Summer Digital Teaching & Learning Series
The 2023 Summer Digital Teaching and Learning Series will run from August 21-23, 2023. Sessions will take place online, via Zoom.
This year’s series is organized around the theme Engaging and Inclusive Digital Learning, and will feature 3 tracks:
- Teaching and Learning with Generative AI
- Digital Storytelling
- Games and Learning
Each track will have 3 sessions; see below for individual session details. Participants who attend all 3 sessions in a track will receive a certificate of completion.
The strategies and approaches introduced in these sessions can be implemented in multiple modalities, including in primarily on-ground courses, hybrid courses, and fully online courses. So no matter in what modality you are teaching this fall, you’ll find ideas to support student learning in your course.
HOW DO I REGISTER?
There is one registration form that covers all the tracks and individual sessions. You can register for as many or as few individual sessions as you would like, within a track, or across tracks. Participants who attend all of the sessions in a particular track will receive a certificate of completion for that track.
Check out individual session details, which include times and dates, by clicking to expand the track titles below. Click the “Register Now” button below to open the registration form (form will open in a new tab).
Generative AI has been positioned as a disruptive force for education and beyond, as faculty, staff, and students grapple with the implications for the use of generative AI in their teaching, learning, and work. In these sessions, you’ll: learn about how generative AI models work; consider the appropriate uses of generative AI in the classroom, and design assignments that build on appropriate uses; and explore practical applications of generative AI to enhance productivity for faculty and students.
What You Should Know About Language Models & Generative AI
Monday, August 21, 2023
12:30-1:30 pm Pacific / 3:30-4:30 pm Eastern
Online via Zoom
Session Facilitator: Middlebury College Assistant Professor of Computer Science, Dr. Phil Chodrow
This session is a brief overview on generative language models. We’ll begin by describing the two technical tasks that underlie contemporary language models, next-token prediction and reinforcement learning with human feedback. We’ll then turn a critical eye towards claims about the capabilities of these models, especially those propagated by large tech corporations. We’ll close with a discussion of the impacts of language models on labor, the environment, artistic production, and cultural representation.
Generative AI in the Classroom: Establishing Expectations & Designing Assessments
Tuesday, August 22, 2023
12:30-1:30 pm Pacific / 3:30-4:30 pm Eastern
Online via Zoom
How do we deal with generative AI in our classrooms? This session will focus on establishing expectations with students for what is appropriate and inappropriate use of generative AI, making those expectations clear via the syllabus, and designing assessments that help students show what they are learning with and without the support of generative AI. This session will not focus on preventing or policing its use in the classroom, but instead on guiding students’ appropriate use of generative AI.
Supporting Faculty and Student Work with Generative AI
Wednesday, August 23, 2023
12:30-1:30 pm Pacific / 3:30-4:30 pm Eastern
Online via Zoom
This session will explore practical applications of generative AI to enhance productivity for faculty and students. We will focus on leveraging generative AI as a tool for streamlining various tasks and processes, rather than its applications in teaching and learning (though these uses will intersect). Participants will gain insights into automated content generation, data analysis, intelligent research assistants, and project management tools powered by generative AI.You should expect to work with at least one generative AI tool during this session to explore its capabilities.
Storytelling facilitates connections between people and ideas, and links the past, present, and future. Storytelling also can advance understanding of complex ideas, and promote inclusion and diversity in the classroom.
While digital storytelling has its roots in video production, today it makes use of a wide range of technologies. It can be a compelling and powerful learning approach for any academic discipline or topic.
In this series of workshops, we offer an introduction to digital storytelling and ways to structure and assess digital storytelling activities. You’ll practice designing and building out a short digital story in two different platforms (ArcGIS StoryMaps and Pressbooks), and we’ll explore rubrics for assessing digital stories. We’ll also spend time discussing your questions and needs, including what type of digital storytelling projects you’re considering implementing (or have already implemented) in your classroom.
Introduction to Digital Storytelling
Monday, August 21, 2023
9:00-10:00 am Pacific / noon-1:00 pm Eastern
Online via Zoom
This workshop will provide an introduction to digital storytelling, including discussing what types of digital storytelling activities you’ve used in the past or are considering using. Then we’ll talk through different pedagogical approaches to incorporating digital storytelling in the classroom, and how you might structure and assess a digital storytelling activity. We’ll also introduce some of the tools that can be used to build digital stories.
Building a Digital Story Using StoryMaps
Tuesday, August 22, 2023
9:00-10:00 am Pacific / noon-1:00 pm Eastern
Online via Zoom
In this second workshop in the Digital Storytelling series, we’ll dive into ArcGIS StoryMaps and its associated tools. We’ll provide an introduction to this tool, and then participants will practice building a short digital story using StoryMaps. We’ll provide media and content you can use to build your story, or you can use your own content. You do not need to attend the first workshop in order to participate in this second one, but you are encouraged to attend both, if possible.
Building a Digital Story Using Pressbooks
Wednesday, August 23, 2023
9:00-10:00 am Pacific / noon-1:00 pm Eastern
Online via Zoom
In this third workshop in the Digital Storytelling series, we’ll dive into Pressbooks and its associated plugins. We’ll provide an introduction to this tool, and then participants will practice building a short digital story using Pressbooks. We’ll provide media and content you can use to build your story, or you can use your own content. You do not need to attend the first or second workshop in order to participate in this one, but you are encouraged to also attend the first workshop, if possible
From systems and strategies to personae and perspectives, games can be used to explore critical topics while engaging and connecting our students. In this series, you will: examine a range of approaches to games and learning; consider assessment strategies and practices that fit both the activities and your learning objectives; and create your own game – no prior experience with games or game making required.
Games & Assessment
Monday, August 21, 2023
11:00 am-noon Pacific / 2:00-3:00 pm Eastern
Online via Zoom
Games, simulations, and table top exercises can be powerful learning activities with the potential to deeply engage students. They also present unique opportunities and challenges to assess learning and provide feedback. In this session, we’ll look at a range of approaches to games and learning, from real world, case study based simulations to open ended collaborative storytelling to making games, and the assessment strategies and practices that fit both the activities and your learning objectives. No prior experience with games or game making required!
Serious Games: Assessing Tabletop and Simulation Games
Tuesday, August 22, 2023
11:00 am-noon Pacific / 2:00-3:00 pm Eastern
Online via Zoom
Fires, floods, and natural disasters. Cross-cultural interactions, multi-party treaties, and fraught negotiations. Global thermonuclear war. (How about a nice game of chess?) The power of games to mimic and model real world scenarios is widely used to teach, learn, and explore human behaviors in complex situations. In this panel presentation, experts from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies will showcase examples of simulations and tabletop exercises that they’ve used in courses and professional settings, and discuss the key considerations in planning, developing, and assessing these kinds of immersive activities.
Game Design Workshop and Game Making for Deep Learning
Wednesday, August 23, 2023
11:00 am-12:30 pm Pacific / 2:00-3:30 pm Eastern
Online via Zoom
Designing, making, testing, and teaching games engages a range of high level cognitive skills, running the gamut of Bloom’s taxonomy and beyond. Facts, concepts, and relations have to be rethought and reorganized, and new connections and understandings made. Making games is a powerful way to explore how seemingly disparate elements can interact, and generate complexity and surprise. Creating physical games out of basic elements like paper and pen can also be a welcome respite from screen fatigue, and engage spatial and mechanical reasoning that are difficult to reach digitally.
In this workshop, we will discuss a broad overview of kinds of games, and the basic interactions that make them up – the mechanics. Then we will run through an entire cycle of the game making process, brainstorming, creating paper prototypes, play testing, and teaching. No previous experience with game design is needed, nor are any special materials. Please do have at least some paper and pens handy, and markers, scissors, coins, and the like may also be useful.