Teaching Triangles: Peer Observation + Non-Evaluative Formative Feedback

This fall, anyone teaching in SEAS that wishes to learn from colleagues about their approaches to teaching, classroom management, and student engagement is invited to join us for Teaching Triangles. Teaching Triangles give faculty/instructors (including GTAs) incentive and space to connect and discuss our teaching practices with an eye to improving our own classes and student experiences.

Each triangle is made up 3 faculty/graduate student instructors. Before the end of term, each member will visit one class of the other two members. Each member will also have their class visited by each other member. That means you will have the chance to observe colleagues twice, and you will have the opportunity to have your own teaching observed twice. The time commitment, including the introductory and concluding meetings of the Triangle members is 4 to 5 hours.

As faculty in Chemical Engineering and Engineering and Society can attest after running Teaching Triangles over multiple semesters, the experiences fostered positive impacts on student engagement while building community amongst colleagues. Knowledge sharing regarding best practices, alongside informal learning gained from simply observing how other faculty/instructors run their classes, help us connect with content beyond our own areas of expertise in a non-evaluative, supportive group. We go into Triangles with a mindset of wishing to improve our teaching while developing community amongst faculty.

We want to extend Teaching Triangles beyond single departments, and this fall we invite faculty interested in further developing and improving their teaching to join a group of likeminded faculty/instructors. If your department would like to run internal triangles, just fill out the form or email William Davis at williamdavis@virginia.edu.

The informal conversations and relationships that grew out of single-department Triangle teams can be extended to everyone in the School of Engineering and Applied Science, giving all of us the chance to enhance our pedagogical (and andragogical) skills alongside colleagues invested in improving their practices and techniques. Participants share and learn best practices, but we will also improve our understanding of how other faculty, and departments, are educating SEAS students.

Submit the interest form to express interest and share your teaching schedule, as well as times that you would have available for observations.

Please, join us!