Tapping Innovative Teaching
~DIIA will assist faculty in preparing entries for annual instructional technology competition.
At last year’s Innovative Instructional Technology Awards Program (IITAP), faculty were recognized for inventive approaches to teaching challenges as diverse as building assignments with automated grading and feedback, helping students complete group projects outside of class, and modeling environmental justice pedagogy using experiential learning. The winners received cash awards totaling $10,000.
The Division of Instructional Innovation and Assessment invites UT Austin faculty and faculty-student/staff teams to submit entries now for the 2010 IITAP event. The deadline for sending an e-mail indicating your intent to enter is November 15, and the deadline for submitting all materials is January 25.
Eligible projects must have employed instructional technologies for at least one semester in UT Austin courses, with data documenting student outcomes and impacts.
Contact the IITAP office at IITAP@www.utexas.edu to indicate that you wish to enter, so that staff members can advise you about your eligibility and readiness, how best to present and organize your entry information and materials, and—most importantly—assist you with preparing a demonstration video to make your entry as strong as possible.
Instructional technologies in a number of areas are eligible for consideration:
- tutorials
- content libraries with creative interfaces to enhance usability and functionality
- narratives and problem-based learning scenarios
- assessment and evaluation practices and tools
- interactive animations, games, simulations, and virtual worlds
- tools enabling mobile, collaborative, and social-networking practices
- learning spaces
Entries should demonstrate how a project’s instructional approach promotes students’ knowledge and skills and makes teaching and learning more effective, relevant, and efficient. Ideally, projects should
- reflect a particularly innovative instructional process
- offer clear advantages over traditional approaches
- connect learning and subject matter to students' lives
- encourage students to gain insight, understanding, and skills
- support teaching, promote students’ understanding, and benefit the department, college, or university
- feature clear navigation and usability that is consistent, intuitive, and aesthetically pleasing
- encourage engagement and interactivity, balancing student control and instructional support
- present content that is clear, readable, well-organized, well-crafted, rich, and deep
- attain media quality with high-quality graphics, video, sound, animations
- accommodate learner preferences with multiple entry points and attention to diverse learning styles
Entries will be reviewed by a panel of experts to determine finalists, which will then be judged by a panel including previous IITAP award recipients, members of the Academy of Distinguished Teachers, a UT Austin student, and members of the New Media Consortium.
For twelve years IITAP has encouraged, supported, and rewarded innovation in using instructional technology to promote students’ knowledge and skills. The program remains a central initiative of the provost to provide incentives for making learning more engaging, relevant, and active.