Design and Development of College Pedagogy

Greating a TIGER DAD Project

Initial Interview

Schedule a meeting with the TIGER Evaluation Coordinator to discuss the possibility of doing a TIGER DAD project.  The Evaluation Liaison and members of the TIGER Team will work with the student through subsequent steps to ensure successful completion of the project.

Develop a Syllabus

With the help of the TIGER Team, the TIGER DAD participant will write a syllabus for a 16-week, 1 credit-hour course.  The syllabus is the “road map” for the subsequent course development.  While writing the syllabus, consider the following topics:

  1.  Course goals – what new skills/ideas should students enrolled in this course walk away with?
  2.  Class Objectives – What will your class accomplish in each meeting?
  3.  Discipline-Specifc Pedagogy – How is your discipline addressing pedagogy?  Are there any ongoing debates that students should be aware of?
  4.  General Approach: The course participants work as a learning community
  5.  Learning Assessments: Participants take a pre/post test to establish learning gains
  6.  Approach to Diversity: Participants from a diversity of backgrounds are considered, and diverse sources and perspectives are presented.
  7.  Methods – What methods have you used, or know about, that students can use to teach certain concepts in your discipline?  How can they assess their progress?
  8.  Assignments – What assignments will help your students learn?
  9.  Grading


It’s important to remember that as a TIGER DAD Fellow you’re going to design your course as if you were going to be the one to teach it.  So, design a course you would like to teach (or take).

At this stage, it is also important to speak with the faculty mentor, members of the TIGER Team, and with your home department to decide the level of development required. 

Develop course content

This is where the TIGER DAD participant designs the actual class content that will be used in the course, using the syllabus as a guide.   During this stage, the Fellow must be in contact with his or her faculty mentor. 

The course content and syllabus are presented to the TIGER Team for feedback and discussion in a TIGER Teaches session.  If scheduling permits, the TIGER Team will convene a meeting of all TIGER DAD Fellows so each can present his or her material to the other DAD Fellows  and gain new perspectives from those involved in the same process.

Submission

Upon completion, the TIGER DAD participant will submit the completed course syllabus, notes, powerpoints and materials to the TIGER Team for final review.  From there, the student may coordinate with his or her department on when the course will be taught.  The TIGER DAD Fellow may negotiate with the department for permission to teach the course under the guidance of a faculty mentor.

To qualify as a DAD fellow, you must be a graduate student pursuing a degree in a Science, Technology, Engineering or Mathematics (STEM) field, and you must have a faculty mentor willing to  work with you on the discipline-specific aspects of your DAD project.

  • NOTE: TIGER DAD projects require a two-semester commitment.
  • Pedagogy courses are challenging: you are literally teaching fellow graduate students how to teach.  This may also require extensive background reading into pedagogical issues in your discipline.  Therefore, we advise experienced graduate students with 3 or more years of teaching to apply for this project.  Those who have completed TIGER TAR projects are also encouraged to apply.
  • NOTE: The funding criteria for our CIRTL subcontract grant prohibit us from funding graduate students from the College of Music, School of Education, or any humanities-related field in the College of Arts and Sciences. 

The TIGER Team provides critical feedback over the course of the project to ensure the proposed course integrated teaching as research through a pre/post test of student knowledge, involves the graduate student participants throughout the semester in a learning community and is predicated on a diversity of sources and perspectives to assure that the course parallels STEM practice.  CIRTL Core Ideas