First Year Experience includes in class and out of class experiences.
Faculty and instructors can engage new students by designing courses using these five keys principles:
The 5 KEYs for teaching new students:
Below is an example of a AAA109 student's project and her experience.
FYE Teaching Tips
Teaching TIP #1: In Announcements, post a clear outline of what will be covered in class that week, to include student deliverables with due date.
Teaching TIP #2: Call students by name. Start all feedback, emails, and discussion responses with the student’s name.
Teaching TIP # 3: Personalize. Add a picture. Use the audio feedback function.
Teaching Tip #4: Use D2L discussion boards to learn from diverse others and engage in substantive conversations.
Examples:
60 Minutes report on Freeman A. Hrabowski, III, the President of UMBC (The University of Maryland, Baltimore County) the school where it's "Cool to be smart."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsAYyf1BOOA -or-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EglK8Mk18o
Why do students drop out?
How do you create an environment where students feel they belong? Do your teachers expect you to do well here? Do they check in with you on your progress? What pushes you to do better?
Teaching TIP #5: Encourage students to talk about their dreams. For example, “Here’s why I want to be a nurse (fill in the blank).” Post career type videos in content.
Example: Watch the video of Justice Sonia Sotomayor when she spoke at Metropolitan State University of Denver in 2016
What lessons can we learn from Justice Sotomayor regarding education? How important is education? Why? How does this connect with your career path?
Teaching TIP #6: Check-in with students individually, on how it’s going, especially grades, and then submit early alerts.
Teaching TIP #7: In Discussions: Ask students to find a TIme Management app. Have students describe which to use and why.
Teaching TIP #8: Develop community through Collaborative Projects. Example: In Google docs, student groups write a letter of advocacy for a group/type of student at the college and send to club advisor, student government, president, dean, department chair, etc.
We work on goals with our students. We do not just focus on the concept of goals, but the breakdown goals and achievability of the goals. I like to use the SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Timebound) method which I adapted into the SMARTiE method (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Timebound, Implementation and Evaluation) for my students. However, I came across another adaptation for SMARTIE (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Timebound, Inclusion and Equity) which I will be using this semester for my goal assignment.
I plan to challenge my students to make 2-3 personal goals using the SMARTiE method (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Timebound, Implementation and Evaluation), and make a community based goal using the SMARTIE (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Timebound, Inclusion and Equity) method."
Grit is not just simple elbow-grease term for rugged persistence. It is an often invisible display of endurance that lets you stay in an uncomfortable place, work hard to improve upon a given interest, and do it again and again. ~ Sarah Lewis
Supporting Research
Bers, Trudy and Donna Younger. "The First-Year Experience in Community Colleges." New Directions for Institutional Research, vol. 2013, no. 160, Aug. 2014, pp. 77-93. EBSCOhost
Connolly, Sara, et al. "First Year Experience for At-Risk College Students." College Student Journal, vol. 51, no. 1, 01 Mar. 2017, pp. 1-6. EBSCOhost
Essential Books
Peeples, Shanna. Think Like Socrates: Using Questions to Invite Wonder and Empathy Into the Classroom, Grades 4-12 (Corwin Teaching Essentials). 1st ed., Corwin, 2018. https://www.amazon.com/Think-Like-Socrates-Questions-Essentials/dp/1506391648
Note: Content is easily adaptable for higher education in all disciplines.
*Available for checkout from PPCC Library at both Centennial and Rampart Range Campus
Verschelden, Cia, and Pasquerella. Bandwidth Recovery. Zaltbommel-Netherlands, Netherlands, Van Haren Publishing, 2017.
*Available for checkout from PPCC Library at both Centennial and Rampart Range Campus