Innovative educators are invited to submit a proposal to present a breakout session at the 1-day Learner Centered Teaching Conference (February 22, 2014, in San Marcos, CA). Be part of the excitement of this professional development festival for learner-centered educators!

Questions? Please use the comment box at the bottom of the page or send an e-mail to Al Trujillo at atrujillo@palomar.edu.

Submit your breakout session proposal directly from this Webpage. Simply fill in the form below and click the “Submit” button.

Instructions:

The Organizing Committee’s priority is to ensure that the breakout sessions offered are excellent models of learner-centered designs that empower students. The Committee will give the highest consideration to breakout session proposals that include a complete Breakout Session Design and that have been used in classrooms.

The Organizing Committee seeks breakout session proposals where one or more facilitators demonstrate an active learning strategy. Note that breakout session facilitators are expected to NEVER read papers or present an entire lecture; rather, the breakout sessions will be the facilitation of an active learning strategy used in class. Activities might be creative adaptations of active learning strategies designed or modified by the presenter(s) to engage students in their learning and the participants will get to experience the activity as if they were students. Sessions may be either 60 or 70 minutes in length (your choice).

Important dates:

• Extended deadline: January 17, 2014: Final day for submitting Breakout Session Proposals
• January 24, 2014: Notification of Proposal acceptance
• January 31, 2014: Presenters must complete their registration for the Conference
• February 22, 2014: Date of the Conference

IMPORTANT NOTE: Breakout sessions are either 60 or 70 minutes in duration. The breakout sessions must be predominately learner-centered and therefore must contain less than 20-25% lecture. Note that examples of lecture include the presenter speaking, showing PowerPoint slides, reading, leading Q&A sessions where learners ask questions of the presenter, and any other activity in which the presenter is actively “professing” rather than guiding an experience in which the attendees are engaged actively in thinking/learning.

Here is an example of a well-designed active learning breakout session entitled “Using Hollywood Films to Teach College Success”:

1. Brief Lecture: Why I use Hollywood films to teach college success. (5 min)
2. Video clip: Show scene from the film “The Edge” in which two characters (played by Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin) are stranded in a remote wilderness and are stalked by a bear. Effectively dramatized is how differently the characters take responsibility in this difficult situation. The Baldwin character responds to the adversity as a passive Victim, while the Hopkins character responds as a pro-active Creator.  (10 min)
3. Guided Pair Conversation: Participants pair up and discuss prepared questions designed to draw out the different ways the two characters respond to the adversity (i.e., Victims or Creators). (10 min)
4. Whole-Group Discussion: Draw out the two ways of responding to life’s challenges that are depicted in the film. (15 min)
5. Brief Lecture: Provide examples of student journal entries written after viewing and discussing scenes from “The Edge.” Journal entries show how students applied the “lesson” of the film to their own adversities in college and in life. (10 min)
6. Whole-Group Brainstorm: Ask participants for their examples of other films that could be used to teach college success. (10 min)

Audio/Visual Needs:

NOTE: All breakout session rooms will have movable student desks, an instructor podium, an instructor computer with Internet access and audio, a data projector and screen, a whiteboard with markers, a flip chart & markers, and wireless Internet. PowerPoint presentations will require the presenter to bring either their presentation on a USB thumb drive or a laptop computer with all connecting cables. If you need specialized audio, you must bring your own audio device to your session.