When I was growing up, it was considered rude to offer unsolicited advice. I never, ever, gave advice to others unless I was specifically asked. People had to actually say, “Could you give me some advice on this?” I felt, “Who am I to advise this person? What do I really know anyway?”
I felt that way in high school, in college, in grad school, as a post-doc, as an assistant professor, as an associate professor.
Author Archives: administrator
Blurred Lines of Plagiarism
What is plagiarism?
Has this become a blurry concept?
Plagiarism is “appropriating” someone else’s words and ideas without acknowledging them and, instead, passing them off as one’s own. Some definitions add in there the word “intentional”. Plagiarism is unethical, dishonest and a “high crime” in academia.
Managing a Class Discussion- Part II
All I could hear was the hum and rattle of the window heating system as my small groups of introductory biology students were supposed to be discussing a fairly exciting article about the evolution of blind cave fish (isn’t that inherently kinda cool and thrilling? Who wouldn’t have lots to say about blind cavefish?). It was like this every time I tried discussions or small group activities. Here it was the seventh week into the semester and I was at my wits’ end.
Managing a Class Discussion- Part I
A host of engaging teaching techniques, many of them encouraged in this blog, involve class discussion or small group discussions. By actively engaging students in the classroom, by having them talk with each other about the course material, our students learn better, retain more and find stronger connections between the course material and their lives. But, not all discussions are equally beneficial.
A Tale of a Compulsion to Cheat
She had been sick last week and so was taking a make-up exam in the conference room, her back to me through the glass window, hunched low over the stapled packet of exam questions. I had asked her to leave her coat and backpack in the department office and had told her I would check in on her every 30 minutes or so in case she had questions. Each time I looked in, she looked visibly more distressed: red-rimmed eyes, a thin sheen on her forehead, her hair mussed and tangled from running her fingers through it over and over.