Designed for Learning

• AI, Cheating, and Trusting Students to be Human

  If you follow the conversations about higher education on social media or in the news, a primary topic on people’s minds is the impact of artificial intelligence on the purposes and processes of an education.For better or worse, much of the focus has been on cheating: Are students outsourcing their work, and their learning, to tools like ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, and Google Gemini? Some high-profile stories have gone so far as to suggest cheating is so rampant that the whole college system is basically collapsing around us.Tricia Bertram Gallant, coauthor of the new book The Opposite of Cheating: Teaching for Integrity in the Age of AI, helps us put these claims into context, providing insights into the deeper questions that we should be asking about academic dishonesty and integrity and sharing pedagogical strategies for adapting to AI’s widespread availability.Key Topics Discussed:Why students cheat (spoiler: the reasons aren’t new)The role of “neutralizing,” or moral justifications, in allowing people to view cheating as bad in the abstract but not in their current situationNot putting the burden to intuit the purpose of an assignment on studentsHow AI has changed cheating, but not why students do itExperimenting with AI tools so you can create guardrails for students—and why doing so doesn’t mean you think less of them as peopleStrategies for communicating effectively with students about generative AIRethinking when, why, and how writing is assigned, including the benefits of having students complete some of that work in the classroomThe potential of pairing written exams with oral assessments—which it turns out students often appreciateHow Tricia suggests instructors react when suspecting a student has cheatedGuest Bio: Tricia Bertram Gallant is the director of the Academic Integrity Office and Triton Testing Center at the University of California San Diego. President emeritus of the International Center for Academic Integrity, she has more than 20 years of experience as an academic integrity researcher, author, teacher, and practitioner.Her fifth book, The Opposite of Cheating: Teaching for Integrity in the Age of AI, which she co-authored with David Rettinger, was published this March. It is part of the Teaching, Engaging, and Thriving in Higher Ed Series at the University of Oklahoma Press edited by Designed for Learning host Jim Lang and Michelle Miller.Resources Mentioned:Book: The Opposite of Cheating: Teaching for Integrity in the Age of AI (University of Oklahoma Press)Tricia’s Podcast and Contact Info: theoppositeofcheating.comNotre Dame Learning’s Lab for AI in Teaching and Learning (LAITL)Related Designed for Learning Episode: Navigating AI’s Evolving Role in Teaching and LearningNotre Dame’s Undergraduate Academic Code of HonorDesigned for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn.

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• Writing Like You Teach

  Can you draw lessons from the way you teach and apply them in your writing? Designed for Learning host Jim Lang thinks so—so much so that he’s written a new book about it called Write Like You Teach: Taking Your Classroom Skills to a Bigger Audience.To learn more, we flipped the script and asked Kristi Rudenga, director of Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence, to interview Jim, a professor of the practice at the Kaneb Center, about his latest project.He shares his insights on the intersection of teaching and writing, offering strategies for educators looking to expand their reach through engaging, accessible prose intended for broader audiences. He also talks about how a life-threatening health situation shaped the creation of Write Like You Teach.Key Topics Discussed:Jim’s career trajectory as an academic, speaker, and writer of popular books and columns on teachingThe inspiration behind Write Like You Teach and how it bridges his passions for teaching and writingTranslating classroom teaching practices into impactful writing techniquesThree core areas to consider to write like you teach: questions, attention, and evidenceOvercoming impostor syndrome when writing for non-academic audiences by recognizing your role as an educator in both classroom and writing contextsJim’s personal journey of recovery from a heart transplant and stroke, and how it affected his writing processGuest Bios: Jim Lang is a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence. The author of several popular books on teaching, including Distracted: Why Students Can’t Focus and What You Can Do About It and Small Teaching: Everyday Lessons from the Science of Learning, Jim writes regularly on teaching and learning for The Chronicle of Higher Education and co-edits a book series on higher education for the University of Oklahoma Press. His latest book is Write Like You Teach: Taking Your Classroom Skills to a Bigger Audience.Kristi Rudenga is the director of Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence, where she is appointed as a teaching professor. In addition to overseeing the Kaneb Center’s team, strategy, partnerships, and initiatives, Kristi consults with instructors on pedagogical approaches and facilitates seminar series and workshops on teaching and mentoring. She writes about pedagogy for The Chronicle of Higher Education, and she has served on the Core Committee of the POD Network, the national organization supporting educational development.Resources Mentioned:Book: Write Like You Teach: Taking Your Classroom Skills to a Bigger Audience (University of Chicago Press)Website: jamesmlang.comJim’s LinkedInDesigned for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn.

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• Building Rapport in Online Courses

  With Notre Dame’s Summer Online courses set to get underway in June, we turn our attention to teaching online—specifically ways to create a sense of community among instructors and students when meeting through screens, and why that matters in the first place.Rebecca Glazier is an ideal person with whom to have this conversation. A professor at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, she is the author of Connecting in the Online Classroom: Building Rapport between Teachers and Students.Grounded in academic research, original surveys, and experimental studies, the book provides practical strategies for helping everyone, students and instructors alike, get the most out of their online courses and take advantage of the increased access to education that online learning enables.Key Topics Discussed:Rebecca’s journey as an online instructor after having only previously taught in person and the longitudinal research she conducted to improve her online teachingHow she found that a high-rapport teaching strategy not only improved the experience for her students, but also for her as an instructorThe importance of connecting with students early in the semester and building rapport in ways that are authentic to your personalityTaking proactive steps to ensure students in online classes don’t feel like second-class citizensGiving students an AI assignment to help them learn the difference between ethical and unethical applicationsStrategies for leveraging class discussion boardsFour concrete things you can do to build rapport in your online class, including sending students personalized emails (and using mail merges to help manage the amount of time that takes)Guest Bio: Rebecca Glazier is a professor in the School of Public Affairs at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. In addition to researching religion and politics, U.S. foreign policy, and political communication, she studies the scholarship of teaching and learning and is passionate about improving the quality of online education. She is the author of two books, including Connecting in the Online Classroom: Building Rapport between Teachers and Students.Resources Mentioned:Book: Connecting in the Online Classroom: Building Rapport between Teachers and Students (Johns Hopkins University Press)Mail Merge Tool for Notre Dame Instructors: Yet Another Mail Merge (YAMM)Notre Dame’s Summer OnlineBarbara Oakley and Terrence Sejnowski Online Course: Learning How to LearnDesigned for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn.

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• Navigating AI’s Evolving Role in Teaching and Learning

  Although artificial intelligence has been part of higher education for a couple of years now, faculty are still struggling with what this development means for themselves, their students, their courses—and especially their assessments.Notre Dame Learning recently launched the Lab for AI in Teaching & Learning (LAITL), led by Alex Ambrose of our Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence, to help instructors navigate this terrain. Alex is an eloquent spokesperson for the argument that by building their AI literacy and taking advantage of the opportunities it provides, faculty can expand student learning and even make it more equitable.But are faculty buying it? And a deeper question: Does everyone need to embrace AI? Or are there times and places where we shouldn’t be welcoming it into our lives and our courses?Fresh off hosting several campus AI workshops together, host Jim Lang and Alex discuss these issues, AI at Notre Dame, and a variety of helpful resources for faculty.Key Topics Discussed:The experiences that have led Alex to become a cautious optimist/power user of AI, a path informed by his long-standing concern over technology’s impact on student learningWhat’s happening right now at Notre Dame with respect to AI in teaching and learning, including the availability of Google Gemini to all faculty, staff, and students and an AI academy for facultyThe case Alex would make to a skeptical colleague about AI, one that is centered around empathy, literacy—and a very practical exampleThe relationship of the two AIs, artificial intelligence and academic integrity, and the results from a survey of Notre Dame studentsResources to help instructors articulate AI policies for their courses and assignments (see “Resources Mentioned” section for links)Imagining next-generation assessments that push students to go beyond just creating a final productAn example of how Alex is starting to see AI assist faculty with assessmentsGuest Bio: G. Alex Ambrose is a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence, where he serves as program director of assessment and analytics and leads the new Lab for AI in Teaching & Learning (LAITL). His work has been published in a range of academic and technology-based journals and earned him the 2015 Campus Technology Innovator Award as well as recognition by Google, IBM, USAID, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and the National Science Foundation.Resources Mentioned:Generative AI Acceptable Use Scale (aka the traffic light)The AI MenuStudent AI Acknowledgment FormNotre Dame Learning’s AI Hub: learning.nd.edu/ai Book: Next Generation Genres: Teaching Writing for Civic and Academic Engagement (Norton Professional Books)Designed for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn.

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• Beyond the Pandemic: The Power of Resilient Learning

  Instructors everywhere responded to the COVID-19 pandemic with new ideas and strategies for teaching students. Georgetown University’s Maggie Debelius is the co-editor of a new book of essays highlighting this work with the intention of helping colleges and universities become more resilient centers of learning.Here, Maggie joins host Jim Lang to discuss the book, titled Recentering Learning: Complexity, Resilience, and Adaptability in Higher Education, and explore how higher education should evolve in our post-pandemic, AI era.Key Topics Discussed:Where the idea for Recentering Learning came fromThe undeniable power of residential experiences, but the moments of beauty brought about by remote learning in the midst of the pandemic’s disruptionThe ongoing importance of resilience to meet future challengesWhy Maggie and her co-editors made sure Recentering Learning features contributions from staff and students as well as facultyWhat institutional responses to the pandemic say about higher ed’s ability to adapt in the long term when there is no immediate crisis to contend withHow the prevalence of generative AI makes the central premise of the book—that is, the need to recenter what makes for good learning—even more urgentMaggie’s advice for recentering learning for both individual faculty and institutions more broadly, including by prioritizing relationship-buildingGuest Bio: Maggie Debelius is the senior director of faculty initiatives at the Center for New Designs in Learning and Scholarship (CNDLS) at Georgetown University, where she also serves as a professor of English and of learning, design, and technology. With Joshua Kim and Edward Maloney, she is co-editor of the essay collection Recentering Learning: Complexity, Resilience, and Adaptability in Higher Education, published in December 2024 by Johns Hopkins University Press. She holds a Ph.D. in English from Princeton University and an M.A. from Georgetown.Resource Mentioned:Book: Recentering Learning: Complexity, Resilience, and Adaptability in Higher Education (Johns Hopkins University Press)Designed for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn.

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