If you’re planning to use your summer break to catch up on some teaching-focused reading, here are some recommendations for books that the Center for Teaching Book Club and Center staff are using to reflect and recharge.
Center for Teaching Book Club:
What the Best College Teachers Do / Bain
Led by Graduate Assistant Mike Sebastian, this semester’s Center for Teaching Book Club selected the influential classic What the Best College Teachers Do, based on a 15-year study of college teachers from a variety of disciplines and institutions.
Book club members say: Bain “elevates teaching to something faculty can be very proud of, not just something they ‘have to do,’” provides strategies for combining “rigor and compassion,” and is perfect for anyone who is “burned out,” looking for practical inspiration, or “needs to revise course, exams, assignments, or worry about participation.” Although published in 2004, book club members argued that Bain’s focus on guiding “students to wrestle with authentic questions, instead of just ‘absorbing’ knowledge” is deeply relevant in an era when “AI has made information abundant, so thinking matters more than ever.”
Tamar Bernfeld, Assistant Director:
Lost in thought: the hidden pleasures of an intellectual life / Hitz
Tamar says: While this book has been out for about six years, I only recently came across it in a search. I am teaching a general education course this semester, and I regularly ask my students, “What is something new, surprising or thought-provoking that you learned today?” And this isn’t a test; I don’t want to measure what they have learned necessarily—I want to measure their interest, attention and perhaps even joy. I’m looking forward to this book because learning for learning’s sake does not feel superfluous to me; it feels necessary and life-affirming.
Katherine Beydler, Associate Director:
Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher / Brookfield
Katherine says: I find myself returning frequently to Stephen Brookfield’s Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher (2nd edition, 2017) both in my work at the Center and as an instructor. Brookfield encourages readers to make teaching decisions informed by a variety of forms of evidence. This feels particularly important in a moment of rapid change in how students and instructors engage in teaching and learning.
Allie Brandriet, Assistant Director:
Allie says: I’m currently reading Experiential Education in the College Context: What it is, How it Works, and Why it Matters by Jay W. Roberts, a valuable resource for instructors designing student-centered, experience-rich learning environments. Roberts addresses the design and facilitation of experiential education and highlights approaches like service-learning, outdoor learning, undergraduate research, internships, and capstone projects. I especially appreciate how the book defines learning as an immersive process, offering a clear framework for designing active and authentic experiences inside the classroom, beyond it, or both.
Anna L. Bostwick Flaming, Assistant Provost for Teaching & Learning and Director:
A Teacher’s Guide to Learning Student Names: Why You Should, Why It’s Hard, How You Can / Miller
Anna says: Many years ago, when I was an undergraduate student, I walked into office hours to talk about an assignment for a huge intro course. The professor never took attendance, and I hadn’t spoken up in class yet, so I was nervous about asking my questions. My professor greeted me with, “Anna Bostwick. You sit in the 10th or 11th row, near the aisle. Good to see you today.” I was astounded, and very motivated to never be late to class. Despite all the reading I’ve done since then about why learning students’ names matters so much, I’ve never had a clear understanding of how that instructor managed that, or how I might do the same. This summer I’m turning to Michelle Miller, an expert on attention, memory, and college teaching, to see if I can finally figure it out.
Eva Latterner, Associate Director:
The Opposite of Cheating / Gallant & Rettinger
Eva says: I’m looking forward to reading The Opposite of Cheating this summer. With generative AI bringing new complexity to questions of academic integrity, I’m interested in exploring how we can design courses that embed academic integrity from the start rather than addressing it only when misconduct occurs.
Sara Nasrollahian, Associate Director:
The SoTL Guide / Chick, Felten, & Mårtensson
Sara says: I’m looking forward to reading The SoTL Guide this summer. Co-authored by thought leaders in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, the book takes a relational and contextual approach to SoTL—framing it not only as a form of research, but as a generative and nurturing journey for instructors and for higher education more broadly. I’m excited to explore its ideas and to share reflections with our campus community as we continue to embrace SoTL as a strategic pathway for advancing teaching and learning excellence at the University of Iowa.