Transforming Curriculum: Strengthening Teacher-Learner Partnership

From our previous conferences, we are aware that empowering learners for life requires a fundamental shift in designing curriculum for Higher Education. New priorities, pedagogies, technologies, spaces and assessment strategies are required to empower learners to take ownership of their learning. Creating resilient, adaptable and future-capable learners is no longer an option for Higher Education institutions as we embrace the Education 4.0 Trends. Hence, as an innovative Higher Education institution, Taylor's has been pioneering holistic education and the integration of Life skills into the curriculum. 

However, these 'student-centeredness' concepts still seem to be prescriptive in nature as most decisions on curriculum, assessment, teaching and learning approaches are still teacher-centric (see Bovill, Cook-Sather, & Felten, 2011, p. 133). Teachers are designing student-centred learning environments without embracing their learners to be a part of the decision-making (see Ntem, 2017). In addition some lecturers who believe they are student-centred in their approach are not embracing the 'voice' of the students within their class. Some lecturers in higher education prefer traditional approaches of content delivery, conventional assessment methods, and familiar teaching and learning approaches rather than experimenting with new best practices. To address this disconnect we propose that there should be a proactive student-teacher partnership in designing assessment and the teaching and learning activities (See Bovill, Cook-Sather, Felten, Millard & Moore-Cherry, 2016). We believe that a paradigm shift in education is not only for teachers, but it is vital for students in embracing their empowered role.

TTLC 2019 is paving the way to understand student-teacher partnerships by examining best practices through dialogue, as well as innovative teaching and learning designs where students have been taking an active role.  The sub-themes below can be utilized as lenses to further envision the student-teacher partnerships in the higher education setting.

The TTLC 2019's innovative agenda is designed to "unlock" the typical conference format, and our aim is to create a space that prioritises engagement with keynotes, panelists and delegates. You can look forward to a relevant, pro-active and rewarding learning experience where peer-to-peer learning and collaboration are prevalent with experts from more than 12 countries and 30 institutions.

Our programme features sessions such as : 

1. Masterclass 
2. Edu-Future Forum
3. Roundtable discussions with industry, graduates, students and academia
4. Lightning Talks
5. 1- Day Student track 
6. Keynotes
7. Parallel Sessions

TTLC2019 Conference Grant available. For more information click here

Come join us at Taylor's 12^th Teaching and Learning Conference today!