Designed for Learning

It used to be that instructors primarily assessed student learning via printed documents that were turned in physically—papers written on actual paper, blue book exams, etc.

Over the last couple of decades, those artifacts largely transitioned into digital products, which students submit through an online learning management system. In addition to efficiency gains, the shift reduced the amount of paper being shuffled back and forth between teacher and students.

With the presence of AI ever increasing on college campuses, though, instructors are more often calling on their students to be “makers” once again, with assignments like handwritten course journals and physical writing portfolios on the rise.

Hinda Mandell, a professor in the School of Communication and English at the Rochester Institute of Technology, takes a fascinating approach to the art of making, asking students in her general education course on persuasion to learn to crochet. She shares with us why she does this and how it relates to student learning, offering insights that are relevant to classes at all levels.

Key Topics Discussed:

• Why producing crocheted items accounts for 15 percent of the grade students receive in Hinda’s gen ed course Persuasion
• Getting students to buy into crocheting as an act of persuasion itself, one designed as part of a larger process to pull their attention away from online spaces and into class
• The reasons Hinda incorporates hands-on making activities into all her courses and ways she connects the process with her goals for student learning
• The benefits of challenging yourself, as an instructor, to do something unexpected in your courses, especially if you’ve been teaching awhile
• Responding to students who resist or have trouble with the handwork assignments
• Fitting handwork into the broader assessment structure of the course
• Making how you spend the time in class with your students a priority

Guest Bio: Hinda Mandell is a professor in the School of Communication and English at RIT, where she was the director of the university’s journalism program from 2020–24. Passionate about prioritizing a DIY, materials-based approach as a thought tool in the university classroom, she has been interviewed by The New York Times and The Associated Press, among other global outlets, on the importance of making objects by hand. She is the author of several books exploring how people use handcrafts as a tool for activism and dissent.

Resource Mentioned:

• Episode Transcript

Designed for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu/podcast. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn and subscribe to our newsletter.

In higher education’s current landscape, many thinkers in teaching and learning are arguing that we need to emphasize that college is more than just the acquisition of knowledge and skills.

We want students to recognize the value of learning in community, listening and speaking to the people around them. We want them to feel like they belong, that they have a place in our courses and on our campuses. We want them to develop confidence in their voices, to feel comfortable sharing their unique perspectives with the world.

Philosopher Rebecca Newberger Goldstein has written a new book, The Mattering Instinct: How Our Deepest Longing Drives Us and Divides Us, which offers insights into who we are as humans that point to another goal we should hold for a college education: helping students believe that they matter.

So what does it mean to matter generally, and to matter in a classroom more specifically? And what can college teachers do to instill that sense of mattering in their courses?

Key Topics Discussed:

• Why Rebecca says “mattering” has to do with our relationships with ourselves and the complications this presents as we navigate the world as humans
• A map of the four personas she says people assume in seeking to matter: the socializer, heroic striver, competitor, and transcender
• The challenges these different personas present to teachers trying to reach students who have different ideas about what the concept of mattering ultimately means to them
• Not assuming that your way of mattering, as an authority in your subject and the classroom, can or should be universally applied to your students
• Respecting students’ different ways of mattering while modeling for them that this is something that can evolve and change
• The importance of having charity toward others and seeing our mutual humanity and vulnerability

Guest Bio: Rebecca Newberger Goldstein is an award-winning philosopher, writer, and public intellectual. She is the author of more than 10 books of acclaimed fiction and nonfiction, most recently The Mattering Instinct: How Our Deepest Longing Drives Us and Divides Us. A fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, she has been supported in her work by a MacArthur Fellowship (aka the “Genius Grant”), among numerous other honors, and has taught at Yale, Columbia, NYU, Dartmouth, and Harvard. In 2015, she was awarded the National Humanities Medal by President Barack Obama.

Resources Mentioned:

• Rebecca’s Book: The Mattering Instinct: How Our Deepest Longing Drives Us and Divides Us (Liveright)
• Episode Transcript

Designed for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu/podcast. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn and subscribe to our newsletter.

The words and metaphors we choose to describe our interactions with artificial intelligence are telling.

Do we view it as a stochastic parrot? A thought partner? A form of co-intelligence? A sycophantic assistant? Each of these phrases reflects a different set of beliefs and attitudes and likely shapes our engagement with AI.

How instructors talk about the technology’s relationship to their teaching goals can be just as revealing. To say we want students to develop AI fluency, for example, means we expect sustained engagement with it. Labelling a course or an assignment as AI-resistant suggests a different orientation.

But what do we lose when the conversation becomes a strict either/or proposition?

Annette Vee is one of the authors of The Norton Guide to AI-Aware Teaching, a new book that presents another way to frame our relationship with AI as educators. She talks with us about all things AI and college teaching and why she believes the concept of AI awareness can make space for a wide spectrum of views and practices.

Key Topics Discussed:

• The origins of The Norton Guide to AI-Aware Teaching and its focus on leading with pedagogy rather than starting from a position that is either AI-engaged or AI-resistant
• How widespread concerns about AI have actually benefited the conversation around teaching by making it more prominent and mainstream
• The importance of considering all manner of perspectives about AI, from faculty and students alike, and why that led Annette and her coauthors to choose the term “AI-aware”
• Areas where she sees students potentially benefitting from using AI—and why it’s NOT at the brainstorming stage
• Two of Annette’s favorite AI-aware teaching practices from the book, including an assignment that asks students to “do something impossible with AI”
• Why tending to student motivation for learning may be more important than ever

Guest Bio: Annette Vee is an associate professor of English and faculty liaison for AI enablement at the University of Pittsburgh, where in addition to facilitating research and faculty development on AI, she teaches courses in writing, pedagogy, digital composition, AI, and literacy. Outside of Pitt, she gives keynotes and workshops related to AI. She is the coauthor of The Norton Guide to AI-Aware Teaching with Marc Watkins and Derek Bruff.

Resources Mentioned:

• Book: The Norton Guide to AI-Aware Teaching (W. W. Norton & Company)
• Annette’s Substacks: Computation & Writing and AI & How We Teach
• Designed for Learning episode with Derek Bruff: Teaching Students When (Not) to Use AI
• Article: What Happened When I Tried to Replace Myself with ChatGPT in My English Classroom (Piers Gelly, University of Virginia)
• Assignment: Do Something Impossible with AI (Kiera Allison, University of Virginia)
• Episode Transcript

Designed for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu/podcast. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn and subscribe to our newsletter.

For better or worse, much of the talk about AI’s impact on the purposes and processes of an education continues to focus on cheating: Are students outsourcing their work, and their learning, to tools like ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, and Google Gemini? Some high-profile stories have gone so far as to suggest cheating is so rampant that the whole college system is basically collapsing around us.

This month, we’re revisiting our most popular episode to date, a conversation with Tricia Bertram Gallant, coauthor of the 2025 book The Opposite of Cheating: Teaching for Integrity in the Age of AI.

Tricia helps us put the cheating claims into context, providing insights into the deeper questions that we should be asking about academic dishonesty and integrity and sharing pedagogical strategies for adapting to AI’s widespread availability. 

Key Topics Discussed:

• Why students cheat (spoiler: the reasons aren’t new)
• The role of “neutralizing,” or moral justifications, in allowing people to view cheating as bad in the abstract but not in their current situation
• Not putting the burden to intuit the purpose of an assignment on students
• How AI has changed cheating, but not why students do it
• Experimenting with AI tools so you can create guardrails for students—and why doing so doesn’t mean you think less of them as people
• Strategies for communicating effectively with students about generative AI
• Rethinking when, why, and how writing is assigned, including the benefits of having students complete some of that work in the classroom
• The potential of pairing written exams with oral assessments—which it turns out students often appreciate
• How Tricia suggests instructors react when suspecting a student has cheated

Guest Bio: Tricia Bertram Gallant is the director of the Academic Integrity Office and Triton Testing Center at the University of California San Diego. President emeritus of the International Center for Academic Integrity, she has more than 20 years of experience as an academic integrity researcher, author, teacher, and practitioner.

Her fifth book, The Opposite of Cheating: Teaching for Integrity in the Age of AI, which she co-authored with David Rettinger, was published in 2025. It is part of the Teaching, Engaging, and Thriving in Higher Ed Series at the University of Oklahoma Press edited by Designed for Learning host Jim Lang and Michelle Miller.

Resources Mentioned:

• Book: The Opposite of Cheating: Teaching for Integrity in the Age of AI (University of Oklahoma Press)
• Tricia’s Podcast and Contact Info: theoppositeofcheating.com
• Notre Dame Learning’s Lab for AI in Teaching and Learning (LAITL)
• Related Designed for Learning Episode: Navigating AI’s Evolving Role in Teaching and Learning
• Notre Dame’s Undergraduate Academic Code of Honor
• Episode Transcript

*Note: This episode was originally released in July 2025.

Designed for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu/podcast. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn and subscribe to our newsletter.

It’s something that sounds so basic it’s easy to overlook how daunting it can be:

Learning and remembering student names.

This month, we’re going back to our very first episode (and one of our most popular ones), a conversation with cognitive psychologist and author Michelle D. Miller about why mastering names isn’t simply a memory exercise—it’s a step toward creating a welcoming, inclusive classroom environment.

Key Topics Discussed:

• The science behind why names are uniquely difficult to remember
• The importance of knowing students’ names for fostering connection and inclusivity
• Michelle’s four-step strategy to improve name recall: Attend, Say, Associate, Retrieve
• The role of attention and retrieval in reinforcing memory
• Practical tips for large and small classes, including the use of name tents and group activities
• How learning names enhances engagement and classroom participation

Guest Bio: Michelle D. Miller is a professor of psychological sciences and President’s Distinguished Teaching Fellow at Northern Arizona University. Originally trained in cognitive psychology, psycholinguistics, and neuroscience, she now focuses mainly on using the findings of these fields to help faculty choose and use educational technology and design engaging, effective college courses. Her latest book, A Teacher’s Guide to Learning Student Names: Why You Should, Why It’s Hard, How You Can, offers practical, research-backed strategies for educators looking to build a sense of connection with their students.

Resources Mentioned:

• Book: A Teacher’s Guide to Learning Student Names: Why You Should, Why It’s Hard, How You Can (University of Oklahoma Press)
• Michelle’s R3 Substack Newsletter
• Michelle’s LinkedIn
• Episode Transcript

*Note: This episode was originally released in January 2025.

Designed for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu/podcast. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn and subscribe to our newsletter.

For better or worse, the educational theory that seems to have permeated American education more than any other has been the notion of learning styles. Although the definition can vary, the most popular version of the idea argues that people can be categorized as visual, auditory, or kinesthetic learners.

From its earliest origins, though, critics have underscored the very thin and tangled research line that supported the learning styles framework, and in recent years cognitive psychologists have tried to toll the death knell of this approach—without much success. Something about the broader idea of learning styles seems so appealing or persuasive that it continues to shape the thinking of many classroom teachers and parents as well as our own self-descriptions.

Thomas Fallace of William Paterson University has written a book titled You Are Not a Kinesthetic Learner: The Troubled History of the Learning Style Idea, tracing the theory from its early origins through a half-century of teaching and thinking about education.

He talks with us about whether learning styles actually exist, whether the concept has helped or harmed students, and—if learning styles don’t exist—whether we should just abandon the idea once and for all.

Key Topics Discussed:

• Cold War psychologist Herman Witkin’s experiments to test whether people could tell they were seated upright in a tilted room and the unlikely link between those studies and the idea of learning styles
• The problematic application of the learning styles idea over time, often emerging out of the efforts of well-intentioned people trying to improve educational outcomes—and in fact succeeding in some cases
• The vagaries of the “kinesthetic learner” label and how it’s been applied disproportionately to Black and Hispanic students, those with special needs, and English-language learners
• Why the idea of learning styles has been so popular and persistent
• Why the danger comes from labelling students as one kind of learner or another, not from varying the modalities in which they engage with course content
• Drawing on the history of research on learning styles as we think about the role of AI-assisted learning

Guest Bio: Thomas Fallace is a professor of education and director of the master’s in secondary education program at William Paterson University. His research focuses largely on curriculum history and the history of ideas in schools, and he is the author of five books, most recently You Are Not a Kinesthetic Learner: The Troubled History of the Learning Style Idea.

Resources Mentioned:

• Thomas’s Book: You Are Not a Kinesthetic Learner: The Troubled History of the Learning Style Idea (The University of Chicago Press)
• Episode Transcript

Designed for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu/podcast. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn and subscribe to our newsletter.

Faculty who teach online know that it comes with distinct benefits, with the ability to reach learners who might not otherwise have access to your course prominent among them.

But as meaningful as that is, the logistical challenges online teaching can present means we don’t necessarily think of it as a “joyful” exercise, particularly in those courses with limited live interaction between instructor and students.

An author and longtime advocate for online teaching, Flower Darby has written a new book titled The Joyful Online Teacher: Finding Our Fizz in Asynchronous Classes. It has much to offer anyone teaching in the online modality, whether your course is entirely on-demand or features regular live sessions.

Key Topics Discussed:

• The turning point with a student that reshaped Flower’s approach to online teaching
• Drawing on positive psychology’s PERMA theory of well-being to create a better online learning environment
• Why being a “joyful” teacher entails something different than surface-level happiness
• The importance of introducing energy to and generating energy in online classrooms
• The impact instructors can have on students by doing simple things like knowing their names and genuinely responding to what they’ve said
• Why Flower believes instructors bringing their full selves into their asynchronous classes is the most effective way to counter unethical uses of AI
• Finding creative ways to connect with students and lean into what gives you joy as a teacher to improve their experience and your own

Guest Bio: Flower Darby is an associate director of the Teaching for Learning Center at the University of Missouri, an author, and a keynote speaker. She’s taught in higher ed for more than 30 years in subjects ranging from psychology to jazz dance. Her latest book is The Joyful Online Teacher: Finding Our Fizz in Asynchronous Classes, which is part of the Teaching, Engaging, and Thriving in Higher Ed Series at the University of Oklahoma Press edited by Designed for Learning host Jim Lang and Michelle Miller.

Resources Mentioned:

• Flower’s New Book: The Joyful Online Teacher: Finding Our Fizz in Asynchronous Classes (University of Oklahoma Press)
• PERMA Theory of Well-Being
• Sarah Rose Cavanagh’s Book: The Spark of Learning (West Virginia University Press)
• Flower’s Website
• Flower’s LinkedIn
• Episode Transcript

Designed for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu/podcast. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn and subscribe to our newsletter.

American higher education has always stood out for its strong commitment to general education courses, or gen ed, the premise being that undergraduates should not necessarily jump directly into a major but instead have the room to learn and explore a variety of fields before choosing a particular path.

With that principled purpose comes a practical teaching challenge: Most students enroll in a gen ed course to fulfill a curricular requirement, not because they actively chose to take that class.

So how do teachers make the best possible case for a required course? And how do they make it a good experience for the students who may never return to the subject when the semester ends?

A professor at Boston College and regular contributor to The New York Times Magazine, Carlo Rotella has written a book that follows 33 students through his own general education course and explores answers to questions like these.

Key Topics Discussed:

• A description of the required literature course Carlo teaches at Boston College and why he chose to write about it
• How he uses the first day of class to attempt to overcome students’ skepticism
• Leading with the utility of the course, even when you as the instructor believe in the subject’s inherent beauty
• The distinct value to students of coming together to participate in a classroom with peers and an instructor and why that value only continues to grow as technology advances
• Strategies for getting students to participate, including working with those who aren’t as comfortable speaking during class
• Carlo’s approach to managing the flow of discussions, why he doesn’t fear silence, and thinking of what goes on in the classroom as “the main event”

Guest Bio: Carlo Rotella is a professor of English, journalism, and American studies at Boston College. He writes regularly for The New York Times Magazine, and his work has appeared in a number of other outlets, including The New Yorker, Harper’s, and The Best American Essays. He has written books about cities, boxing, blues, and literature and film, among other subjects; his latest, What Can I Get Out of This? Teaching and Learning in a Classroom Full of Skeptics, was named a Forbes Best Higher Education Book of 2025.

Resources Mentioned:

• Carlo’s New Book: What Can I Get Out of This? Teaching and Learning in a Classroom Full of Skeptics (University of California Press)
• Episode Transcript

Designed for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu/podcast. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn and subscribe to our newsletter.

Imagine you have a student who starts the semester strong but unexpectedly misses a deadline, and then you don’t see them in class for a few sessions. You reach out and are surprised to learn it isn’t because they lost interest in the course; it’s because they were so ashamed of missing that due date that it prevented them from coming back.

Maybe you don’t have to imagine. If you’ve been teaching awhile, chances are you’ve had this exact experience, one that might be related to a student having ADHD.

So what do learners with ADHD need from us as teachers? In her new book An Educator’s Guide to ADHD: Designing and Teaching for Student Success, Karen Costa shares strategies aimed at not only supporting these students but also taking advantage of the valuable strengths and perspectives they can bring to the classroom.

Key Topics Discussed:

• Thinking of the ADHD neurotype as a house with all its doors and windows thrown open
• What we need to unlearn about ADHD, starting with the implications of the name attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder
• Tapping into the creativity and outspokenness often exhibited by students with ADHD to improve the overall classroom environment
• Strategies for helping students with ADHD that will benefit everyone in the class
• Karen’s own experiences as someone with ADHD—both as a student and a professional—and why that drives her to talk about them openly, even when it’s uncomfortable
• Navigating potential sticking points between students who might thrive with more flexibility and faculty who are responsible for structuring a course
• How helping learners with ADHD can start with something as simple as making a checklist

Guest Bio: Karen Costa is a faculty development facilitator, adjunct faculty member, and the author of 99 Tips for Creating Simple and Sustainable Educational Videos: A Guide for Online Teachers and Flipped Classes. Her latest book, An Educator’s Guide to ADHD: Designing and Teaching for Student Success, was published in January 2026 by Johns Hopkins University Press.

Resources Mentioned:

• Karen’s New Book: An Educator’s Guide to ADHD: Designing and Teaching for Student Success (Johns Hopkins University Press)
• Karen’s Website: 100faculty.com
• Episode Transcript

Designed for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu/podcast. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn and subscribe to our newsletter.

For decades now, the call to college teachers has been to rely less on lecture and to draw more on active learning techniques such as discussions, small group brainstorming, and think-pair-shares.

Strategies like these fit well within smaller courses. But in an auditorium with a couple of hundred students, how do we encourage participation and community?

To meet this challenge, Notre Dame’s Rachel Branco has turned to an assessment approach known as the two-stage exam. It’s worked so well that she has now written a how-to guide to help other instructors incorporate this active learning experience into classes of any size.

Key Topics Discussed:

• How Rachel initially encountered the concept of two-stage exams, in which students answer the same set of questions first as individuals and then in groups
• Her experience incorporating two-stage exams into her smaller courses and why that inspired her not only to adapt the setup for her larger classes but also to write a guide for other instructors interested in doing so
• Well-established advantages of using two-stage exams as well as Rachel’s own observations of the benefits based on surveys of her students
• The logistics of deploying two-stage exams in a class with hundreds of students, including the importance of seating plans, the creation of the exam documents themselves, and group construction
• Why Rachel has each student turn in their own answer sheet for the group part of the exam and the kinds of questions that work best in light of the group dynamic
• Why it’s critical to communicate the rationale behind this style of assessment to students

Guest Bio: Rachel Branco is a neuroscientist and an associate teaching professor at the University of Notre Dame, where she teaches courses through both the Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry and the Neuroscience and Behavior Program. She is passionate about researching and implementing practical classroom strategies that improve how students learn about and experience science.

Resources Mentioned:

• Rachel’s Implementation Guide for Two-Stage Exams
• Mail Merge Tool for Notre Dame Instructors: Yet Another Mail Merge (YAMM)
• Grading Assistance Software for Notre Dame Instructors: Gradescope
• Episode Transcript

Designed for Learning is hosted by Jim Lang, a professor of the practice in Notre Dame Learning’s Kaneb Center for Teaching Excellence and the author of several influential books on teaching. The podcast is produced by Notre Dame Learning’s Office of Digital Learning. For more, visit learning.nd.edu/podcast. You can also follow Notre Dame Learning on LinkedIn and subscribe to our newsletter.