December 2019
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Join the CFT in Celebrating the Two New Books by Our Staff
On December 3rd at 2:30pm, the CFT will honor the 2019 publication of books by Director Derek Bruff and Associate Director Cynthia Brame.
Please stop by for a wine reception and panel discussion of the books at 2:30, followed by an informal celebration of scholarship at the CFT.  
New CFT Guide on Assessing Student Learning Now Available
Student assessment is, arguably, the centerpiece of the teaching and learning process and therefore the subject of much discussion in the scholarship of teaching and learning. Without some method of obtaining and analyzing evidence of student learning, we can never know whether our teaching is making a difference. That is, teaching requires some process through which we can come to know whether students are developing the desired knowledge and skills, and therefore whether our instruction is effective. Learning assessment is like a magnifying glass we hold up to students’ learning to discern whether the teaching and learning process is functioning well or is in need of change.
This guide was created to provide an overview of learning assessment and why it is important, discuss several approaches that may help to guide and refine student assessment, address various methods of student assessment, and offer several resources for further research.
See the full teaching guide.
Is Your Brightspace Gradebook Ready for the End of the Semester?


The end of the semester is coming up quickly! Is your Brightspace gradebook set up correctly? Read the tips and tricks on our latest blog post to find out!
Teaching Writing Workshops
Over the course of the academic year, the Writing Studio leads a faculty workshops focused on different aspects of teaching writing.
Workshops provide participants with current research, strategies for best practices, and a forum for discussing how these approaches might be adapted to teaching writing in their disciplines. This workshop is open to all writing instructors.
Scaffolding Writing Across the Semester
December 10th, 11:00- 12:30
Participants will learn how to use backward design to scaffold writing projects and assignments throughout the semester. They will also have the opportunity to workshop syllabi for courses with writing components. Participants should bring a draft of a syllabus they wish to redesign.
Let us know you’re coming!

This program cosponsored by the Margaret Cuninggim Women’s Center and the Graduate School offers Ph.D. students and postdocs a chance to reflect on the ways that gender affects their experience as they begin their professional journey in the academy.
Negotiating your First Academic job
Date: Wednesday, December 4th
Time: 12-1:30
Location: Buttrick 123
For more information, visit the Women's Center website.
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Celebration of Learning 2020:
An Exhibition of Students as Producers
On February 13, 2020, the Center for Teaching will hold a Celebration of Learning, an exhibition of students as producers. The event will feature students from all over campus sharing what they have learned, created, designed, and discovered, providing the Vanderbilt community with a picture of deep learning across the colleges and schools.

We are inviting faculty and other instructors to recommend students to participate in the Celebration of Learning. We are particularly interested in showcasing work done by students as part of courses taught at Vanderbilt.
Have you asked your students to tackle open-ended problems, to operate with a degree of autonomy, or to share their work with wider audiences? Please think about students who might share a project from calendar year 2019.
Visit our Celebration of Learning event page for details.
Come Work at the
Center for Teaching! 
Each year the Center for Teaching (CFT) hires a number of graduate students as part of its efforts to mentor and train graduate students, including those serving as teaching assistants or instructors of record here at Vanderbilt as well as those interested in developing teaching skills for future faculty careers. The CFT has several types of positions available for graduate students for the 2020-2021 academic year.
Graduate Teaching Fellow – GTFs lead sections of the Certificate in College Teaching program; consult with graduate students about their teaching; facilitate workshops for graduate students at TA Orientation and throughout the year; and assist CFT senior staff with various ongoing and short-term projects, including the creation of online resources for the Vanderbilt teaching community. Learn more about the GTF Program.
Teaching Affiliate – The primary responsibility for Teaching Affiliates is to lead a cohort of incoming TAs through a day-long workshop at August’s TA Orientation. These workshops familiarize new TAs with the challenges and opportunities of working as TAs at Vanderbilt and help prepare TAs for the first few weeks of class. Cohorts are divided by discipline, and so the CFT seeks Teaching Affiliates from a wide variety of disciplines on campus. The Teaching Affiliate position is a 70-hour position, with most of those hours occurring in August 2020.
CiCT Facilitator – The CiCT Program facilitator will, alongside the Graduate Teaching Fellows, lead a section of the CiCT program.  The facilitator will read and prepare lesson plans, lead class sessions, and attend weekly meetings with the GTFs.  When the CiCT program is in session (8 weeks per semester), the approximate workload will be between 5-10 hrs/week.
These positions are great opportunities for graduate students to refine their teaching and presentation skills and network with graduate students outside of their department or program.
Learn more about each of these positions and apply online by visiting the CFT's employment opportunities page. 
Applications for all three types of positions are due Tuesday,
January 21st, 2020.
Leading Lines Podcast Featuring Ian Bogost

Bogost is the Ivan Allen College Distinguished Chair in Media Studies and Professor of Interactive Computing at the George Institute of Technology. He’s an author of multiple books, an award-winning game designer, and a contributing writer at The Atlantic. Ian studies games by making games and is an incredibly deep thinker about an impressively broad array of topics, as you’ll hear from this conversation. 
To hear the podcast episodes you've missed, visit the Leading Lines website, search for “Leading Lines” in iTunes, or subscribe via RSS.  You can also follow us on Twitter, @LeadingLinesPod. 
Listen
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