Want to get started on the OpenLab, create a dynamic syllabus, or learn how to blog more with your students? Look at this Fall semester’s workshops for Faculty and Staff. Workshops take place in G604, the Faculty Commons (N227), or the Library–please note the different times and locations of various workshops and office hours. Download a PDF of the Fall Schedule here
Student photo of an egg for group project on photographer Alexander Rodchenko
Last fall, Professors Sandra Cheng (HUM, Living Lab Fellow), Kylie Garcelon (HGMT, Living Lab Associate Fellow), and Joanne Jacus (HGMT) participated in “The Art of Food,” a learning community between the Hospitality Management and Humanities Departments. Entry-level students enrolled in their first lab courses, either Professor Jacus’s Baking and Pastry I (HGMT 1204) or Professor Garcelon’s Culinary I (HGMT 1203), came together in Professor Cheng’s art history course dedicated to studying the history of photography (ARTH 1100). One objective of the learning community was to foster stronger bonds between Hospitality students in order to emphasize the importance of teamwork, an essential practice for success in culinary labs and in the daily operations of commercial kitchens.
Egg and photography themes in collaborative poem written during shared luncheon
M.F.K. Fisher’s “How not to boil an egg” provided the theme for the learning community as a shared reading between all three classes. Students engaged with the Fisher reading in individual sections as well as in a shared dining experience, in which faculty and students dined together. The shared meal included a shared poetry writing exercise that reinforced the structure of group work promoted in culinary labs and in the art history class.
Whether in culinary labs or the lecture class, students were asked to contemplate creative expression in a myriad of ways, which included considering the visual elements of culinary production, the study of poetry in culinary labs, or taking photographs of eggs for group projects on important photographers. All three classes shared a central website on the OpenLab for the learning community, which was filled with student reflections and examples of student photography. The learning community culminated in smart phone photo contest, from which the winning photos will be exhibited in City Tech’s Janet Lefler Dining Room.
DOWNLOAD PDF of OpenLab Schedule HERE
OPENLAB FACULTY AND STAFF WORKSHOPS FALL ’15
INTERESTED IN FINDING OUT MORE ABOUT CITY TECH’S OPENLAB? JOIN US FOR A WORKSHOP!
This week:
GETTING STARTED ON THE OPENLAB
Find out how to collaborate with your students and colleagues on the OpenLab in these introductory sessions. You will need access to your City Tech email account.
Thursday, February 5, 2:30-4:30pm (G604)
Workshops are open to all City Tech faculty and staff. Part-time faculty are eligible to receive a stipend.
RSVP: http://bit.ly/1nwXRnL, or email us at OpenLab@citytech.cuny.edu. Please include workshop date(s) and time(s).
WORKSHOPS:
USING YOUR SITE AS A DYNAMIC SYLLABUS (OpenLab Account Required!)
Ready to learn more about setting up and designing a course on the OpenLab? Bring your questions to these mixed-level sessions, along with your syllabus and other materials.
Friday, February 13, 11:00am-1:00pm (G604)
BLOGGING WITH YOUR STUDENTS (OpenLab Account Required!)
Discuss and brainstorm assignment design for your OpenLab course, as well as course set-up and useful tools for blogging with your students.
Thursday, March 5, 2:00-4:00pm (G604)
REORGANIZING YOUR SITE (OpenLab Experience Required!)
Now that you’ve been working on the OpenLab, learn how to structure your site for improved interaction with your students or colleagues.
Wednesday, April 15, 12:00-2:00pm (G604)
OPENLAB OPEN HOUR (All Levels Experience Welcome!)
Ready to get hands-on experience on the OpenLab, with face-to-face help available for support? Bring your ideas and questions, and join the OpenLab Team for this Open Hour, a great opportunity to find out more about getting started with the OpenLab, but also a perfect time to ask your more advanced questions about using the OpenLab for your courses, clubs, projects, and portfolios.
Thursday, May 7, 2:30-3:30pm (A540)
Workshops are open to all City Tech faculty and staff. Part-time faculty are eligible to receive a stipend for workshop participation.
RSVP: http://bit.ly/152nATa or email us at OpenLab@citytech.cuny.edu. Please include workshop date(s) and time(s).
Come and find out what’s been happening in the Living Lab on Friday, September 19, 2014 in Namm 119, 11:45 am-1:30 pm. The dissemination event is open to all. See what your colleagues have been doing in the Living Lab. Take a break, grab a little lunch, and even think about different approaches to your own classroom. Hope to see you there!
Download PDF of OpenLab Faculty Staff Workshop Poster
OPENLAB FACULTY & STAFF WORKSHOPS FALL’14
INTERESTED IN FINDING OUT MORE ABOUT CITY TECH’S OPENLAB? JOIN US FOR A WORKSHOP!
Using Your Site as a Dynamic Syllabus (OpenLab Account Required!)
Ready to learn more about setting up and designing a course on the OpenLab? Bring your questions to these mixed-level sessions, along with your syllabus and other materials. You will need an account on the OpenLab – or attend a Getting Started session first.
Tuesday, September 9, 11:00am-1:00pm (G604)
Getting Started on the OpenLab
Find out how to collaborate with your students and colleagues on the OpenLab in these introductory sessions. You will need access to your City Tech email account.
Thursday, September 4, 10:30am-12:30pm (G604)
Wednesday, December 3, 2:00pm-4:00pm (G604)
Blogging with Your Students (OpenLab Account Required!)
Discuss and brainstorm assignment design for your OpenLab course, as well as course set-up and useful tools for blogging with your students. You will need an account on the OpenLab – or attend a Getting Started session first.
Thursday, October 2, 11:00am-1:00pm (G604)
Reorganizing Your Site (OpenLab Experience Required!)
Now that you’ve been working on the OpenLab, learn how to structure your site for improved interaction with your students or colleagues.
Tuesday, November 4, 1:00pm-3:00pm (G604)
Workshops are open to all City Tech faculty and staff.
Part-time faculty are eligible to receive a stipend.
RSVP: http://bit.ly/1nwXRnL Questions? Email us at OpenLab@citytech.cuny.edu.
Associate Fellow Professor Lenore Hildebrand, Human Services Dept, presents her Living Lab activity
Faculty from a wide range of disciplines gathered for the “Real World Problem Solving” meeting to hear final presentations by Associate Fellows and their Living Lab facilitators. After a series of workshops, the latest cohort of Associate Fellows presented creative examples of pedagogical activities to their peers, Living Lab facilitators, and the greater CityTech community.
The gathering began with reflections from Third Year Fellows Aida Egues, Jill Bouratoglou, and Robert Leston, who spoke of their Living Lab involvement and its impact on their teaching and professional development. The Associate Fellows showcased their works-in-progress by adapting an unusual structure for academic presentations. Taking a cue from speed dating, each Associate Fellow took 2 minute-turns to present an activity to small groups that rotated around the workspace from one presenter to the next. Faculty ranging from Construction Management and Civil Engineering to Dental Hygiene and Human Services presented and listened to mini presentations from their colleagues across the college. Gathering in small, intimate groups, each participant had ample opportunity to listen, learn, and ask questions of their peers.
Choosing Your Best Practices
All attendees were given the opportunity to vote for what they thought were the best engagements with issues of Assessment, Place-Based Learning, High Impact Educational Practices, and General Education but in reality all presenters were winners for every professor revealed their passion for teaching and strong commitment to student learning. The gathering culminated in a graffiti activity in which all attendees had a chance to visually express their interests, frustrations, and aspirations. Participants left with an arsenal of new ideas and new strategies to use in their own classes and much to reflect on.
Zombies in Pop Culture: Monopoly’s Survival Edition The Walking Dead
In Professor Robert Leston’s upper-level course ENG 3402 Topics in Literature on Vampires and Zombies in Popular Fiction and Film, students explored the popularity of the undead in popular literature, film, and TV. Using a hybrid course format, in which students met once per week face-to-face and numerous times online, Professor Leston depended on his OpenLab class website for discussion and the submission of reading responses for fellow students to read and comment on. The OpenLab became an online meeting space to explore the fascination with vampires, werewolves, zombies, and monsters in American popular culture.
From reading classics such as Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis and contemporary academic critiques to watching excerpts of film and TV like Shaun of the Dead and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, students submitted reflections and critical responses to readings and viewings on the class website in order to create a virtual ‘reading journal.’ Open to all classmates and the larger CityTech community, the class website extended the learning experience beyond the walls of the classroom and invites outsiders to look in. Students used the OpenLab to access readings and media clips too as well as to stay on top of the work of fellow students in order to avoid overlap with other student projects as each took turns to lead group discussions as ‘expert readers.’ The OpenLab offered a vast range of interaction for professor and students in a hybrid class.
Take a peek at a student’s ‘reading journal’, another student’s response to a reading that contrasts Steve Jobs the vampire to Bill Gates the zombie, and a selection of class readings and media clips.
Garbage in Local Neighborhoods, part of student studies on waste in Biology I
Last fall, a unique learning community brought together first-year students in English, Math, and Biology courses. 24 English composition students in Professor Suzanne Miller’s ENG 1101 along with 24 Math students in Professor Lin Zhou’s MAT 1175 section came together in Professor Jeremy Seto’s BIO 1101 Biology I course. Exploration was the theme of the learning community that encouraged students to better understand their environment in a qualitative and quantitative manner. Professor Seto helped students identify math problems, Professor Zhou helped her Math students find the solutions, and Professor Miller helped the Composition students articulate problems and solutions. In an early assignment, students read about the local rat problem in Manhattan’s Upper East Side and responded to the article on the OpenLab. Professor Seto even contributed a graphic decomposition study to illustrate the effect of poison on rodent control. Soon after, students were asked to document the waste in their own neighborhoods to compare to the Manhattan rat problem. The photo essays encouraged students to better relate the terms and concepts they learned in the classroom to their own environment (click here for an example of student documentation). Simultaneously, students learned to better articulate their analysis of texts and acquired basic skills such as distinguishing between primary and secondary sources. Assignments were scaffolded to help students draw connections between the diverse courses and their own lives. For a group project, students in English Composition and Math worked together to identify and solve a math problem in Biology I. Over the course of the semester, student groups identified a challenge, formulated questions to solve the problem, and collectively answered the questions. Each group was tasked with creating a poster to illustrate the process of investigating problems and finding solutions.
Explore Professor Seto’s Learning Community here.
Students in Professor Susan Phillip’s Urban Tourism class at the Highline
The knotty issue of gentrification is one of many issues that students address in Professor Susan Phillip’s upper level Urban Tourism course (HMGT 4987) in the Department of Hospitality Management. Field trips around New York City are incorporated into the course that investigates tourism as an engine of urban renewal and economic regeneration. Class lectures, discussion, and research projects let students examine the roles of government, business, and community along with issues of development, environmental concerns, and social equity.
Following lectures on historical Brooklyn, students observe first hand the contrast of two neighborhoods in guided tours of Bedford-Stuyvesant and Brooklyn Heights. Students broaden their place-based experience with research projects that identify tourism resources and media perception of Brooklyn neighborhoods, in which they evaluate the roles of public and private sectors in urban tourism and in the revitalization of less affluent neighborhoods. Professor Phillip’s emphasis on helping students connect to the history of social change of local neighborhoods aligns with many General Education objectives that highlight ethics in learning and civic engagement. During field trips, residents have been known to interact with her class, pointing out local spots, recounting local lore, and even inviting the group into their residence. One group assignment is the development of a walking tour. You can see an example of a student walking tour of Downtown Brooklyn here: HMGT 4987 Student Downtown Brooklyn Walking Tour
OpenLab Workshops For Faculty and Staff:
Getting Started (Access to your City Tech Email Account Required!)
Find out how to collaborate with your students and colleagues on the OpenLab in these introductory sessions.
W 2/5 2:30-3:00pm
Th 2/13 2:00pm-2:30pm
Designing a Course, Project, Club (Access to your OpenLab Account Required!)
Ready to learn more about using the OpenLab? Bring your questions to these mixed-level sessions, along with your syllabus or other materials. You will need an account on the OpenLab – or come early and attend the Getting Started session first.
W 2/5 3:00-4:30pm
Th 2/13 2:30-4:00pm
Tools, Tips, and Tricks (Experience Required!)
Learn how to use widgets, plugins, and other tools to enhance your Course, Project, or Club on the OpenLab.
W 3/12 1:00-2:30pm
Th 4/3 3:30-5:00pm
Reorganizing Your OpenLab Site (Experience Required!)–NEW!
Now that you’ve worked on the OpenLab for a while, learn how to structure your site for improved interaction with your audience.
Th 5/1 3:30-5:00pm
* Faculty/Staff workshops require registration. All part-time faculty are eligible to receive a stipend for workshop participation.
The OpenLab is an open-source, digital platform designed to support teaching and learning at City Tech (New York City College of Technology), and to promote student and faculty engagement in the intellectual and social life of the college community.
