Michael G. Gale Medal for Distinguished Teaching Award Recipient Sharing: Simple strategies to encourage curiosity, unlock creativity and engage students both in the classroom and online

Abstract:

At HKUST, the Michael G. Gale Medal for Distinguished Teaching is awarded each year to an academic staff who best exemplifies continued pursuit of excellence, devotion to teaching, and the ability to inspire and motivate others. The recipient is representative of the high quality of teaching and learning that the University offers and promotes. We are honored to have Professor Julian GROVES (2019 award recipient) share with us his views on good teaching practices, and in particular, how to adopt these pedagogies to online teaching environment.

How to encourage curiosity and unlock creativity in the classroom and engage students in analysis, problem solving and theory building, rather than just application? In this seminar I will describe some of the fairly low-tech things I have been doing in my large sociology classes to achieve these goals. I’ll give specific examples of some of my in-class activities to demonstrate what I call a more “organic” rather than “linear” approach to flipped classroom teaching. I will also talk about how I have adapted some of these activities for the new online teaching environment, and how to create a learning community in which students are more willing to turn on their cameras and participate.

Speaker:

Julian M. Groves is a sociologist who holds the position of Associate Professor of Social Science Education I the Division of Social Science at HKUST. Originally from the UK he obtained his PhD at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He researches and publishes articles on migrants, education and youth in Hong Kong. * The Michael G. Gale Medal for Distinguished Teaching is awarded each year to an academic staff who best exemplifies continued pursuit of excellence, devotion to teaching, and the ability to inspire and motivate others. The recipient is representative of the high quality of teaching and learning that the University offers and promotes.