Open-Access Hub

Resources

Teaching tips, academic presentations, and shared tools — a growing collection of materials for educators and curious minds.

Weekly Newsletter

Tuesday Teaching Tips

A weekly pedagogy newsletter sent to faculty across UC Merced — in partnership with CETL. Short, practical, grounded in real classroom experience. Topics span AI in education, student engagement, assessment design, and the art of the dad joke.

31 tips Spring 2025 → Spring 2026 4 topic themes

Browse all tips

Latest tips

S26-04 Reignite the Mid-Semester Spark — Practical strategies to re-energize students when motivation dips
S26-03 Take Your Class Temperature — A think-pair-share mid-semester check-in with your students
S26-02 When Low-Tech Wins — Why printed group activities often generate better collaboration than digital ones
S26-01 Welcome Students with Connection — First-week introductions that set the tone for a whole semester

+ 27 more tips across all semesters →

Active Learning Reference

Active Learning, Built for Your Class

A curated, searchable database of 67 evidence-based active learning strategies — with best practices, Bloom's taxonomy alignment, and filters for time, modality, class size, and difficulty. Built for instructors who want to move beyond lecture.

67 activities 5 filter dimensions U. Georgia · teaching.tools

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Sample activities

Discuss Think-Pair-Share — Students think independently, pair up to discuss, then share takeaways with the class
Assess Muddiest Point — Pause mid-class to surface what's most confusing, then address it immediately
Move Human Histogram — Students physically line up to create a living bar chart of class perspectives
Create Jigsaw Discussion — Divide a problem into parts, then reorganize groups to piece the whole solution together

+ 63 more strategies across all Bloom's levels →

Talks, Slides & Recordings

Academic Presentations & Media

Slide decks and recordings from symposia, workshops, and academic conferences — including the "Demystifying AI in Academia" symposium at UC Merced Research Week. New materials added as they become available.

Growing archive Symposia · Workshops · Conferences

Featured

Mar 2025 Demystifying AI in Academia — Symposium at UC Merced Research Week. AI in research workflows, virtual TAs, scientific writing, eye-tracking & personalized learning.
Coming More recordings on the way — Workshop materials and future symposium recordings will be added here

AI-Powered Apps

Shared Tools

Custom AI tools I built for my students using Playlab.ai — a tutoring assistant, a data analysis guide, and a rubric maker. Free to use, no account required.

3 tools Built with Playlab.ai Free to use

Available tools

Playlab ESS Tutor — Provides tutoring and reviews course topics Playlab Excel Guide — Helps analyze datasets, explain formulas, and develop plots Playlab Rubric Maker — Creates adequate rubrics for any assignment
Coming More to come — Additional tools in development