Welcome to the Intentional Teaching newsletter! I'm Derek Bruff, educator and author. The name of this newsletter is a reminder that we should be intentional in how we teach, but also in how we develop as teachers over time. I hope this newsletter will be a valuable part of your professional development as an educator.
AI-enhanced learning on a bonus podcast episode, plus birdwatching!
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Surprise! I have another podcast episode for you this week. Usually I release episodes every other Tuesday, but I've been talking to too many interesting people lately! I'm taking the Intentional Teaching podcast weekly for the month of April to catch up on my backlog of interviews. AI-Enhanced Learning with Pary FassihiThis week I have another fantastic interview about teaching with AI. Pary Fassihi is a senior lecturer in the College of Arts and Sciences Writing Program at Boston University. She's been at the leading edge of teaching with technology since I met way back in 2007 or so. In fact, she's one of the instructors I profiled in my first book, Teaching with Classroom Response Systems, about her use of "clickers" in language instruction. Pary is part of a program at Boston University piloting AI-intensive writing, research, and inquiry courses. Pary and the other participating faculty have been paired with AI affiliates, undergraduate students with expertise in generative AI, who help them develop and implement new AI-enhanced activities and assignments. Also, Boston has picked up the tab for ChatGPT Plus subscriptions for all the students in these courses. The goal of the program is help instructors find ways to "incorporate AI into their teaching ethically, responsibly, and effectively," and then have those instructors share what they've learned with Boston and beyond. After reading some of Pary's posts on LinkedIn about the AI-enhanced activities and assignments in her courses this spring, I reached out to her to see if she would share her explorations on the podcast. In the interview, she talks about having students make art with AI (and reflect on the experience), using ChatGPT as a robot peer reviewer for student work, getting AI to help students with course readings, and more. I was impressed with the thoughtfulness and creativity Pary has brought to her AI-enhanced courses this spring, and I think you will be, too. She also has a charming story about the first time she realized she wanted to be an educator. You can listen to my conversation with Pary Fassihi here, or search for "Intentional Teaching" in your favorite podcast app. Thanks for reading!That's it for this week's newsletter. Between travel and illness, it's been quite a week in the Bruff household. But I'll leave you with a couple of migrating warblers I saw in Radnor Lake here in Nashville yesterday. If you found this newsletter useful, please forward it to a colleague who might like it! That's one of the best ways you can support the work I'm doing here at Intentional Teaching. |
Intentional Teaching with Derek Bruff
Welcome to the Intentional Teaching newsletter! I'm Derek Bruff, educator and author. The name of this newsletter is a reminder that we should be intentional in how we teach, but also in how we develop as teachers over time. I hope this newsletter will be a valuable part of your professional development as an educator.
Programming Note: You might have noticed that there wasn't a new episode of Intentional Teaching in your podcast player this week. I aim for a biweekly release schedule, posting new episodes every other Tuesday. That didn't happen this week, mainly because I'm still catching up on work after being away for a week of fall break. I have a couple of fantastic interviews recorded, however, so look for a new episode in your feed next Tuesday. And since I didn't post a new podcast episode this...
Not Your Default Chatbot: Teaching Applications of Custom AI Agents As I've mentioned here, I've been working this fall with a number of faculty at the University of Virginia and elsewhere who are experimenting with custom AI chatbots in their teaching. So when OneHE reached out to ask me about doing an AI-related webinar next month, I thought it would be a great chance to share some of what my colleagues and I are learning about teaching applications of custom agents! Here's the abstract for...
Peer and AI Review of Student Writing Peer review is a signature pedagogy of writing instruction. What happens when you take that established structure and add in a layer of AI-generated feedback on student writing? You get PAIRR: Peer and AI Review and Reflection, an approach to integrating AI into writing instruction developed by a team of faculty at California public institutions. On the podcast this week, I talk with two members of that team, Marit MacArthur and Anna Mills. They share how...