Newsletter August 2023: A new semester – and new opportunities!

Regardless of who you are or what educational challenges you face, you can get help from SDU University Pedagogy - just write to sduup@sdu.dk. 

For the individual teacher, we offer, among other things, a large number of courses on university and e-learning pedagogy. Some courses require physical presence, others are online, - some last three hours, others span several days, but they are all aimed at teachers who want to expand their pedagogical toolbox. 

We also have many offers for groups of teachers, whether it is all the teachers on a course, or just a group of interested colleagues. You can request, for example, a workshop or a presentation at an staff seminar on, among other things: 

• First-year pedagogy: how do we create a good study environment? 
• Integration of research and teaching: how can we live up to SDU's strategy of "stimulating the already close contact between researchers and students"? 
• AI in education: how can AI play a role in our education, and should AI play a role in our education? 

But maybe courses and workshops are not really for you? In that case, we are also happy to help arrange colleague supervision at your place. Feel free to contact us if you would like to hear more about how you can arrange a process where your group of colleagues can learn from each other and each other's teaching practices. 

Vitamins on a daily basis? 

Sometimes you may also need inspiration in between courses, workshops, or colleague guidance – maybe for oral group exams, video recordings of Power Points, multicultural group work, and much more. SDUUP also offers a number of possibilities of getting just-in-time inspiration, available to everyone and at any time – the daily university educational vitamin pill: 

• SDU Blog: Reflections on Teaching & Learning. Here you can find short texts on interesting topics, written by staff and students at SDU. For example, you can read about the challenges in multicultural group work. The blog is under construction, so please contact us if you want to contribute. 
• SDUUP Learning Resources. This is our resource page where we gather information and guidance on university educational topics, our courses and other events. Here, for example, you can find a guide on how to record your Power Point presentation and share it with students. 
• Teaching for Active Learning (TAL) conference. Every year in November we hold this conference, which is for teachers and about teaching. A conference publication will be published after the conference, in which many of the teaching examples are described, and you can also find Book of Abstracts and recordings of the conference keynotes on the TAL website. The conferences are always about activating teaching, but each year has a special focus – e.g. test forms, employability, learning spaces, online learning, 21st century skills. This year, the special focus is on group work - and you can still sign up! 
• Newsletters. Almost all of SDUUP's newsletters are built on the this template: introduction to a university pedagogical topic followed by several examples of how it is used in practice. That is why there is also inspiration to be found in the catalogue of previous newsletters. Read, for example, about oral group exams and get ideas on how you can apply it yourself by reading examples from master programmes in Cand. Negot. and Political Science. 

In other words: help is always close at hand if you or your colleagues need inspiration for or sparring on teaching practice. Make use of the above offers or contact us - and we will surely find a topic, a form and a time that suits you and your situation.

Welcome back from vacation!