Teaching from “among” students rather than teaching “to” them is one of the core concepts behind Academic Technology Services & Innovation’s “Untethered in the Classroom” project.  Faculty are free to roam throughout the classroom while teaching instead of being chained to the podium at the front of the room.  Better yet, students can review all of the class interactions anytime they want — everything is recorded.  Because they’re not furiously taking notes, students feel less stressed and more focused.  That’s the feedback so far, says Dr. Lorretta Krautscheid, interim Associate Dean of UP’s School of Nursing and our guest on this episode of Tech Talk.

Social Media seems to pervade every aspect of life and often consumes many waking hours for lots of people.  Something with such a large footprint deserves a serious look.  Peter Pappas, of UP’s School of Education, has put a spotlight on the topic of where social media has taken us. Once enthusiastic about the promise of this communication tool, Pappas is a little more hesitant these days.In this roundtable-style podcast, we bushwhack through a lot of philosophical terrain from Orwellian outcomes and conspiracy theories to Troll farms and seatbelts for Twitter.

Theology professors face a big challenge. How do you make the words spoken a few thousand years ago talk to young people today? One way is to combine the multisensory stimuli of media with the connectivity of the web and add in a large dose of community building. That’s what Dr. Rebecca Gaudino does to bring the lives of her 21rst Century students into dialogue with ancient prophets and scribes.

Dr. Rebecca Smith of UP's School of Education decided to make assessments more fun.  How? By having her MAT students take quizzes.  What, that doesn't sound fun to you? Ah, but these are not your grandmother's quizzes. Using quiz making apps like Socrative and Kahoot takes quiz making to the next level with fun interactive features that promote collaborative learning.

The ISTE standards (International Society for Technology in Education) for students are designed to empower students to become global, innovative, creative learners by leveraging technology in the process of learning, collaborating and problem-solving. In this podcast with Drs. Eric Anctil and Randy Hetherington from UP’s School of Education, we discuss the role the ISTE standards play in addressing 21st-century skills in learning.

Getting students up to speed with hands on technical skills can be challenging, especially when students are coming to class with a wide variety of experience levels.  For engineering students, fundamentals like using a multimeter are basic skills needed to move on to bigger projects.  Dr. Shaz  Vijlee, Assistant Professor of Engineering, decided to make a series of videos for students, teaching them the core technical skills in a self-paced format that has enabled students to tackle new ground in a user-friendly format.

Bootcamps are usually designed to get participants up and running quickly with a new skillset provided they're willing to use plenty of elbow grease.  Imagine, if you will, a kinder, gentler bootcamp.  That's what Dr. Lindsay Benes and Dr. Joanne Olsen had in mind when they teamed up with Instructional Design & Technology Specialist Ben Kahn (who is the co-host of this podcast) last summer to create a professional development opportunity for School of Nursing graduate faculty.