Bennett Grubbs, APSA Educate, Editor
For faculty and graduate students teaching this term, January provides a window to update or design your new course. You might be looking for readings to add to your syllabus, new assignments or assessments, or ways to engage your class in active learning assignments online. APSA Educate can help with all of this and more. Keep reading to learn how.
Political Science’s Teaching Resource Library
Educate is political science’s teaching resource library, currently home to over 175 original teaching resources. This new cutting-edge virtual platform allows faculty and graduate students to easily share, find, and use high quality political science teaching resources of all types and across all topics. Educate is free to use, resource submissions take just a couple of minutes, and allows users to assign copyright licenses and revise or remove materials at a later date.
Looking for ideas for the online classroom? Check out the materials from APSA’s Virtual Teaching Workshop
Over the summer, Rebecca Glazier, Professor of Political Science at the University of Arkansas Little Rock, and Veronica Reyna, Professor and Associate Chair of the Department of Government at Houston Community College, led ten other faculty with experience in online teaching and learning in a workshop that produced 21 original teaching resources. Resources include:
- Danielle Hanley’s, Visiting Assistant Professors of Political Science at Rutgers University, “Peer Review Activity” and her companion blog, “Building Community in the Online Classroom.” Together Hanley’s resources provide clear steps for faculty to create the positive atmosphere required for active learning activities run smoothly in the virtual classroom.
- Strategies to build faculty student rapport in large online classrooms.
- Virtual simulations in introduction to international relations courses.
- Open education resources for American government courses.
- View the full collection of 21 resources here.
Beyond this curated collection, Educate also has numerous blogs and 45 teaching resources related to online learning. One way to access these is to use the Advanced Search option available on the homepage and then select “Online Teaching” in the search icon.
Want to learn more about online teaching from faculty experts in the online classroom? Join us January 26, 2021 for “Strategies in the Online Political Science Classroom” a two-part webinar led by faculty with decades of experience in online education.
Interested in virtual games or simulations for the classroom? Learn more about APSA Educate’s Active Learning Resources
Educate’s library already includes a wide selection of discussions and resources related to active learning.
- Sherri Wallace, Professor of Political Science, University of Louisville, shared her African American politics syllabus and film exercise.
- Rachel Bzostek Walker, Professor of Political Science at Collin College, shared three separate American government simulations – (1) Amending the Constitution, (2) Creating a Political Party and Party Platform, and (3) Creating a Government.
- Benjamin Gonzalez O’Brien, Professor of Political Science at San Diego State University, shared his Immigration and Border Politics syllabus, including assignments prompts and grading rubric.
- Victor Asal, Professor of Political Science at SUNY Albany and Editor in Chief of the Journal of Political Science Education (JPSE), and Joseph Roberts, Associate Professor of International Relations and Political Science at Roger Williams University and an Editor with the JPSE, put together this PowerPoint on virtual simulations.
- Teaching political theory this semester? Here is Jennet Kirkpatrick’s, Associate Professor of Politics and Global Studies at Arizona State University, teaching social contract theory with a short story.
One easy way to look up more of these items is to use the Advanced Search icon and select the “active learning” or “simulation” icons.
Looking for tools and ideas to teach political science civic engagement?
While APSA has its own civic engagement micro-site, Raise the Vote, Educate still has plenty to offer. Resources include:
- This religion and electoral politics course focused on community building, designed by Rebecca Glaizer.
- A virtual role playing game asking students to navigate the U.S. immigration system shared by Patrick Stewart, Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Arkansas.
- An app designed by Betsy Sinclair, Professor of Political Science at Washington University in St. Louis, allowing students to record and connect with local civic activities.
- A semester long Icitizens program coordinated by Kimberly Saks McManaway, Director of the MPA program at University of Michigan-Flint.
Looking for more civic engagement ideas? Use the “civic engagement” icon in the advanced search option.
Are you looking for readings to add to your syllabus?
Educate is home to a number of course syllabi and reading lists. Users can type any search terms related to their course into our search bar to find materials from other faculty on the topic. This is a great way to find new reading materials or to fill out a new unit in an existing course.
Another direction you might want to consider is checking out The Monkey Cages Topic Guide. The Monkey Cage has organized all its high-quality articles from political science scholars and made them available for free.
Upload, Share & Get Involved
Lastly, if you found any of these resources helpful in your own work, consider uploading a syllabus or teaching resource to Educate. We welcome materials of all types, from syllabi to simulations, and on all political science topics.