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by Gina Merys, Associate Director, Reinert Center Much of the learning students are called to do in academic courses, especially at the introductory level, focuses on convergent thinking—thinking that aims to identify one right answer. At its best, this process requires students to learn how to use logic, analyze choices, and make decisions; in essence,… Continue reading Divergent Thinking as a Path to Creative Problem-Solving

by Debie Lohe, Director, Reinert Center As we welcome you back to campus, we’re reminding you of our theme for the year: Thinking Critically, Thinking Creatively.  As I explained here, back in the fall, we’re spending this year examining what it means to think critically and/or creatively and how we teach students to do it. … Continue reading How Do You Teach Creative Thinking?

by Ludwig Weber, Graduate Assistant in Reinert Center, Graduate Student in English Continuous critical reflection is one of the most essential processes effective teachers employ. By constantly reflecting on the choices, successes, and failures experienced in the classroom, we learn to grow as pedagogues, and the impactfulness of our instruction grows with us. While this… Continue reading Impactful Reflective Practices

The Reinert Center is pleased to announce Fall 2016 Innovative Teaching Fellows. These fellows will work with the center’s instructional developers in the spring 2015 session to prepare for teaching in the learning studio in fall 2016. The fellows and their courses are: Chris Carroll, Ph.D., Civil Engineering “Structural Analysis” Cathleen Fleck, Ph.D, Fine and… Continue reading Reinert Center Announces Fall 2016 Innovative Teaching Fellows

by Doug Boin, Assistant Professor, History There’s a cliche among people outside the historian’s guild: History is about names and dates, memorization of facts, and the knowledge of content crammed into textbooks. Ten years ago, there were probably some truths to this cliche, back in the era before YouTube and Wikipedia. These days, the same… Continue reading Teaching History As the “Great Unknown”

By Mary R. Vermilion, Ph. D., Assistant professor, Department of Sociology and Anthropology In thinking (critically and creatively, of course) about the issues of critical and creative thinking, I have come to the conclusion that they are intrinsically tied. I will elaborate on this idea later. First, however, I want to discuss the particular issues surrounding… Continue reading Creative Critical Thinking

by Paul Lynch, Associate Professor, English The question we’ve been asked is straightforward: what do critical and creative thinking look like in your discipline? Mine is rhetoric, and in rhetoric I’m not sure there’s much distinction between critical and creative thinking. There is no way to engage in one without engaging in the other. To… Continue reading Thinking Critically about Critical Thinking

By Lauren Arend, Assistant Professor, Education A few years ago a graduate student in my statistics course shared with me the website “Spurious Correlations,” a site replete with near perfect statistical correlations between variables such as per capita consumption of margarine and the divorce rate in Maine.  While humor in statistics is always welcome, the… Continue reading Making the Invisible, Visible: Engaging Students in Critical Media Literacy

by Luke Yarbrough, Assistant Professor, Department of History Last week a student in one of my courses told me that she was feeling frustrated. In the course—an advanced seminar on how the concept of “jihad” has been interpreted historically—students break up each week into three “task forces,” each of which works to master an assigned primary or… Continue reading Encounters with Primary Sources: On Teaching Critical Thinking in History