What makes a great teacher great? Who are the professors students remember long after graduation? This book, the conclusion of a fifteen-year study of nearly one hundred college teachers in a wide variety of fields and universities, offers valuable answers for all educators. The short answer is—it’s not what teachers do, it’s what they understand. Lesson plans and lecture notes matter less than the special way teachers comprehend the subject and value human learning. Whether historians or physicists, in El Paso or St. Paul, the best teachers know their subjects inside and out—but they also know how to engage and challenge students and to provoke impassioned responses. Most of all, they believe two things fervently: that teaching matters and that students can learn. In stories both humorous and touching, Ken Bain describes examples of ingenuity and compassion, of students’ discoveries of new ideas and the depth of their own potential. What the Best College Teachers Do is a treasure trove of insight and inspiration for first-year teachers and seasoned educators.

Shows where and how exemplary teaching is practiced in US higher education and charts a course for cultivating teaching improvement throughout all types of institutions. Great College Teaching highlights where and how exemplary teaching is practiced in U.S. higher education and charts a course for cultivating teaching improvement throughout all types of institutions. As Corbin M. Campbell reveals in this incisive work, although teaching quality is rarely reflected in college rankings such as those produced by U.S. News and World Report, this metric has implications not only for student outcomes such as subject-matter knowledge and preparation for careers but also for college prestige, educational equity, and even democracy. Campbell draws from a multi-institutional observational study that covered more than 700 higher education courses in a range of contexts, from regional public universities to highly ranked private universities, from small liberal arts colleges to large flagship universities. She examines what each type of institution typically excels at and where they often fall short. In mapping the terrain of teaching quality in higher education today, Campbell parses out the best practices of exemplary teaching institutions, in which evidenced-based practices such as equity-based and culturally relevant teaching support student learning, and teaching-supportive institutions, in which policies and cultures prioritize teaching and promote faculty development. This clear-eyed work provides options for enacting real, sustainable teaching improvements by using individual, collegial, and organizational levers to shift perceptions and priorities around teaching. The actionable practices and policies suggested in Great College Teaching can be adopted by academic leaders, administrators, and faculty developers to improve teaching within a spectrum of academic contexts, across multiple disciplines, and for various course settings.

Teaching at Its Best This third edition of the best-selling handbook offers faculty at all levels an essential toolbox of hundreds of practical teaching techniques, formats, classroom activities, and exercises, all of which can be implemented immediately. This thoroughly revised edition includes the newest portrait of the Millennial student; current research from cognitive psychology; a focus on outcomes maps; the latest legal options on copyright issues; and how to best use new technology including wikis, blogs, podcasts, vodcasts, and clickers. Entirely new chapters include subjects such as matching teaching methods with learning outcomes, inquiry-guided learning, and using visuals to teach, and new sections address Felder and Silverman's Index of Learning Styles, SCALE-UP classrooms, multiple true-false test items, and much more. Praise for the Third Edition of Teaching at Its BestEveryone veterans as well as novices will profit from reading Teaching at Its Best, for it provides both theory and practical suggestions for handling all of the problems one encounters in teaching classes varying in size, ability, and motivation." Wilbert McKeachie, Department of Psychology, University of Michigan, and coauthor, McKeachie's Teaching TipsThis new edition of Dr. Nilson's book, with its completely updated material and several new topics, is an even more powerful collection of ideas and tools than the last. What a great resource, especially for beginning teachers but also for us veterans!" L. Dee Fink, author, Creating Significant Learning ExperiencesThis third edition of Teaching at Its Best is successful at weaving the latest research on teaching and learning into what was already a thorough exploration of each topic. New information on how we learn, how students develop, and innovations in instructional strategies complement the solid foundation established in the first two editions." Marilla D. Svinicki, Department of Psychology, The University of Texas, Austin, and coauthor, McKeachie's Teaching Tips

Using empirical research this text gives faculty and graduate teaching assistants the tools for understanding why certain teaching practices work and how to adjust their teaching to changing classroom room and online environments.

Praise for Inspired College Teaching "The thoughtfulness, personalization, and consideration Maryellen Weimer demonstrates in discussing the experience of faculty members; her ability to identify issues that are shared and solvable; and her suggestions and solutions to commonly experienced stressors and difficulties in college teaching are major strengths of this volume. In addition, her personal and professional reflections on her long career as a faculty member, writer, and faculty developer expose tantalizing research questions that young education researchers might want to examine. The originality of this volume is its exploration of and reflection on a faculty member's career from a long-term perspective. The focus on iterative self and course renewal is personal and thus practical. In a way, it is a 'workshop between book covers' or perhaps several workshops!" Laura L. B. Border, director, Graduate Teacher Program and Collaborative Preparing Future Faculty Network, University of Colorado at Boulder "A book by Maryellen Weimer always displays her wonderful grasp of the literature on college teaching and learning, her ability to tell good stories, and her wit and wisdom. This one is no exception." Nancy Van Note Chism, professor, Indiana University School of Education, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis "Although I work at a faculty teaching center and encounter many books on teaching, I have seen very few that span the full arc of the teaching career and what steps can be taken at each stage in order to retain vitality all the way through the way that this book does. I look forward to getting my own copy and using it as a resource in the faculty development activities of my center. It will have a wide readership." Mano Singham, University Center for Innovation in Teaching and Education, Case Western Reserve University

What makes a good college teacher? This book provides an evidence- based answer to that question by presenting a set of "model teaching characteristics" that define what makes a good college teacher. Based on six fundamental areas of teaching competency known as Model Teaching Characteristics outlined by The Society for the Teaching of Psychology (STP), this book describes how college faculty from all disciplines and at all levels of experience can use these characteristics to evaluate, guide, and improve their teaching. Evidence based research supports the inclusion of each characteristic, each of which is illustrated through example, to help readers master the skills. Readers learn to evaluate their teaching abilities by providing guidance on what to document and how to accumulate and organize the evidence. Two introductory chapters outline the model teaching characteristics followed by six chapters, each devoted to one of the characteristics: training, instructional methods, course content, assessment, syllabus construction, and student evaluations. The book: -Features in each chapter self-evaluation surveys that help readers identify gaps between the model characteristics and their own teaching, case studies that illustrate common teaching problems, discussion questions that encourage critical thinking, and additional readings for further exploration. -Discusses the need to master teaching skills such as collaborative learning, listening, and using technology as well as discipline-specific knowledge. -Advocates for the use of student-learning outcomes to help teachers better evaluate student performance based on their achievement of specific learning goals. -Argues for the development of learning objectives that reflect the core of the discipline‘s theories and applications, strengthen basic liberal arts skills, and infuse ethical and diversity issues. -Discusses how to solicit student feedback and utilize these evaluations to improve teaching. Intended for professional development or teacher training courses offered in masters and doctoral programs in colleges and universities, this book is also an invaluable resource for faculty development centers, college and university administrators, and college teachers of all levels and disciplines, from novice to the most experienced, interested in becoming more effective teachers.