Life Of E's

Although most faculty use many high tech innovations in the classroom, let’s not forget the necessity for some of the basic accoutrements. After a couple of years of hearing frequent requests for some basic office supplies and also recognizing that there were times I wished I had some sticky notes or whiteboard markers in a [...]

Tags: college, Professors, Teaching, Toolkit

Why in the world would you have ‘class sets’ of dictionaries?  Because that’s what everyone else does?  You are  smarter than that, right? To explore that further, please answer the following questions: Do all of the students in your class read at exactly the same level?  Does any dictionary have ALL the features, words, tools, and [...]

Tags: dictionary, school, students, teachers, Teaching, vocabulary

One of my “colleagues” got very angry with me one day (we taught courses that tended to share the same students). He said, “Students don’t put out much effort in my class to get their assignments done because they say they have so much work to do for your class. You convince them that what [...]

Tags: college, grades, Professors, school, students, Teaching

Over the years, I got smarter about keeping up with my students and their assignments. Once I figured out that numbers were easier – and faster – for recording grades and returning student work, I refined my system. Here are ten tips to help you if you are ready to do the same.     [...]

Tags: assignments, college, grades, Professors, students, Teaching

Being a huge fan of teleseminars, both as a learner and as a business owner, each month I participate and host these high tech (but low tech) ways of learning and teaching. If you have not been integrating one or more aspects of telelearning and telecommunications as part of your strategy as an entrepreneur, then [...]

Tags: business development, business strategies, entrepreneurs, Products, profitability, teleseminars, webinars

Delegating is an essential part of being productive both at home and at work. There are certainly tasks that I am sure you have done where you asked yourself “did I earn a master’s degree to qualify me to stuff these envelopes?” Other times, you wonder, “Hmmm….why am I doing this when a machine can [...]

Tags: delegate, distractions, Productivity, time, tips, work

Here is a question asked by one our the Life of E’s members. Q.What “end of the day/debriefing” strategies do you recommend?  As a follow-up to that question, what do you recommend doing when you are finished teaching a class (a single-day lesson)?  I mean end of class techniques to bring closure to the class [...]

Tags: educators, feedback, Professors, teaching tools

Faculty members don’t get behind in their grading until after the semester gets started, however there are distinct measures you can take BEFORE the semester gets started that will help you avoid getting behind. 1. Make sure that you have a planner (either paper or digital) that shows all of your major commitments throughout the [...]

Tags: grading, homework, paper, Productivity, professor, school, student, teach, teacher, Teaching, tips, tricks, writing

Student evaluations are a part of every faculty member’s life. Some consider them to be a positive part of the academic life and others dismiss them as a meaningless exercise (or even worse, as a detriment to good teaching). You might as well know that I come down on the side of student evaluations being [...]

Tags: positive, Professors, students, teachers, Teaching, tips, work

Perfectionism runs rampant through the professorial world. Let me acknowledge up front that I am perfectly familiar with this, having lived with it for 56 years at this point, but having learned a great deal in the last 25 about how to deal with it so that it’s not debilitating. Here are ten tips for [...]