Delgado Community College

DELGADO COMMUNITY COLLEGE TITLE III SLO/LA COURSE SYLLABUS

SECTION NUMBER: XXAG 909 1WA

FACILITATOR’S NAME: Angela Breckenridge

Background Up until August, 2004, I had been a pretty successful corporate consultant in training and employee development for about 10 years. I had my own business and also worked for one of the big global accounting/consulting firms in Indonesia for awhile. I worked with CEOs and other executives on how to be good leaders and with all kinds of employees all the way from managers to janitors to find their potential and work toward their own kind of success. But nothing has been as rewarding as teaching in the community college, especially at Delgado where I was hired full-time temp in the ENGL department on the Northshore. I felt very lucky to be back in the classroom, even though I realized how unprepared I actually was to address some of the obstacles our students face when they come here hoping to gain something that will help them succeed in this complicated world. Well, the contract ended, and I happened to be qualified to assume the Title III support role of Learning Outcomes Specialist for faculty participating in this project. I do well as a resource and advocate for people interested in realizing their visions about teaching and learning or those interested in undertaking innovative projects that are meaningful to them and valuable for those they influence—like you all.

Oh, and I love Shakespeare. (Are you ready to run away far and fast now?) It’s just my thing. I read it, teach it, perform it, write about it, and wish everyone would love language like he did. Summer 2005 I even fulfilled a life-long dream and played the role of Hamlet in a professional production at Southern Rep in New Orleans.

I’m a student, too, working on a doctorate in Human and Organization Development— kind of fancy way of saying I’m learning how to help people and groups recognize and reach their potential through interaction and collaborative learning. I like it when others succeed. Most recently, I’ve been examining the miraculous way our faculty and staff found one another, students, and the courage to transform themselves and the service Delgado provides from our well-known traditional classroom learning into a viable distance learning provider in only a few short weeks after the levees broke. This was an almost seamless continuation of institutional operation, albeit on a much smaller scale. I believe this was a pretty monumental effort that undoubtedly has it’s kinks to be ironed out, but it is an excellent example of the capabilities Delgado has to unite when the faculty are allowed to do what they do best without the restrictions of policy and frustrations of organizational inefficiencies that often disable innovative ideas for learning that require support or committee approval. So, lately, a lot of my work has been trying to demonstrate that theory may not actually need to inform practice; but that practice, especially the innovative teaching that often goes unnoticed or unrecognized as effective practice, actually can inform learning theory through practice. My dissertation is a study of experiences and knowledge that instructors accumulate in their brains over time and that they intuitively draw from when they evaluate performance or assess whether or not students are learning. I hope that through reflective interviews, we can make explicit this valuable experience and embedded knowledge so that Delgado’s “best practices” are those shaped by what our faculty know about learning from experiences in our own classrooms with our own students.

OFFICE HOURS: CP – MWF 12:00 – 2:00pm; WB – TH 12:00 – 2:00pm; NS – TR 12:00 – 2:00pm

OFFICE PHONE: 504-483-4525 CELL: 985-778-6538

COURSE MAXIMUM ENROLLMENT: 50 1 COURSE NAME: Designs For Learning

COURSE DESCRIPTION: This is an online collaborative seminar to strengthen existing capabilities in learning-centered instruction, outcomes assessment, and course design. The course is designed to prepare Title III Pilot Faculty (and others who wish to participate) for implementing a pilot plan with the course they choose to work on in Phase II of this program. It therefore comprises the first phase of the Pilot Faculty contract conditions.

The purpose of the course is to create a set of common, learning-centered principles for creating Student Learning Outcomes and Classroom Learning Assessments that will be piloted for general adoption on master course syllabi. This follows an ongoing commitment to adopting learning- centered improvements based on scholarly, evidence-based practices found to impact student learning and then endorsed through an ongoing collaborative dialogue of faculty engaged in the ongoing exploration of teaching and learning potential.

All pilot faculty are enrolled in the course and will be able to access it on BlackBoard by February 1, 2007.

PREREQUISITES: Full-time teaching experience at Delgado, familiarity with Blackboard and an online learning environment.

A desire to improve student learning with ideas you’ve had and wanted to experiment with.

LEARNING OUTCOMES: As a result of learning in this course, individuals should be able to . . .

1. Create an outcome-oriented course 2. Apply learning theory to Instructional Design 3. Integrate Active Learning Strategies that apply to learning outcomes 4. Integrate Assessment Tools For Learning 5. Engage in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning

COURSE OBJECTIVES: Individuals achieve the learning outcomes by using the course content in the following ways. . .

 In Creating Outcome-Oriented Courses, course content will help: o Define meaningful, measurable student learning outcomes o Align course outcomes with GenEd core competencies o Align learning activities with course outcomes o Align classroom assessment strategies with learning activities and course outcomes o Use assessment feedback in collaboration with colleagues to assure student learning align across courses  In Applying Learning Theory to Instructional Design, course content will help: o Create ways to foster social connections in classroom, library, counseling environments 2 o Design learning experiences that address students’ unique strengths, needs o Develop reciprocity and cooperation among students (interdependence and teamwork) o Include content well-suited to Delgado’s diverse student population o Establish connections among students in and out of the classroom (learning communities) o Vary assessment measures and techniques to engage cognitive diversity o Create learning atmospheres that encourage all students to share view points o Use alternative methods to engage and deepen critical thinking o Develop student self-awareness (learning styles, personality types, assumptions)

 In Applying Active Learning Strategies, course content will help: o Employ techniques such as engaging lectures, discussions, experiential learning, scenarios, role- play, case study, problem-based learning, etc. o Employ collaborative and cooperative learning techniques o Encourage students to challenge ideas with reason o Integrate concrete, real-life situations into learning strategies o Invite student input on course outcomes and assessments (goals to achieve course outcomes, choice among assignment topics; in-progress student feedback. . .)

 In Using Assessment Tools for Learning, course content will help: o Employ formative feedback loops early and often (both to and from students) o Provide students with written or face-to-face comments on strengths and weaknesses o Give timely feedback on class activities, exams, and papers o Design activities to help students self-assess their learning o Align summative evaluations with course outcomes and learning activities (appropriate to level of thinking; appropriate levels of performance) o Make assessment criteria public to students and colleagues o Evaluate effectiveness of assessment strategies and grading practices

 In Engaging in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, course content will help: o Produce professional work that meets the Standards of Teaching Excellence (course designs, action research projects, publications, etc.) o Build upon the work of others (consult literature, peers, self, students) o Be open to constructive critique (by peers, students, self) o Make work public to college and broader audiences o Demonstrate relationship between scholarship and improved teaching and learning processes o Expand college capabilities in learning-centeredness by sharing expertise with others (mentorships, leadership programs, faculty-led workshops, etc.)

COURSE CONTENT: The course content focuses on a common language for talking about student learning and for assessing when and how learning occurs. It covers meanings for terms such as Student Learning Outcomes, Course Objectives, and Learning Assessment. It covers processes for defining, piloting, and assessing outcomes and objectives.

3 Course content also includes your own syllabus, the practices you use in your classrooms for teaching and learning. It includes the content of your discussions, conclusions you draw from the readings and actions you and your colleagues choose to take as a result of your conversations on the readings.

In a nutshell, the course content is a blending of theory with practice. You’ll be examining teaching/learning theory in its practical application in the classroom and with your students.

TEXTS: “Learner-Centered Assessment on College Campuses” by Huba & Freed

OTHER MATERIALS:  Computer access  Worksheets  Your course syllabus  Some supplemental reading

ASSESSMENTS: There will be other forms of assessment, but here are the primary means of assessing the learning outcomes of this course:

1. An individual self-assessment to be taken online at the beginning and end of the course. 2. A syllabus that demonstrates a course design with measurable student learning outcomes, activities, and valid assessment practices that pilot faculty will use in their pilot courses in 3. Phase II of this program. 4. A plan for documenting and recording findings from the use of practices you choose to achieve learning outcomes in your classroom.

The last two items there are also the practical deliverables that this course is designed to produce. They are the deliverables that will organize and substantiate your pilot in Phase II of this program.

Course Structure The main value of this course lies in the dialogue you generate with your colleagues in the online discussions. There is much to learn from what we all are doing in our classes and how the themes we’ll read about are played out already in so many ways here at Delgado. Therefore, we’ll begin this journey reading a common text and discussing the major themes, the controversies, the practices that are related to the chapter topics at hand.

You’ve already divided yourselves into teams. Each team is responsible for facilitating the dialogue of a particular chapter. We’ll learn more about what this entails as we go along, but there’ll be some general guidelines and responsibilities for the facilitators. The teams have already chosen chapters to facilitate. They will be listed along with the dates for each chapter in the following section.

4 Finally, this course is structured for participant feedback. In other words, since this is the first time I’m teaching/facilitating an online forum, I’ll need your ideas, your feedback, and your questions in order to make whatever changes are necessary for continual improvement in the program. This is an open invitation to co-create your learning environment.

Teams, Chapters, and Calendar Start Date Team Chapter/Topic Feb. 1 – Thursday Elaine Tolliver – ADOT 101 “Setting Direction w/ Intended Learning Krista Lawrence – ADOT 105 Outcomes” Ch. 4 Ruby Holliday – ADOT 106 Warren Duclos – ADOT 264 Mary Ellen Logan – ADOT 265 Bettie Abbate – HORT 101 Feb. 16 – Friday Kim Gatzke – ACCT 218 “Experiencing a Paradigm Shift Beth Laskey – ACCT 203 Through Assessment” Ch. 1 Dennis Worsham – BUSG 129 Stephen Edwards – MUSC 105 Feb. 26 – Monday Undisclosed guest facilitator “Understanding Hallmarks of Learner- Centered Teaching & Assessment” Ch. 2 Mar. 9 – Friday Amanda Rosenzweig – BIOL 101 “Applying Principles of Good Practice Marceau Ratard – BIOL 102 in Learner-Centered Assessment” Ch. 3 Jacqueline Wood – GEOL 101 Brett Heintz – PSYC 240 Mar. 19 – Monday Jennifer Johnson – MATH 095 “Using feedback from Students to Pat Cox – MATH 096 Improve Learning” Ch. 5 Chris Rome – MATH 131 Chris Doyle – MATH Laila Bicksler – MATH 203 Mar. 30 – Friday Jon Petrie – CULA 103 “Using Rubric to Provide Feedback to Vance Roux – CULA 217 Students” Ch. 6 Donald Davenport – MOVH 101 Lorraine Zeringue – CADD 125 Victor Mirzai – ARCH 110 Apr. 9 – Monday Missy Diaz – ENGL 102 “Assessing Students’ Ability to Think Cathy Gorvine – ENGL 101 Critically and Solve Problems” Ch. 7 Brenda Bryant – ENGL 222 Shelley Tyler – ESLR 023/027 Apr. 20 – Friday Emily Cosper – ENGL 212 “Using Portfolios to Promote, Support, Elizabeth Feltey – ENGL 205 and Evaluate Learning” Ch. 8 Kathy Favret – READ 072 Connie Whitehurst – READ 071 Apr. 30 – Monday Undisclosed guest facilitator “Shifting the Paradigm: Individual and Organizational Implications” Ch. 9