preparing students for the unknown

Preparing students for the unknown

Leslie Reid

Vice-Provost Teaching & Learning

Jay Cross

Professor and Director

College of Discovery, Creativity and Innovation

Taylor Institute for Teaching and Learning

Welcome

Webinar series by University of Calgary scholars

Information presented is a summary of the scholars’ research

Jay Cross

Director of the College of Discovery, Creativity and Innovation in the Taylor Institute of Teaching and Learning, UCalgary

Professor, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine and Cumming School of Medicine

Innovator in human and animal health through research and educational program development, governance, and leadership development

Leslie Reid

Vice-Provost Teaching and Learning

Teaching Professor, Faculty of Science

3M National Teaching Fellow

21st century landscape

What’s changing?

Student needs and demographics

What’s changing?

The Growing Importance of Social Skills in the Labor Market

Deming (2017), The Quarterly Journal of Economics

What’s changing?

Will Robots Take our Children’s Jobs?

Alex WilliamsNew York Times

Dec. 11, 2017

What’s changing? Higher Ed partnerships

Mission U

UCalgary Eyes High strategy

What’s needed?

Old smart: knowing the most, making the fewest mistakes.

New smart: how you think, how you relate to others

New smart behaviors

New smart behaviors:

• Quieting ego

• Managing thinking and emotions

• Reflective listening

• Relating to others

Growth mindset beliefs

• Intelligence and talents can be developed

• Effort is the path to mastery• Mistakes are essential to

learning• Failure is an opportunity to

learn• Feedback is essential to

learning

Expert learners

Transition in focus of education

The Three Rs of the 20th Century

Writing

Reading

Reading

Arithmetic

Skills for the future:World Economic Forum

10 Mar 2016

Jenny Soffel

Website Editor, World Economic Forum

Modes of learning

Experiential learning = learning by doing + reflection

“Lectures are a way of transferring the instructor’s lecture notes to students’ notebooks without passing through the brains of either.”– Eric Mazur

Experiential learning shifts the role of the instructor

Experiential learning comes in many different forms

Modes of learning

Experiential learning = learning by doing + reflection

“Lectures are a way of transferring the instructor’s lecture notes to students’ notebooks without passing through the brains of either.”– Eric Mazur

Authentic learning a type of experiential learning that involves students exploring, discussing, and constructing concepts and

relationships in real-world contexts through projects with audiences and communications appropriate to them

Definition: Authentic learning

Four themes supporting authentic learning are:

1. An activity that involves real-world problems and that mimics the work of professionals; the activity involves presentation of findings to audiences beyond classroom.2. Use of open-ended inquiry, thinking skills and metacognition.3. Students engage in discourse and social learning in a community of learners.4. Students direct their own learning in project work.

Audrey Rule, State University of New York (SUNY) at Oswego, Journal of Authentic Learning

Purpose1) Learning through authentic experiences that enable inter-disciplinary, critical and creative thinking, team-work and innovation

2) Development unit for signaturepedogogies and program design

BackgroundCollege of Discovery, Creativity and Innovation included in 2012 Academic PlanLaunched in 2016 with approval of first courses and recruitment of Director

College of Discovery, Creativity and InnovationTaylor Institute of Teaching and Learning

College of Discovery, Creativity and Innovation authentic learning

UNIV 201/203 Global Challenges coursesTheme: feeding 9 billion people

Student-initiated innovation projects (winter 2017)

• “Up There” vertical farms for northern communities

• Insects as alternative protein• Ugly Food smoothies (food waste

awareness)• Distributed Calgary Food Bank through

Calgary Co-op stores• Student Union Foodbank

The modern university has become a confederation of specialties…

fine arttheatre

economics

history

philosophy

psychology

anthropology

engineeringchemicalelectrical

mechanicalbiomedical

mathbiology

molecularcellular

computer science

physics

medicine

english

communication

commerce

neuroscience

biochemistry

law

ecology

veterinary medicine

agriculture

sociology

…with barriers between disciplines

fine arttheatre

economics

history

philosophy

psychology

anthropology

engineeringchemicalelectrical

mechanicalbiomedical

mathbiology

molecularcellular

computer science

physics

medicine

english

communication

commerce

neuroscience

biochemistry

law

ecology

veterinary medicine

agriculture

sociology

UNIV 201 Global Challenges students go public

Feeding 9 billion people dinnerMarch 14, 2017

“Failing Successfully” panelNovember 9, 2017

Authentic learning through partnership with high schools

High school students focus on the year 2050 and develop innovation projects, workshop with mentors at Banff Centre

• Pilot: Strathcona-TweedsmuirSchool (AB), Appleby College (ON), Lower Canada College (QC), Rothesay Netherwood (NB)

• October 2016 launch and summit April 9 to 14, 2017

The innovation itself is not the goal, it is the motivation for learning…

The innovation ’pitch’ is not the end but rather an inflection point for learning

Lear

nin

g

Time

ReflectionRefinement

X‘the pitch’

• Reasoning• Connectivity of issues • Real-world inquiry• Source validation• Critical reflections• Perspectives shaped

by disciplines and culture

Discover Create Innovate

• Connection with communityCommunication

• Validation • Refinement

• Ideation• Refinement• Collaboration

Authentic experience, not content, as the driver of learning

This practice is similar in the arts, science, business…

critical

design

collaborativenumerical

systems

growth mindset

world views

thinking

thinkingentrepreneurial

U Calgary Eyes High strategy: Foundational commitments

Innovation feels risky but the rewards are great

1. Student engagement 2. Re-invigoration of instructors

Thank you

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