{"id":6322,"date":"2011-04-27t08:00:52","date_gmt":"2011-04-27t14:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/?p=6322"},"modified":"2011-04-25t11:08:56","modified_gmt":"2011-04-25t17:08:56","slug":"sotl-symposium-derek-bruff-answers-what-is-sotl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/2011\/04\/sotl-symposium-derek-bruff-answers-what-is-sotl\/","title":{"rendered":"sotl symposium: derek bruff answers ‘what is sotl?’"},"content":{"rendered":"

at the recent sotl symposium<\/a>, cft assistant director, derek bruff, shared his remarks in response to the common question: ‘what is sotl?’<\/em> with the attendees who gathered to listen to, ask questions of, and provide feedback to the group of presenters at the event. derek’s remarks are included here:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/strong>what is sotl?<\/strong> the scholarship of teaching and learning (or sotl) is a way of investigating the nature of the teaching and learning processes in one\u2019s own classroom. \u00a0it\u2019s an activity that\u2019s open to academics from all disciplines, not just those with appointments in schools of education. \u00a0academics in all disciplines teach, and all of us can learn more about our students, their learning, and our own teaching.<\/p>\n

think for a moment about how research and scholarship is done in your discipline, whether that\u2019s mathematics, psychology, engineering, or history. \u00a0you ask questions that are interesting to you and to others in your field. \u00a0you seek to answer those questions by making sense of evidence. \u00a0the kinds of evidence you gather and the ways you make sense of it vary dramatically by discipline, but we all make sense of evidence in one way or another. \u00a0and you share your work with others, so that they can provide you useful feedback on your work and so that they can learn from and build upon your work. \u00a0these three elements\u2014questions, evidence, and \u201cgoing public\u201d\u2014lie at the heart of the scholarship of teaching and learning.<\/p>\n

questions<\/strong> \u2013 the scholarship of teaching and learning involves asking questions about student learning and the teaching that fosters it. \u00a0often those interested in sotl start with a \u201cwhat works?\u201d kind of question\u2014does teaching method x work better than teaching method y? \u00a0however, answering that question involves figuring out what \u201cworks better\u201d means in a particular context. \u00a0that\u2019s a \u201cwhat is?\u201d question\u2014what is happening in my students\u2019 heads right now, before i try some new teaching method? \u00a0some of the best sotl work i\u2019ve seen has shed light on what and how students learn in a particular context. \u00a0that work, in turn, often provides assessment tools useful for answering those \u201cwhat works?\u201d questions.<\/p>\n

evidence <\/strong>\u2013 what kind of evidence is used in sotl? \u00a0it might be quantitative\u2014student exam scores, student ratings of aspects of their learning experience. \u00a0it might be qualitative\u2014observations of students at work, content analyses of student responses to essay questions. \u00a0it might be direct\u2014what, exactly, did student learn? \u00a0it might be indirect\u2014what do students *think* they\u2019ve learned? \u00a0the kind of evidence collected and analyzed in a sotl project depends on the question asked, the learning objectives at play, the format of the learning experience, and the discipline of the investigator. \u00a0in all cases, one of the toughest parts of designing a sotl project is figuring out just what kind of evidence of student learning can be collected that will shed light on the question of inquiry. \u00a0creativity is often required!<\/p>\n

going public<\/strong> \u2013 if i spend my nights and weekends proving mathematical theorems in my garage but i never share my work with other mathematicians, i\u2019m not engaged in mathematical research\u2014i have a math hobby. \u00a0\u201cgoing public\u201d with our work is a key part of what makes it scholarly. \u00a0we invite others to critique our work, and we contribute to the ever-growing body of knowledge in our field. \u00a0by \u201cgoing public\u201d with our teaching, with our questions about student learning and the answers we generate by analyzing evidence of student learning, we treat our teaching as scholarly work, as well. \u00a0when it comes to our teaching, we can learn from each other and we can help each other.<\/p>\n

you can read more about the sotl symposium here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

at the recent sotl symposium, cft assistant director, derek bruff, shared his remarks in response to the common question: ‘what is sotl?’ with the attendees who gathered to listen to, ask questions of, and provide feedback to the group of presenters at the event. derek’s remarks are included here: what is sotl? the scholarship of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":452,"featured_media":6323,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[64],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/cdn.vanderbilt.edu\/vu-wp0\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/59\/2018\/07\/09153743\/sotl3.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6322"}],"collection":[{"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/452"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6322"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6322\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6323"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}