Research on learning styles now spans four decades. The amount of work ebbs and flows with more flowing recently. Interestingly, work on learning styles continues to occur across a wide spectrum of disciplines, including many quite removed from psychology, the disciplinary home of many of the central concepts and theories that ground notions of learning style.

Here’s an exciting announcement: McGraw-Hill and The Teaching Professor (Magna Publications) have joined forces to create an award that recognizes exemplary scholarly work on teaching and learning. The first award with its stipend of $1,000 will be given at the 2009 Teaching Professor Conference, June 5-7 in Washington, D.C.

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I am lucky to have my mentor (who still mentors me, despite our shared retirement status) reading this blog. His name is Gene Melander, and he addresses higher education with keen insights and heartfelt passion. Here’s what he wrote in response to the July 2 blog on critical thinking.

While wandering through a new book sent for review I found this great way of characterizing how people (the specific reference is students) respond to ideas expressed in seminar discussions.

The University of Oklahoma’s (OU) College of Arts and Sciences has a long history of successful interdisciplinary programs. Each was created under different circumstances without a standard process, but they all share several characteristics that have helped them thrive. Academic Leader recently spoke with Paul B. Bell, Jr., dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and vice provost for instruction, about what makes these interdisciplinary programs successful.

Getting students to read their textbooks is like pulling hen’s teeth! Even syllabus language just short of death threats, firmly stated admonitions regularly delivered in class, and the unannounced quiz slapped on desks when nobody answers questions about the reading don’t necessarily change behaviors or attitudes. Rather, students remain committed to seeing to get by without doing the reading, or only doing it very superficially, or only doing it just prior to exam dates.

As a distance learning trainer at the University of West Georgia, Christy Talley helps develop online courses, trains faculty in online instruction, provides student support, conducts student surveys and evaluations, and delivers online professional development. Part of her role is to give advice to online instructors. The following are her top 10 tips for online instructors:

The Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Studies (BAiLS) program, an interdisciplinary program at Northern Arizona University designed to meet the needs of returning adult students, is less structured than programs with similar goals at other institutions. This looser structure encourages collaboration among disciplines and provides for greater flexibility, says Larry Gould, associate dean of the College of Behavioral and Social Sciences.