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Building a culture of teaching innovation

Sarah Vanderveen — Mon, 25 Aug 2025 14:24:33 +0000

UM is pleased to announce the funding of five innovative projects through the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) Support Fund. This fund provides opportunities for professors, instructors, and librarians to engage in SoTL research that increases knowledge in teaching pedagogy and learning.

Guided by MomentUM: Leading Change Together, UM is committed to empowering learners through dynamic learning experiences that meet the needs of an increasingly diverse student body. Investing in SoTL enables instructors and faculty members to examine their teaching practices, incorporate evidence-based findings, and ultimately, improve student success.

The 2025 SoTL Support Fund has awarded five Seed projects, a stream within the scaffolded-funding program which supports time-limited and innovative new teaching and learning research ideas with a budget of up to $6000. These projects span a range of disciplines, each offering an innovative approach to advancing research-based teaching and learning at UM.

Empowering Statistical Minds: Data Exploration for Student Engagement

Project lead: Hina Shaheen, Department of Statistics, Faculty of Science

Bridging the gap between theoretical statistical concepts and real-world applications can be challenging for many Statistics students. Traditional lecture-based approaches often encourage rote memorization of formulas rather than deep understanding. This project will introduce small-group, collaborative experiments using real-world databases, promoting active learning through data exploration and statistical decision-making. The hands-on problem-solving activities aim to strengthen students’ analytical reasoning, decision-making, and statistical interpretation skills. Analysis of students’ behavioural, emotional, and social engagement outcomes will inform and support ongoing initiatives aimed at enhancing student success and career readiness.

Live Podcasting in Teacher Education: Amplifying Engagement, Dialogue, and Multimodal Literacies

Project lead: Amir Michalovich, Department of Curriculum, Teaching and Learning, Faculty of Education

This project examines the extent to which live podcasting in class can cultivate engaging, dialogic, and multimodal classroom discussions for students in teacher education. Given the rapid advancement of generative AI, it is increasingly important to explore classroom-based assignments involving students co-developing and demonstrating their knowledge. While some research has explored the use of pre-recorded or edited podcasts in post-secondary education, it has rarely examined digital multimodal assignments conducted live in class. This study addresses that gap by exploring how these tools can impact student engagement with course content, participation in dialogic learning, and development of communicative skills across multimodal literacies (e.g., speaking, listening, writing, viewing, and representing).

Team-based collaborative learning from the head to the toes to better health for all

Project lead: Dr. Laura MacDonald, Dental Hygiene, Dr. Gerald Niznick College of Dentistry, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences

This project pilots an interprofessional team-based collaborative experiential learning program aimed at facilitating the integration of oral health within comprehensive health care. It will examine students’ perspectives of a novel interprofessional education (IPE) initiative delivered in a dental clinic setting. Both existing research and the outcomes of a recent Rady Faculty of Health Sciences interprofessional simulation indicate a persistent gap in incorporating oral health within comprehensive health-care practice. Situating this intervention within a dental clinic is intended to help health professional students connect oral health with overall health and roles and responsibilities to ensure comprehensive health care. Findings will offer curriculum IPE developers valuable insights into the key traits students believe support interprofessional collaboration competencies, specifically relationship-focused care, clearly defined roles and responsibilities, and collaborative leadership.

Case-Based Learning in Landscape Architecture and Environmental Design

Project co-leads: Yuhao Lu, Department of Landscape Architecture and Mark Meagher, Environmental Design Program

In landscape architecture and design education, students often struggle to build and apply an accurate vocabulary for describing spatial patterns. Relying solely on memorized definitions limits students’ abilities to recognize or articulate design intensions in new contexts. Applying case-based learning principles, which emphasize that deeper understanding emerges from exposure to concrete examples, this project will give students access to real-world cases in the form of project drawings and photographs. A curated collection of design patterns and vocabulary will be developed from an extensive database of precedents and enhanced through state-of-the-art machine learning. Students will submit their own sketches, which the system will analyze to generate key vocabulary terms to describe the patterns and examples of related patterns across multiple design disciplines. Pre- and post-project surveys will assess the tool’s impact on students’ design literacy, pattern recognition, and communicative competence.

Collaborative Proof Writing: Enhancing Mathematical Understanding and Communication Skills Through Group-Based Learning

Project lead: Jamie de Jong, Department of Mathematics, Faculty of Science

Writing mathematical proofs can be a significant challenge for undergraduate students, who must shift from the computational problem-solving emphasized in high school to the formal reasoning required in university mathematics. This project will evaluate the effectiveness of targeted in-class group activities designed to strengthen both mathematical understanding and communication. The activities will focus on analyzing and writing mathematical proofs, with opportunities for immediate feedback from both instructors and peers. While peer feedback is well-established in writing-intensive fields, its application in proof-based mathematics is limited. Surveys and assessments of student performance will be used to measure the effectiveness of this teaching approach.

Learn more about how UM is supporting teaching excellence.

The Centre for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning June Workshops

Nicolas Tamayo — Fri, 16 May 2025 14:47:15 +0000

Check out the variety of workshops scheduled for June, offered by The Centre for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning!

Revitalize Your Teaching: Accessible Learning

This series of four 60-minute sessions aimed at faculty and instructors at all experience levels in Rady Health Sciences. Each session offers practical strategies on a range of topics relevant to teaching, including strategies for assignment design that offer students greater levels of clarity, developing your teaching-centered Personal Reconciliation Action Plan, checking in with accessible learning design, and staying motivated and creative when it comes to including active learning in your lesson planning.

This session will outline the Accessibility for Manitobans Act – Information and Communication Standard. We will review strategies and tools available to align with this legislation.

Experiential Learning Community of Practice Brown Bag Lunch Conversations: Learning from Experiential Learning Challenges

Bring your lunch and connect with other members of our community of practice! There is no formal agenda for these casual meetings just good people and conversation! Everyone is welcome to share their thoughts and experiences as we explore different topics in experiential learning.

Topic: Have you ever introduced an experiential activity in your class that didn’t unfold as expected? Anyone who has engaged in experiential learning knows that setbacks are inevitable. Let’s take this opportunity to reflect on our “flops,” not as failures, but as valuable learning moments—reminding ourselves that not every activity is a triumph, and that’s part of the process.

Revitalize Your Teaching: A Teaching & Learning Reconciliation Action Plan

This session will introduce attendees to strategies required for developing your teaching-centered Personal Reconciliation Action Plan.

Manitoba Open Education Symposium

UM Libraries is working with Campus Manitoba and other Manitoba post-secondary institutions to organize the Manitoba Open Education Symposium — with the theme of Open Horizons: Affordability and Access through Open Education.

We’re inviting faculty, staff and students to join us for engaging discussions on how to build an open and accessible education system that fosters digital innovation, cross-institutional collaboration, and student affordability.

Keynote speakers include Amanda Coolidge, executive director, BCcampus, and Robert Luke, CEO, eCampusOntario. Apurva Ashok, executive director of the Rebus Foundation will be facilitating workshops on “Creating OER with Students” and “DEI in Open Publishing.”

Registration and program details can be found here

Designing Accessible and Engaging Online Courses

In this engaging 3-hour workshop, university faculty and instructors will explore practical aspects of designing online courses. Participants will engage in hands-on activities to develop learner personas, apply constructive alignment, and integrate UDL principles, focusing on decolonizing and accessible design approaches. Guided by real-time facilitation, participants will create course blueprints that align learning outcomes with active learning and assessment strategies. They will be empowered to craft a targeted, interactive, and inclusive course that prioritizes learners’ agency.

This workshop is part of The Centre’s Online Learning Institute. No prerequisite workshops required.

Revitalize Your Teaching: Keeping Active Learning Fresh and Fun

Whether you are flipping a day or two in your upcoming courses, or just looking for new active learning strategies to add to your toolbox, this session on ‘Keeping Active Learning Fresh and Fun’ will help you continue to add to your repertoire of activities and options.

What’s Working, What’s Not?: Shake Hands with the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL)

All instructors identify problems in their courses. Whether students’ struggles to master a key concept or a teaching practice that may not be meeting its purpose, how do we explore “what’s working and what’s not” in our courses? In this workshop we will explore problems that are ripe for investigation and consider how SoTL (the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning) practices might help us to systematically evaluate the impact of intervention strategies. To participate fully, please bring a smartphone, tablet, or laptop.

Developing Accessible and Engaging Courses in UM Learn

Ready to enhance your online teaching with a course that’s clear, interactive, and accessible? Join us for a hands-on workshop where you’ll learn how to create student-friendly course modules using UM Learn and other UM-supported tools. Whether you’re just getting started or looking to refine your approach, this workshop will equip you with practical strategies to develop inclusive and engaging online learning environments.

This workshop is part of The Centre’s Online Learning Institute. No prerequisite workshops required.

Facilitating Online with Confidence and Care

This workshop empowers faculty members to translate and build on their teaching expertise, in the online environment by applying and using inclusive facilitation practices, active learning strategies, accessible technologies, and evidence-based approaches, including decolonial and relational methods to foster meaningful connection, engagement, and equity in digital spaces.

This workshop is part of The Centre’s Online Learning Institute. No prerequisite workshops required.

Universal Design for Learning in Practice: Integrated Accommodations and Incorporating SAS Accommodations to Design Inclusive Classrooms

In an ongoing monthly series, participants will review discreet elements of Universal Design (UDL) for Learning and work together to develop pedagogical practices that align with the UDL principle being discussed that month.

This session will focus on the Integrated Accommodations initiative. This initiative is a collaboration between Student Accessibility Services and The Centre for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning and is meant to help instructors design SAS accommodations into their courses. Courses with integrated accommodations are registered with SAS, removing the need for further accommodations within that specific course. Attendees will learn about the philosophy and benefits behind this initiative as well as how to take part.

Science of Teaching and Learning Laboratory Open House

Nicolas Tamayo — Wed, 30 Apr 2025 16:00:43 +0000

Join us at the Centre for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning (65 Dafoe Road) on Tuesday, May 13, 2025, from 9:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. for an exciting Open House at the newly renovated Science of Teaching and Learning Laboratories. This event offers a fantastic opportunity for faculty and students to connect with the Science of Teaching and Learning Team, share ideas for teaching and learning research, and explore cutting-edge educational technologies.

Event Highlights:

Interactive Discussions: Engage with the Science of Teaching and Learning Team about your research interests, explore potential collaborations, and learn how we can support your teaching and learning projects.
Technology Demonstrations: Discover innovative tools such as virtual reality, eye-tracking, facial expression analysis, and more.
Networking Opportunities: Connect with fellow educators and researchers who are passionate about advancing the scholarship of teaching and learning.
Light Refreshments: Enjoy coffee, tea, and cookies while you mingle and explore the space.

Location: Lower Level, 65 Dafoe Road

Don’t miss this opportunity to begin—or continue—your journey with a dynamic and forward-thinking teaching and learning research community. We look forward to seeing you there!

Discover the Power of Teaching and Learning Scholarship at the 2025 SoTL Symposium

Sarah Vanderveen — Mon, 21 Apr 2025 14:09:37 +0000

Faculty and instructors are invited to attend the 2025 Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) Symposium, where innovation and education come together!

Sponsored by the Provost and Vice-President (Academic) and hosted by The Centre for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning, this annual interdisciplinary event celebrates the impactful research of SoTL Support Fund recipients, highlighting innovative approaches to improve student learning.

Why attend?

Whether you’re just beginning to explore the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning or looking to refresh your teaching practice, the SoTL Symposium has something for you.

The event showcases the teaching and learning research findings of SoTL Support Fund recipients – colleagues who are using scholarly inquiry to improve their teaching and elevate student success.

Join us on May 29 to hear their insights, exchange ideas, and connect with a vibrant community of educators and researchers dedicated to transforming learning experiences at UM!

Keynote presentation

This year’s symposium will feature Dr. Andrea Webb from the University of British Columbia as the keynote. Dr. Webb is currently co-directing a multinational SSHRC-funded project, Narrative Art and Visual Storytelling in Holocaust and Human Rights Education. As Chair of SoTL Canada, she plays a key role in shaping national conversations on scholarly teaching and in supporting a vibrant community of educators committed to enhancing student learning through reflective and research-informed approaches. Dr. Webb worked as a high school teacher for ten years before transitioning to a teacher educator in post-secondary education. Her research interests include Threshold Concepts, the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, and Social Sciences Teacher Education.

Event details and registration

Date: Thursday, May 29

Time: 9 a.m. – 2:30 p.m.

Location: Marshall McLuhan Hall, Room 204 UMSU University Centre, Fort Garry Campus

Light breakfast, lunch refreshments will be served.

Reducing barriers to supporting international students

Janelle Sumner — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 20:12:14 +0000

International students face unique challenges adapting to living and studying abroad. The success rate of many international student can be improved by accessing UM resources and supports. Yet, international students’ stereotype of how Canadian faculty, staff, and students stereotype them, a metastereotype, can be barrier to them seeking supports.

Join us Thursday, March 6, 2025, for the third session of the Teaching and Learning Research Colloquium Series. Dr. Matthew Quesnel [B.A./13, M.A./15, Ph.D./20] (The Centre for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning) will share his research examining the connection between international students’ metastereotypes and seeking out peer support and support services offered by their postsecondary institutions. Quesnel will share his research findings and explore how they can inform strategies for fostering a more inclusive campus environment, promoting accessing UM support resources, and improve academic success and well-being for international students.

The Teaching and Learning Colloquium Series, hosted by The Centre for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning, supports educators in creating a learning environment that responds to the changing needs of learners and strengthens student supports. It provides a platform for UM scholars and educators to share knowledge, research, and success stories to empower learners.

The series was designed “to provide an opportunity for faculty and higher education professionals to gather and talk about students’ support needs, barriers students may face in seeking help, and effective strategies for supporting and enhancing student learning,” says Quesnel, Teaching and Learning Colloquium Series chair.

Location: Room 325, Education Building

Date: Thursday, March 6, 2025

Time: 1:00 p.m. to 2:00 p.m.

Session details: 25-minute presentation, followed by discussion and refreshments.

Designed with care: Series encourages change to build a more supportive UM

JJ Cloutier — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 15:07:13 +0000

This new series, called Pedagogies of Care, shows how different expertise, initiatives or pedagogies work together to create inclusive and engaging courses and programs. The creators and facilitators recognize that treating the students holistically, with their well-being in mind, will help contribute to a sustainable future for UM.

Join one or all of the four 50-minute sessions designed for professors, instructors and graduate students committed to exploring Pedagogies of Care. Sessions are standalone and alternate between in-person (Fort Garry) and remote modalities. Whether you’re teaching in-person or in an online format, this series will equip you with pedagogical approaches that cultivate caring and inclusive educational spaces.

The design of this workshop series embraces the same attributes the workshop aims to infuse into faculty teaching practices across UM. Each session will provide practical tools for creating inclusive, engaging, and empowering learning environments. The facilitators will look to learn from the participants on how the community wants to be supported.

“This series will engage in a conversation around Pedagogies of Care and how they can be practiced at the university” explained John Bevan [MA/21] facilitator and educational developer from the Teaching Initiatives and Innovation Team. As a change agent “Pedagogies of Care allows for us to be flexible and adaptable and recognizes that the individual contexts in which students learn are an important factor in their learning.” adds Dr. Lori Doan [BA(Hons)/05, MA/07, PhD/14] facilitator from the Science of Teaching and Learning team.

Pedagogies of Care was sparked by Cintia Costa, senior educational developer on the Programs and Curriculum Development Team, who saw the need to incorporate neuroscience into learning strategies workshops. What began as a single workshop grew after Costa’s team lead suggested connecting with Doan. A casual conversation with a colleague about upcoming projects had Bevan eagerly joining the series to contribute his skill. Each facilitator helped shape the workshop into a four-part offering, focused on changing to a more caring teaching environment.

While this series does not directly address faculty wellness or care, Costa believes there are indirect benefits of Pedagogies of Care in changing classrooms: “it will be better for instructors, faculty, and professors if they see that their students feel safe to ask questions instead of feeling afraid. I have a feeling that the classroom atmosphere is going to feel lighter and more supportive”

This workshop series hosted by The Centre for Advancement of Teaching and Learning continues our support of Empowering Learners. By identifying flexible practices to incorporate into courses, it will help us move towards a more supportive and sustainable education system.

Our February storytelling theme, Agents of Change, highlights those driving meaningful change in their communities and beyond. Through bold ideas and actions, these change-makers challenge the status quo, spark transformation, and shape a better future.

Pedagogies of Care series – Winter Term 2025

Cultivating Liberatory Spaces

Date and time: Tuesday, February 4, 2:00 p.m. to 2:50 p.m.

Location: Remote – UM Zoom

Description: This session with focus on key elements of relational and emancipatory teaching approaches that foster inclusivity and empowerment in the classroom.

Universal Design – Curb Cutting the Academy

Date and time: Tuesday, February 25, 1:00 p.m. to 1:50 p.m.

Location: Room 223 – The Centre (65 Dafoe Road)

Description: This session with focus learning activities that incorporate Universal Design for Learning (UDL) principles, evaluate existing course materials improvement opportunities.

Science of Learning – Firing and Wiring the Neurons

Date and time: Thursday, March 13, 10:00 a.m. to 10:50 a.m.

Location: Remote – UM Zoom

Description: This session will focus on how the brain processes information and that influences learning and memory retention. Then they will explore brain-based strategies to generate environments that enhance cognitive engagement and student learning.

Bringing it All Together – Sharing Our Stories

Date and time: Tuesday, April 1, 2:00 p.m. to 2:50 p.m.

Location: Room 223 – The Centre (65 Dafoe Road)

Description: Participants will create an integrated teaching approach based on their experiences over series or insights from their classrooms.

Start your new journey in teaching with the enhanced and flexible Graduate Teaching Program

JJ Cloutier — Wed, 29 Jan 2025 14:28:21 +0000

Are you ready start your journey in teaching? Learn the foundations of post-secondary teaching and learning in Canada with the Graduate Teaching Program (GTP). The program is grounded in principles of inclusivity, Indigenous knowledge and teachings. It brings greater flexibility and choice to students while creating comprehensive journey for aspiring educators.

Registration for the Winter 2025 cohort of the GTP opens on February 4, 2025, with a limit of 200 spots.

Learn about teaching at your own pace by combining foundational modules, elective modules and an optional capstone to build your own path to success. Students can select to pursue individual courses (with digital badges) or complete the program with a capstone project. The modules are fully online in UM Learn. Renato Bezerra, a PhD candidate in Engineering Education, participated in the 2024 pilot and found the experience to be unique compared to others. Bezerra described it as “more relaxed, welcoming, and meaningful. Relaxed because it was self-paced with enough time to complete it; welcoming because of the friendly tone and relatable nature of the content; and more meaningful because the assessment allowed me to connect the learnings from the GTP with my previous experiences and knowledge.”

The GTP program not only helps build classroom skills but also equips participants with a broad set of abilities that can be applied to further their career in other ways. Dr. Ruchira Nandasiri, a Post Doctoral Fellow in Food and Human Nutritional Sciences, used skills developed in the GTP program to apply for the McCall MacBain Postdoctoral Fellows Teaching & Leadership Program at McMaster University. Nandasiri explains “The GTP program, particularly its emphasis on inclusive teaching practices and cultural awareness, has helped me refine my application and better articulate my approach to teaching and research. The McCall McBain Fellowship places a strong emphasis on teaching excellence and the ability to engage postdoctoral fellows from diverse backgrounds, both of which are areas I have worked to strengthen through the GTP program”

Nandasiri is one of only twenty fellows selected for the McMaster program this term. Nandasiri believes the GTP has “positioned me to take on more leadership roles in academia and contribute meaningfully to creating inclusive, student-centered learning environments.”

The GTP program was revamped to improve access, recognize the diverse needs of graduate students, and foster their success as part of The Centre for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning’s continued commitment to empowering learners. Strengthening graduate student teaching skills is one way The Centre is helping build an exceptional student experience at UM.

Registration

Registration opens on February 4th, 2025, and will be limited to 200 students for the Winter term. To register and learn more about the graduate teaching program, please visit the GTP website.