This week is the TED Education week so I am happy to share these links with you. Exploring teaching and teaching philosophy is so valuable to us all as we strive for excellence in teaching.
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/ted-talks-education/
http://www.ted.com/
If anyone is interested I think it would be great to get together and discuss some of the issues presented in these talks. Anyone interested?
Professor Paul King teaching on the Brooklyn Waterfront
Professor Paul King heads a unique learning community comprised of two classes, ARCH 1200 Architectural Drawing II and ARCH 1290 Architectural CADD, both taught by him. Using the learning community framework to combine the two classes offers increased one-on-one contact hours between professor and students, and it allows for greater flexibility with lessons. Both courses share a common class website on the OpenLab that links to team pages for group projects. Professor King applies numerous innovative pedagogical strategies to his courses, including a motivating field trip early in the semester that allows students to apply practical, disciplinary knowledge as well as become better acquainted with their teammates.
A field trip to the nearby Brooklyn waterfront launches a two-part assignment for which students are assessed for individual work and a group presentation. Professor King uses a detailed worksheet to transform a field trip to Brooklyn Bridge Park into a site visit. Students are asked to present a preliminary subject for an individual case-study that they continue working on during the semester. Working in teams, students prepare slideshow presentations that present team members and documentation of architectural structures related to “movement,” “expansion joints,” “points of failure,” “retrofits,” and things that need improvement in design. The early field trip enhances class objectives by encouraging students to discover and apply architectural concepts in real settings. Moreover, the class outing creates an opportunity for students to interact beyond classroom walls to foster group dynamics.
The Brooklyn Waterfront Research Center is pleased to announce another Breakfast Talk!
What’s There Now and What Might Be Coming: A Look at Land Use along the Brooklyn Waterfront
Richard Bearak, Director, Land Use, Brooklyn Borough President’s Office
Brooklyn Borough Hall’s director of land use, Richard Bearak, will offer a comprehensive look at the Brooklyn waterfront, speaking of what has changed during the Borough Presidency of Marty Markowitz and what changes will occur on the waterfront in the future.
DETAILS:
Friday May 10th
8:30am to 10:00am
Room N119
Free and open to the public!
Who’s reading the New York Times?
Recently, Professor Sean Scanlan’s ENG 1101 English Composition class participated in a learning community with two courses in the Hospitality department (Perspectives of Hospitality Management-HGMT 1101 taught by Professor Karen Goodlad and Food and Beverage Management-HGMT 1102 by Professor John Akana). The learning community shared readings, shared their experience of the Brooklyn waterfront, and even shared a meal in CityTech’s Janet Leffler Dining Room. This ambitious endeavor helped create a unified experience for first-year students and linked the three classes on the OpenLab. A common goal for all was to raise student awareness of the connections between different courses, in essence, one of the critical aims of General Education. But how does one assess Gen Ed in the classroom? within the curriculum? across the college? Assessment begins by asking the right questions, and asking the right questions begins by opening the discourse on Gen Ed to students and faculty. Professor Scanlan starts the dialogue in his classroom and on the class website, on which he dedicates a section to Gen Ed, beginning with a question “Is English 1101 a General Education course?” As Professor Scanlan notes, ENG 1101’s emphasis on reading, writing, and critical thinking makes the course fall firmly within the broad parameters of Gen Ed.  Moreover, Professor Scanlan raises important questions on the impact of our digital age on General Education and to this end, he posts an amusing video “The Machine is Us/ing Us” for us to reflect on.
Smile Pinki, 2008 documentary by Megan Mylan
Students in Professor Maria Bilello’s DEN 1114 Oral Histology and Embryology course do more than master the many tissues of oral cavities, they write to become more culturally sensitive health care practitioners. To better connect basic knowledge to real world issues in contemporary dental care, Professor Bilello incorporates assignments that encourage students to examine their cultural identities and personal biases in relation to oral congenital malformations. With her guidance, she urges her students to take the first step to greater self-awareness when confronted with deformity. For one project, students are asked to research and prepare oral presentations of developmental abnormalities and their impact on dental development and care. For a reflective writing assignment, students view the Academy Award-winning documentary Smile Pinki about the life-changing journey of a 5-year-old girl Indian girl with a cleft lip. Students are asked to reflect on the film and to share their personal cultural views of deformity and disability on the OpenLab (read examples of student writing here). By incorporating different forms of writing, Professor Bilello aims to shape a more competent and sensitive dental care provider.
On Friday February 22 we held our third annual combined meeting of the City Tech General Education Committee and our Living Lab Seminar Fellows. Once again it was an exciting and productive opportunity for collaboration. We focused on small group discussions of questions that face both initiatives right now, centering on the topic of dissemination. How do we promote, share, and collaborate with faculty in our own departments and across the college to disseminate the work of the Gen Ed Committee and the Living Lab project? How can we institutionalize our lessons learned, and continue to learn with and from each other as we strive to improve our students’ educational experiences?
As part of the ongoing conversation about these important issues we thought it would be useful to all to post the notes taken during the meeting here. Please feel free to peruse them, and to use them as a jumping off point for your own conversations with colleagues!
During the first part of the meeting, faculty groups discussed the attributes of 1st and 3rd year students at City Tech and relevant General Education Student Learning Outcomes (SLOs). This year the Living Lab Seminar Fellows are working on strategies for their 1st and 3rd year courses.
Discussion 1 notes from all groups
During the second half of the meeting, the same faculty groups answered and discussed questions about the work of the collegewide General Education and Assessment Committees and the Living Lab Project, with a focus on strategies to further disseminate and implement these initiatives.
Discussion 2 notes from all groups
Last fall, chemistry students tested water quality along the waterfront in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. For the lab component of CHEM 1102 General Chemistry II, student teams collected water from various points in Brooklyn Bridge Park, where one can walk down to and touch (if you dare) the East River. Taking samples back to CityTech labs, student groups performed a series of tests to assess the levels of nitrate and nitrite, water hardness, pH, iron concentration, and the measure of conductivity. Professor Samaroo’s students were able to borrow samples taken pre-storm from students in Professor Ralph Alcendor’s BIO 3302 Microbiology I course, which allowed the chemistry lab students to compare their findings with data from water sampled before the hurricane.
Using New York waterways as an open laboratory, students engaged in an innovative collaborative project and conducted significant research at the undergraduate level. Professor Samaroo demonstrated how local settings could give students experience in field-based research. Moreover, real-world engagement enhanced student learning in the methodologies of data collection and lab analysis, and the production of scientific lab reports. The semester’s research project culminated in a presentation “Analysis of Inorganic Chemicals on Water Quality in Brooklyn:  A Title V Collaborative Project” at CityTech’s Annual Faculty and Student Research Poster Session.
On Friday March 22, the Brooklyn Waterfront Research Center will host a half-day conference on the history, culture, and future of biking in our namesake borough. The conference will bring together local authors, business people, planners and advocates in a conversation about what is happening on our streets and why it matters to Brooklyn and New York City. Hope to see you there!
Viviana Vladutescu and CityTech group at Brookhaven National Lab
For students in Professor Viviana Vladutescu’s EET 3132 Remote Sensing class, a visit to a “real” lab vividly brought together theory and practice.  In the classroom and university labs, students learned the principles of remote sensing techniques, acquired new software knowledge, and gathered and interpreted data as well. As part of their coursework, Professor Vladutescu’s students participated in a departmental field trip to the impressive Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island. With the objective of expanding awareness of the field and encouraging further study in the applied sciences, engineering, and physics, students had the opportunity to observe firsthand the work of technicians, engineers, and scientists. One student noted how unexpected it was to hear a Brookhaven physicist cite the “right hand rule method” that was taught in class, a technique that the student thought was used to “dumb down” content in class when in reality it was a practical trick of the trade.
Students in Professor Vladutescu’s course are enrolled in the Associate or Bachelor degree programs in the Department of Electrical and Telecommunications Engineering Technology (ETET). For many, meeting active professionals helped validate their own academic choices in the ETET programs.   Several students were inspired when they learned that some of the Brookhaven lab technicians graduated with associate degrees too, thus giving them a better sense of the end goals of graduating with a degree from City Tech.  To encourage students to be proactive in their academic and professional careers, Professor Vladutescu’s class website on the OpenLab included links to internships and job opportunities as well as newsfeeds to stay up-to-date on current technology.
Click here for reflections on one of Professor Vladutescu’s field trips.
Guests are served student wine blends in the Janet Lefler Dining Room at City Tech
In honor of Presidents’ Day, it is fitting to showcase a class lesson conducted by Professor Karen Goodlad and Prof. Lynda Dias as guest lecturer’s in Prof. Roger Dagorn’s class, HGMT 4997 Wines of the New World, which ended in a wine presentation to City Tech President Russell Hotzler in the University’s Janet Lefler Dining Room. Students worked in groups to produce new blends and evaluated and voted on which wines to serve in City Tech’s dining room, a veritable lab for students in the Hospitality program. Student teams created blends called “Spicy Brooklyn” or “Charlie’s Angels” by striking a tasty balance of reds such as Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Merlot, and Petit Syrah.  The teams blogged about their experience and various blend formulations on the class website.
This course examines the multi-faceted world of wine, from production to service to economic regulations of wine industries in North America, Australia, New Zealand, Chile, Argentina, and South Africa. Class trips included a memorable one to the local City Winery in Lower Manhattan. In turn, experts from the industry visited the classroom on City Tech campus.
Click here for more photos of Professor Goodlad’s blending lesson.
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.
