Welcome
The Crown Center for Teaching (CCT) is a resource for educators who want to expand and hone their teaching toolkits. You will find information throughout this webpage about our Educational Development programming, including New Faculty Orientation, the Mentoring Alliance Program, Crown Conversations, Crown Affiliate Events, DocuGuides, Educator Learning Communities (ELCs), and Scholarly Writing and Research Groups (SWARGs), and additional funding opportunities.
The Crown Center Office is located on the second floor of Tutt Library across from the Colket Center. Drop-in office hours are to be determined. In the meantime, please contact Associate Director Jessica Hunter to schedule an appointment: (719) 352-1586.
24-25 Crown Programming
Regular Crown Center Programming during the 2024-25 academic year will consist of formal lunches on the second Tuesday of each block, from 12:15-1:30pm in Tutt 317. Please see the schedule of dates and topics below, along with links to RSVP. An RSVP is strongly suggested to ensure we have enough food for lunch, thank you!
Crown will also host Block Breakfasts on the Thursday of fourth week in Cossitt Commons from 8:30am-10:30am: Bagels, coffee, tea, and informal conversation about the block just finished or yet to come. We’ve made this opportunity available in response to a request for more informal space to converse. Use it as an excuse to catch up with others and/or delay your grading! No RSVP needed.
Educator Development Days will take place on the Friday before the start of Block 5 (January 17, 2025) and the Friday before Commencement (May 16, 2025). See 2025's offering below.
B4 Workshops & Events
Crown Conversations Workshop
Hosted by Sofia Fenner
November 21, 1-3pm
Location TBD
In anticipation of challenging moments with friends and family over Fall Break, we invite you to a workshop on Embodied Conversation on November 21 from 1-3pm. Most of us are familiar with how a frustrating conversation feels in our bodies: a quickening heartbeat; a tight chest; a desire to get up, lash out, or walk away. What are our bodies telling us in these moments? How can those messages help us engage—or, if need be, disengage? We’ll be exploring these questions through ideas, movement, and practice.
Human Input on AI at CC
The AAC&U Institute on AI, Pedagogy, and Curriculum team, comprising faculty and academic staff members, recently developed a set of guiding principles for our ongoing campus-wide exploration of Generative Artificial Intelligence at CC. These principles reflect a deliberate and thoughtful approach to GenAI that draws upon the strengths of our liberal arts foundation and upholds our core institutional commitments to antiracism and sustainability. You can read the full statement here.
What are your thoughts on the use—or non-use—of Generative Artificial Intelligence at CC? Throughout block 4, we invite you to attend one or more “pop-up” conversations with members of our AAC&U AI team. Here are three options, more will emerge:
- Week 1: Thursday, November 21 from 1:30 – 2:30 p.m. – Location TBD
- Week 2: Thursday, December 5 from 1:30 – 2:30 p.m. – Location TBD
- Week 3: Thursday, December 12 from 1:30 – 2:30 p.m. – Location TBD
Crown Lunches
Hosted by Crown Center Director Ryan Bañagale
As part of CC's participation in the 2024-25 AAC&U Institute on AI, Pedagogy, and the Curriculum, we invite you to a lunch discussion on the evolving landscape of teaching and generative AI at our college. Faculty and staff from the institute team will share insights on current pedagogical strategies and considerations for implementation of AI in the specific context of our CC classrooms. This will also be an open forum to hear your experiences, insights, and concerns as we navigate these technologies together on our campus.
Hosted by Assistant Dean Marion Hourdequin (Philosophy)
Supportive advising enables students to chart a thoughtful path through CC and beyond, taking advantage of the college’s rich curriculum and co-curricular activities, as well as opportunities such as study away, internships, and undergraduate research. Whether you’re new to advising or a seasoned advisor, please join us for a lunchtime workshop on advising at CC. We’ll briefly discuss advising nuts and bolts, then invite colleagues from across campus to share approaches and ideas for effective (and efficient!) advising, leaving plenty of time for questions and broader discussion. Although the focus of this session is on faculty advising, all interested members of our educational community are welcome.
Hosted by Crown Center Director Ryan Bañagale and Director of the Career Center Brett Woodard
(description to follow)
Hosted by Director of Creativity & Innovation Kris Stanec
Tutt Library , Room 317
Come experience Possibility Books (PB) and have time to adapt the prompts to align with any course. PB materials are provided for each class using this method.
Possibility Books are a brief daily exercise (~10 minutes at the start of class) in which students are asked to respond to various prompts through mark-making and dialogue. PB have been found to increase students’:
- sense of community
- well-being
- creative thinking
- engagement, and
- learning of course content
Over a thousand students across all disciplines have used PB. Most students surveyed indicated that the daily practice of PB was valuable in learning new ways to engage with content.
Hosted by the Health Professionals Advising Committee
Join a session focused on writing letters of recommendation hosted by the current Health Professions Advising Committee (Jane Byrnes, Eryn Murphy, Sara Hanson, and Amy Kohout). This session will cover what makes an excellent letter of recommendation, as well as strategies for managing lots of requests, and for gathering the most useful information from the students we write for. While our committee sees a lot of letters focused specifically on medical and dental school applications, we think this session might be useful for both newer letter-writers and seasoned recommenders from all divisions, writing in support of students pursuing a wide range of opportunities.
Hosted by Crown Faculty Fellow Professor Sophia Fenner (Political Science)
(description to follow)
Click here to RSVP.
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Educator Resource Day 2025, January 17, 2025, 9:00 am – 3:00 pm
Engaging Students through Objects-Based Teaching
Tutt Library Room 105
Hosted by Jessica Hunter (Associate Director of the Crown Center for Teaching) and Rebecca Tucker (Professor, Art), this interactive workshop will focus on teaching with objects. We define “objects” broadly, to include artworks and items in museum collections as well as works from visual and popular culture, material culture, infographics, charts, graphs, diagrams, etc.
Objects-based pedagogies are effective across disciplines. They offer students opportunities to hone their observation and analysis skills, develop curiosity and questioning, and engage deeply through visual interpretation. Objects-based teaching also supports students’ creative thinking capacities – and creates ideal conditions for developing nuanced interdisciplinary connections.
Whether you are a seasoned practitioner – or just curious about the idea – this session will address how objects-based pedagogies can support your teaching. We will address challenges, develop techniques, and identify strategies to support your goals. As well, we will explore approaches, projects, and scenarios that will help us push boundaries and create new possibilities for teaching and learning with objects.
24-25 C&I Programming
Presented in collaboration with the Mellon Humanities grant and the Crown Center for Teaching
Open to all faculty and staff.
To ensure we have enough food, please RSVP using the Google Form under each workshop description.
When: 3rd week of the block
Where: in C&I’s Honnen classroom (101)
Thursday 9/12 12:30-2:00
Multiple Narratives, Kris Stanec
Multiple Narratives lays a foundation for the creative process by valuing students' lived experiences and cultural identities as they construct knowledge collaboratively. This method promotes active listening and inquiry. It can be easily adapted for check-ins as well as integrated with course content to get students thinking metaphorically and creatively about the class.
Tuesday, 10/8 12:30 – 2:00
Ten questions, Jessica Hunter
This problem-finding activity is designed to help us think through messy, ill-defined problems where the parameters aren't clearly specified and the goal isn't clear. The Ten Questions exercise asks participants to practice using divergent and convergent thinking to generate multiple questions surrounding their problem, then choose the question that best fits what they want to explore.
Thursday 11/7 12:30—2:00
Lyrical Questions, Kris and Jessica
Lyrical Questions is a community-building experience that can have a profound bonding effect. The interviews give participants insight into one another in a surprisingly short time. For groups that will be working together in an ongoing way, the exercise creates a foundation of respect and empathy, which makes all the work go more smoothly. It may also allow people with differing perspectives to engage in generative and respectful conversations.
No formal workshop – find spaciousness
Give yourself the gift of an hour that you don't fill with work- alternatively, during this time, experiment with finding ways to connect to something that you find uplifting. What kind of spaciousness can you create in this now unplanned hour? What possibilities can you explore that might put you in a positive "place" - physical or metaphorical? How can you stay open to whatever happens? We see this practice as a radical act of self-compassion, and we hope you take the hour to be creative in ways that bring you joy during a busy time.
Thursday 2/6 2:00-3:30
Perception and Creativity at FAC– Jessica Hunter
Although remaining open and receptive when faced with ambiguous situations is a component of creative thinking, we typically make decisions about unfamiliar things quickly. This session features exercises designed to help build participants’ tolerance of ambiguity so they might eventually make more creative decisions.
Thursday 3/6 2:00-3:30
Polarity Thinking – Kris Stanec
Polarities, also called dilemmas, tensions or paradoxes, are differences between two alternatives. Each pole brings something positive to the interdependent pair and each pole becomes a liability without its pole partner. This workshop will explore this phenomenon and the dynamics by which it functions to more creatively and effectively leverage its energy.
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Mission & Vision
Our Vision
The CCT mobilizes students, staff, and faculty to collectively cultivate a learning community that co-creates innovative, inspiring, inclusive, and equitable educational experiences.
Our Mission
The CCT aims to do the following through its programming and services:
- To foster curricular innovation through collaborative partnerships between faculty, staff, and students.
- To build educational awareness, knowledge, and skills about innovative pedagogies and curriculum development
- To provide opportunities to learn and implement evidence-based pedagogies to facilitate dynamic, inclusive, and equitable educational environments across the institution
- To support educators in varied institutional roles, at different career stages, and working in a multitude of disciplinary areas.
- To promote scholarship across field areas including research on teaching, learning, and educational development.
