- 38 minutes 30 secondsHow to Engage Learners in Online Courses with Denise Maduli-Williams
Denise Maduli-Williams shares how to engage learners in online courses on episode 624 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast.
Quotes from the episode

The very first thing I saw was the online instructor posting this video where she was roller skating in this roller Derby rink and welcoming us online, and that just changed everything for me.
-Denise Maduli-WilliamsWhen we design with accessibility in mind, we support everyone, all students.
-Denise Maduli-WilliamsStudents who are quieter, whether it’s synchronous on Zoom or synchronous in person, they have the opportunity to participate when they’re ready and to prepare.
-Denise Maduli-Williams
28 May 2026, 12:00 pm - 44 minutes 39 secondsCan’t Stop, Won’t Stop: Teaching with AI Tools with Rebecca Fordon
Rebecca Fordon unpacks vibe coding and the eight AI teaching tools she built in a single semester on episode 623 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast.
Quotes from the episode

Vibe coding, I think of being able to describe the kind of application or website that you want in just words, a narrative, rather than having to code it, knowing coding language.
-Rebecca FordonI think the easiest place to start is in ChatGPT, or Gemini, or Claude Code.
-Rebecca FordonMany of my students have not used it for anything related to law school. Until they get into my class, and then they see there actually are some good, legitimate uses.
-Rebecca FordonIf you want to mess with things on your own, you can really just ask AI: How do I do that? Where should I look?
-Rebecca Fordon21 May 2026, 12:00 pm - 40 minutes 59 secondsWhy Mattering Matters with Jennifer Wallace
Jennifer Wallace shares about her book, Mattering: The Secret to a Life of Deep Connection and Purpose on episode 622 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast.
Quotes from the episode

Mattering says you belong at the table, but it goes even further, and it says you would be missed if you weren’t here. You are adding value, and we would notice if you weren’t here.
-Jennifer WallaceWe have so much input and so much output being demanded of us today that often we go through life on autopilot.
-Jennifer WallaceMattering is not another thing to add to your to-do list. Mattering is a way of looking at your to-do list.
-Jennifer WallaceWhen you look at the data on what drives performance, it is engagement. And what drives engagement is mattering.
-Jennifer Wallace14 May 2026, 12:00 pm - 42 minutes 13 secondsThe Public Scholar with David Perry
David Perry shares about his new book, The Public Scholar, on episode 621 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast.
Quotes from the episode

Teaching is the most important form of public engagement that any of us do.
-David PerryIf we are really practiced at teaching, and as we develop our skills as teachers, those are the skills that can also take us into other spaces outside of the classroom.
-David PerryAcademia is structured around all kinds of failure. Once you recognize that, and then bring yourself into another context where you’re going to experience rejection, you already have the skills to cope with it.
-David PerryI think all writers, and certainly in academia, worry a lot about our worst faith readers. How do we not get ripped apart? You have to write for your best faith reader. You have to really shift your focus.
-David Perry7 May 2026, 12:00 pm - 40 minutes 23 secondsThe Joyful Online Teacher with Flower Darby
Flower Darby shares about being a joyful online teacher on episode 620 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast.
Quotes from the episode

Higher education doesn’t do a great job of preparing faculty to teach, generally speaking, that’s not new, but especially online teaching.
-Flower DarbyIf you’re not a meme person, don’t do that. Something that isn’t authentic to your personality is not going to be effective.
-Flower DarbySometimes you don’t need all the latest bells and whistles; you don’t need the latest iPhone. We can be effective with simpler tools.
-Flower DarbyWe can’t be joyful if we’re always working.
-Flower Darby30 April 2026, 12:00 pm - 36 minutes 16 secondsThe Science of Learning Meets AI with Lew Ludwig + Todd Zakrajsek
Lew Ludwig + Todd Zakrajsek uncover themes from The Science of Learning Meets AI on episode 619 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast.
Quotes from the episode

We could actually create an educational system. Not so that it deals with the problems we have with AI, but so that those problems are no longer relevant.
-Todd ZakrajsekIf you don’t have students attention, they can’t learn because if you don’t attend to something, you can’t learn it.
-Todd ZakrajsekKeep in mind that you’re the expert. This is your assignment. You know what you’re doing, you know the content, so then you can judge what AI gives you, what works, and what still may need some work.
-Lew LudwigWhat this gets down to is backward design; we start with the learning goals. We should figure out how to assess them, and then decide if AI fits in that or not.
-Lew Ludwig23 April 2026, 12:00 pm - 44 minutes 2 secondsFrom Awareness to Action: Interrupting Bias in the Classroom
Norma Montague shares of her experiences going from awareness to action, interrupting bias in the classroom on episode 618 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast.
Quotes from the episode

One thing that my work on inclusive teaching focuses on, is really being able to understand your learner’s motivations.
-Norma MontagueOne of the ideas that I learned from a colleague who had recommended a book was the idea of rebranding office hours as student hours.
-Norma MontagueI think it’s important to help students understand what those student hours are for and how they can get the most out of them.
-Norma MontagueWhen students feel safe in the classroom, then they’re going to contribute, invest. That’s when I find that I can really increase their rigor and challenge them more.
-Norma Montague16 April 2026, 12:00 pm - 46 minutes 27 secondsHow Today’s Agentic AI Changes What and How We Teach with Teddy Svoronos
Teddy Svoronos describes how today’s agentic AI changes what and how we teach on episode 617 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast.
Quotes from the episode

An AI agent is an LLM that runs tools in a loop to achieve a goal.
-Teddy quoting Simon Willison’s definitionThe process of having a task, write a report, use a tool, web search, and do it over and over again until you feel like you’ve gotten the full sort of spectrum of things—that I think is what an agent really is.
-Teddy SvoronosThese LLMs are now becoming like this intermediary between me and the actual content. And so I’m optimizing in a different way than I used to.
-Teddy SvoronosI think there’s an analogy with these tools that I’ve been thinking of as cognitive debt, which is that as you offload to them, there are things that they’ll do that you won’t quite understand.
-Teddy Svoronos9 April 2026, 12:00 pm - 42 minutes 46 seconds(Re)Orienting the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning
Nancy Chick, Peter Felten, and Katarina Mårtensson share about The SoTL Guide: (Re)Orienting the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning on episode 616 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast.
Quotes from the episode

We see SOTL as simply inquiry into teaching and learning for the purposes of improving teaching and learning in context and then contributing to what we know about teaching and learning in support of the broader aims of higher education.
-Nancy ChickWhat I usually say when I speak to colleagues and academics who are sort of starting a SOTL journey is to start small, small steps, and whatever is a low threshold.
-Katarina MårtenssonI can’t go through this book and say who wrote this sentence or this section or whose idea this part was, because it really is a product of the three of us.
-Peter Felten2 April 2026, 12:00 pm - 43 minutes 38 secondsBeing Kind to Our Future Selves with Matthew Mahavongtrakul
Matthew Mahavongtrakul and Bonni Stachowiak have a conversation about being kind to our future selves on episode 615 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast.
Quotes from the episode

Not everything that comes your way is an emergency. Not everything that comes your way has to demand your immediate attention.
-Matthew MahavongtrakulOnce you are comfortable with your system and you’re iterating, it actually starts to become second nature, not only to professional life, but to personal life as well.
-Matthew MahavongtrakulAn exercise that I did with my supervisor once was to actually go through each of these tasks and to see what I thought was high priority, was it actually high priority for the job that I was in?
-Matthew Mahavongtrakul26 March 2026, 12:00 pm - 25 minutes 13 secondsKeeping Your PKM Real Simple with RSS
Bonni Stachowiak shares how to keep your Personal Knowledge Mastery (PKM) real simple with RSS on episode 614 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast.
Quotes from the episode

Rather than get that overwhelmed feeling of how hard it’s going to be to keep up, I don’t have to, and neither do you. Enter RSS, Real Simple Syndication.
-Bonni StachowiakIt’s pretty spectacular how, if somebody knows about RSS, and they’ve subscribed to a blog or a website, how you can find people that you have a lot in common with, and get going with your curiosity.
-Bonni StachowiakIt’s amazing what happens when, before we start trying to lecture or share information, we ask people to predict something. Even if they end up predicting incorrectly, there still is that connection where we’ve piqued their curiosity.
-Bonni Stachowiak19 March 2026, 12:00 pm - More Episodes? Get the App