Blog

I blog about educational development, facilitation, and teaching. 

As of March 2018, I am blogging more regularly at isabeauiqbal.com (my coaching site). I will still occasionally blog here.

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Please click on the tags at the bottom of the page (in the black shaded area) if you would like to find a post on a particular theme. For example, to find posts I have tagged with “educational development”, you would click on that word at the bottom of this page.

Photo credit: Colors by Jon Cornwell (CC BY)

  • Does good student-faculty rapport enhance student learning?

    Over the past few months, I have collaborated with faculty members from the Faculty of Arts to do two panel presentations on the topic of student-faculty rapport. As I prepared for those sessions, I looked into the connections between learning and student-faculty rapport. For those who are impatient to know whether rapport can enhance student…

  • Insights from facilitating outside of higher education

    As someone who facilitates workshops regularly, it is a treat to watch/experience someone else’s strong facilitation. Last month, I had the occasion to collaborate with Isabel Budke to offer Leadership Principles, a 3-part course at Vantage Point for those in the non-profit sector. Isabel facilitated the first and last session, and I did the middle…

  • How do young undergraduate students learn best?

    It should come as no surprise to me that the longer I work at UBC, the younger the students look. I can’t tell the difference between someone who is 17 and 26 and even photos of newly appointed faculty members make me feel “old”. I frequently wonder how the generational gap between educators and students…

  • Using stick figure narratives in educational development

    This blog describes how we can use stick figure narratives in our educational development (ED) work. My thoughts on this were inspired by a workshop facilitated by Dr. Jessica Motherwell McFarlane who presented at Symposium 2018.  Dr. Motherwell McFarlane uses stick-figure narratives in her role as an instructor and counsellor to explore resiliency. One of the premises…

  • 3 Quick and Easy Energizers

    In a course I recently taught, I used and/or learned a few energizers. Since I love having these types of activities in my ‘back pocket’, I wanted to share them with you: Ping Pong Ball Good for a large group energizer. Divide the group into 3 and have each sub-group stand or be in a…