Teaching Toolkit Program
Overview
The Teaching Toolkit is a professional development program designed to help faculty develop practical, evidence-informed approaches to teaching and course design. The program is intended for faculty who want to strengthen their teaching practice, whether they are developing a new course, revising an existing course, or looking for strategies to increase student learning and engagement.
Through five self-paced modules, faculty will explore foundational principles of course design, effective planning and organization, assessment strategies, active learning, and feedback. Each module combines practical strategies with opportunities to apply what you are learning to your own teaching.
The Teaching Toolkit is designed to be useful across disciplines and course formats, but the CFE also offers a Teaching Online Program (TOP) for online-specific courses. Faculty can work through the modules using an existing course or a course they are currently developing.
Teaching Toolkit Content
The Teaching Toolkit consists of five modules:
- Foundations of Course Design
- Build a foundation for intentional, learner-centered course design. This module introduces key principles of course design—like Bloom’s Taxonomy and backwards design—to help faculty consider how their teaching choices can support student learning.
- Course Structure & Planning
- Explore strategies for organizing a course into a clear, coherent learning experience. Faculty will consider how course structure, planning, and scaffolding can help students understand expectations and arrive at outcomes outlined in Module 1.
- Assessment Strategies
- Explore assessment as a tool for supporting and measuring student learning. This module introduces strategies for designing assessments that align with learning outcomes and provide useful information to both instructors and students.
- Active Learning & Effective Feedback
- Explore strategies for increasing student engagement and creating opportunities for students to actively participate in their learning. Faculty will also consider how effective feedback can help students understand their progress and improve their work.
- Final Capstone
- Bring the concepts and strategies from the Teaching Toolkit together by applying them to your own course. The capstone provides an opportunity to move from learning about teaching strategies to putting those strategies into practice.
What to Expect
The Teaching Toolkit is designed as a practical, application-focused professional development experience. Throughout the program, faculty will have opportunities to:
- Learn evidence-informed approaches to teaching and course design
- Reflect on their current teaching practices
- Apply new strategies to an existing or developing course
- Develop practical course materials and teaching strategies
- Identify opportunities to strengthen student learning and engagement
Faculty are encouraged to work on a course throughout the program so that the concepts and strategies introduced in each module can be immediately applied to their own teaching.
Faculty Excellence Credit
The Teaching Toolkit training program takes approximately 3-6 hours to complete. Faculty who complete the training entirely will earn 2 credits toward the Certificate of Teaching Enhancement and 2 credits toward the Early Career Success Certificate.
Registration Process
Enrollment for the Teaching Toolkit remains open throughout the academic year—the course date appears as May in the Canvas registration system.
When registering using your NetID and password, please be sure to include your MSU email.
Within one week after you register, you will be notified via Canvas that you have been enrolled and can begin the course.
Questions
For more information about the Teaching Toolkit, contact Cassia Hameline at cassia.hameline@montana.edu