Improving your Teaching: A Teaching Demo, Debrief, and Discussion about Effective Teaching Practices

Dan Levy, PhD 
Senior Lecturer in Public Policy
Faculty Chair of SLATE (Strengthening Learning and Teaching Excellence) Initiative
Harvard Kennedy School 
RSVP 
This session will consist of three parts.

In the first part, Dan Levy will lead a short teaching demonstration, engaging participants through experimental and established teaching techniques he uses in his teaching to try to make learning memorable.

In the second part, Eric Mazur, Balkanski Professor of Physics and of Applied Physics, will lead a “teaching demo debrief” asking Dan and participants to reflect on the learning experience and assess what lessons/principles/ideas they could apply in their own teaching.

In the third and final part, Dan will share some of the teaching practices he uses to advance the learning of his students, and lead a discussion where everyone will be invited to share their favorite teaching practices.

Upon completing this workshop, participants will be able to:

• Identify opportunities for making learning more memorable in their courses.

• Consider “behind the scenes” decision-making in teaching– how they can better prepare for their courses and class sessions and how they can better design and assess for learning.

• Identify one or more teaching practices to adopt in their teaching a week after the workshop

• Identify one or more teaching practices to adopt in their teaching a semester after the workshop

Biography: 

Dan Levy serves as a Senior Lecturer in Public Policy and Faculty Chair of Harvard Kennedy School's SLATE (Strengthening Learning and Teaching Excellence) Initiative. He teaches courses in quantitative methods, policy analysis, and program evaluation.

He has become increasingly interested in digital learning as a way to complement and strengthen residential education. He now directs the Harvard Kennedy School’s efforts on digital education and previously served as the Faculty Co-Chair of the HarvardX Research Committee, a university-wide committee focused on promoting research about online learning.

He has won several teaching awards, including the university-wide David Pickard Award for Teaching and Mentoring (awarded by the Harvard Statistics Department to a faculty member who has made important contributions to the teaching of statistics) and the Manuel C. Carballo Award for Excellence in Teaching at the Harvard Kennedy School.

He received his PhD in Economics from Northwestern University. Finally, and most importantly, he is passionate about effective teaching and learning, and enjoys sharing his experience and enthusiasm with others.