just some small part of it, and that we have to let students play the game, not just read about it. Professor Jon Sperling’s analogy of teaching as “fishing story” suggests learning can be more effective when we feel compelled to ask questions. Professors Erin Steuter and Geoff Martin liken colleges and universities to cooking schools, where the faculty are master chefs with expertise in particular types of cuisine, and the students are apprentice chefs who benefit from the masters’ instruction on the basic principles and methodologies of cooking. Professor Zopito A. Marini prefers the teacher as Sherpa guide metaphor. “Learning has striking similarities to mountain climbing in that it requires a sense of adventure, perseverance, and a great deal of plain, hard work,” says Professor Marini. “If learning is like mountain climbing, then teaching can be seen as the process of facilitating the climb. And what better facilitator of mountain climbing than a Sherpa guide.” What’s your favorite metaphor for yourself as a teacher? Whether you think of yourself as a gardener, builder, bricklayer, musician, coach, fisherman, master chef, ringmaster, Sherpa guide or something else, I think you’re going to want a copy of The Best of The Teaching Professor for your personal library. The Teaching Professor, the newsletter devoted to the art and science of better teaching, illustrates innovative, creative ways to reach, motivate and inspire students. Plus, it speaks with authority because it’s based on consistent theoretical research into sound pedagogical practice through scholarship on teaching. Typical topics include assessment and evaluation, engagement of student interest, faculty time management, and the learner-centered classroom. And now we’ve taken the best of the best — 83 articles from first 18 years of The Teaching Professor — and compiled them in one volume: The Best of The Teaching Professor. Do you want innovative, creative ways to reach, motivate, and inspire students?Practical advice from The Best of The Teaching Professor: Articles that not only discuss theoretical issues but also offer detailed guidanceDr. Shipley, who selected the articles for The Best of The Teaching Professor, characterizes The Teaching Professor as a humble newsletter. “Although it contains what I think is some of the most practical advice available…its articles seem to engage the reader in a conversation. They talk with the reader, not at the reader,” he says. “Receiving each issue of The Teaching Professor is a bit like hearing from an old friend — a well-read, incredible articulate, and still-youthful friend. “Editing this collection has been both edifying and gratifying. Selecting the best articles was like trying to choose what to eat from a menu on which every item is appetizing.” Generous praise, indeed. And if you’re a regular reader of The Teaching Professor, I think you’ll agree. Now The Best of The Teaching Professor brings you a compendium of practical advice, with articles that not only discuss theoretical issues, but also offer detailed guidance. Each chapter of The Best of The Teaching Professor explores specific aspects of learning, including learner-centered teaching, classroom activities, writing and technology. You’ll discover the pervasive aspects of critical thinking, grading, motivation, plus an overall view of teaching in higher education. The articles compiled in The Best of The Teaching Professor represent the outstanding, diverse, and thought-provoking writing that The Teaching Professor, routinely publishes. The wisdom contained in the essays will challenge you to reflect on your own teaching practices and help you to clarify your own teaching philosophy. Are you ready to unlock the secrets of how to connect with your students?Discover techniques to improve your teaching with new ideas, innovative strategies, and tactics you can use in the classroom todayThe goal of The Best of The Teaching Professor is not to advocate for any one particular philosophy of teaching, but to encourage you to develop your own understanding, rationale and reasons for teaching. To that, we add a generous helping of very practical ideas and advice. In The Best of The Teaching Professor, you’ll discover diverse tips on classroom activities, from suggestions for learning your student’s names…to the benefits of “concept maps” for encouraging conceptual thinking…to using “minute papers” for soliciting feedback on the content presented in class. You’ll learn how one professor discovered how to use “The Knowledge Game” to pique student interest beyond his wildest expectations in previously “boring” topics. You’ll find practical advice on everything from how to pace your lectures…to how to integrate humor into the classroom…to how to coach students on note-taking skills…to dealing with cognitive overload…to reckoning with learning modalities. Plus, you’ll find chapters on:
Plus, insightful chapters on student work beyond the classroom; student ranking of teachers; reconfiguring the privacy of teaching; and the scholarship of teaching. Are you ready to re-discover your love of teaching and learning? |
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Kam Hou Vat, PhD
Faculty of Science and Technology
University of Macau
Av. Padre Tomás Pereira, Taipa,
Macau, China
Room: N327C
Telephone: (Office) (853) 8397-4379, (Mobile) (853) 66501747
Fax: (Office) (853) 28838314 or (Home) (853) 28832731
Email: fstkhv
Personal Homepage: http://www.fst.umac.mo/en/staff/fstkhv.html
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