Short Description:
In this survey text, directed at those not majoring in biology, we dispel the assumption that a little learning is a dangerous thing. We hope that by skimming the surface of a very deep subject, biology, we may inspire you to drink more deeply and make more informed choices relating to your health, the environment, politics, and the greatest subject that all of us are entwined in, life itself. This text also includes interactive H5P activities that you can use to evaluate your understanding as you go.

Long Description:
In this survey text, directed at those not majoring in biology, we dispel the assumption that a little learning is a dangerous thing. We hope that by skimming the surface of a very deep subject, biology, we may inspire you to drink more deeply and make more informed choices relating to your health, the environment, politics, and the greatest subject that all of us are entwined in, life itself. This text also includes interactive H5P activities that you can use to evaluate your understanding as you go.

In the adapted textbook, Concepts of Biology, you will find the following units: Unit 1: Principles of Cellular Life Unit 2: Principles of Inheritance Unit 3: Principles of Evolution Unit 4: Principles of Ecology

Word Count: 189879

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Short Description:
In this survey text, directed at those not majoring in biology, we dispel the assumption that a little learning is a dangerous thing. We hope that by skimming the surface of a very deep subject, biology, we may inspire you to drink more deeply and make more informed choices relating to your health, the environment, politics, and the greatest subject that all of us are entwined in, life itself. This text also includes interactive H5P activities that you can use to evaluate your understanding as you go.

Long Description:
In this survey text, directed at those not majoring in biology, we dispel the assumption that a little learning is a dangerous thing. We hope that by skimming the surface of a very deep subject, biology, we may inspire you to drink more deeply and make more informed choices relating to your health, the environment, politics, and the greatest subject that all of us are entwined in, life itself. This text also includes interactive H5P activities that you can use to evaluate your understanding as you go.

In the adapted textbook, Concepts of Biology, you will find the following units: Unit 1: Principles of Cellular Life Unit 2: Principles of Inheritance Unit 3: Principles of Evolution Unit 4: Principles of Ecology

Word Count: 189359

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The DDNJ publishes high-quality research and evaluation about the multiple systems that serve individuals with disabilities and their families. Central to these systems is the “Developmental Disabilities Network,” a group of federally designated programs in each U.S. state and territory, that provide advocacy, training, research, and service focused on the unique needs of people with disabilities and their families. This journal specifically highlights programs, practices, and policies that encourage the full inclusion of people with disabilities in communities and all aspects of public life.

Word Count: 90348

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As the second book in the Empower Teaching Open Access Book Series, Exploring how we teach seeks to create a knowledge-sharing resource that validates and amplifies the experiences and voices of graduate student instructors. The collection encompasses the many titles, responsibilities, and levels of autonomy that graduate student instructors hold. The authors, all graduate students at the time of writing, interrogate issues of identity, community, and vulnerability within the context of college teaching, all while providing the reader with concrete takeaways to apply in the classroom. We hope that this collection can support the professional development of graduate students across disciplines, institutions, and levels of teaching experience.

Short Description:
Foundations of Aural Skills is a research-based, accessible, relevant, creative, inclusive, empowering textbook for teaching introductory aural skills. The first seven chapters provide thorough instruction in aural fundamentals, allowing students to build their foundations from a variety of starting points. The following chapters address the traditional tasks of sight-reading and dictation, but also improvisation, mimicking music you hear (“playback”), transcription, and ensemble skills. The final two chapters add some basic form- and chord-listening skills. Every section includes creative activities that learners can try out on their own or do in class. Embedded playlists for practicing listening skills include a diverse range of music that will connect with students’ preferences and allow them to experience music they haven’t worked with before. While the text is primarily designed for a first semester or year of instruction, it also includes some instruction on modulation, chromaticism, and mixed meter, and future additions/development will make these advanced applications more robust.

Word Count: 76943

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Short Description:
Student participation in syllabus development; re-envisioning pedagogical practices that move beyond traditional lectures; learning from past crises to improve communication, equity, and inclusion in the classroom; promoting student reflection through writing tasks; and using simulations to shift students' attitudes toward poverty.

Long Description:
The Spring 2023 issue presents research and guidance on topics related to student self-reflection, participatory learning, and returning to the in-person learning following the COVID-19 pandemic. The first article takes a critical approach to understanding pedagogy with adult learners by involving students in the creation of course syllabi as a way to challenge ideologies related the roles of instructor and students. The second article blends research and narrative to explore how the experiences of the COVID-19 shift to online learning can be translated to in-person learning environments to redefine what participation looks like and to advance faculty collaboration. The third article continues to explore how the COVID-19 pandemic can lead to opportunities for improved course development and delivery as faculty and students return to the classroom, particularly in the areas of communication, equity, and inclusion. The fourth article presents a selection of prompts used to promote student learning through written reflection tasks and describes how such tasks can be applied to various teaching contexts. The fifth article describes the use of a digital poverty simulation with business students and examines how the activity affected the students’ attitudes toward poverty.

Word Count: 37782

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Short Description:
Knowledge for Humans is a textbook aimed at introducing students to fundamental questions about knowledge and skepticism. Many topics often covered in epistemology textbooks are also covered here, such as radical Cartesian skepticism, phenomenalism, externalism, and naturalism. But the text also covers useful topics that are not usually included, such as the social conditions for knowledge, common fallacies, Bayesianism, the internet, conspiracy theories, and how we should go about arguing with one another. It’s written in an easy-going style with clear examples and funny diagrams.

Long Description:
Knowledge for Humans is a textbook aimed at introducing students to fundamental questions about knowledge and skepticism. Many topics often covered in epistemology textbooks are also covered here, such as radical Cartesian skepticism, phenomenalism, externalism, and naturalism. But the text also covers useful topics that are not usually included, such as the social conditions for knowledge, common fallacies, Bayesianism, the internet, conspiracy theories, and how we should go about arguing with one another. It’s written in an easy-going style with clear examples and funny diagrams.

Word Count: 42952

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As the third book in the Empower Teaching Open Access Book Series, Making Connections is a comprehensive resource for those in academia who want to understand how to develop, implement, evaluate, sustain, and fund mentorship at their respective universities. Making Connections is a unique and needed contribution to the mentoring field, and is a collaborative institutional effort between Utah State University’s (USU) Empowering Teaching Open Access Book Series and the University of New Mexico (UNM) Mentoring Institute.

This online textbook contains short articles on each major deity, hero, monster, etc., in Greek mythology. The text is supplemented with color photographs and maps to enhance the learning experience.

Short Description:
A Practicum in Behavioral Economics is a practice-based textbook covering the broad field of behavioral economics. Because behavioral economics is foremost a “test-and-learn” field of scientific inquiry that evolves according to experimental outcomes, so too should students test-and-learn. As such, the book’s primary goal is to help students experience behavioral economics through participation in the same experiments and games that serve as the foundations for, and shape the contours of, the field. With the help of this book students learn behavioral economics firsthand, and in the process create their own experiences. They learn about themselves – about how they make private and public choices under experimental conditions – at the same time as they learn about the field of behavioral economics itself.

Long Description:
The approach of this book is premised on a simple assumption: because behavioral economics is foremost a “test-and-learn” field of scientific inquiry that evolves according to experimental outcomes – and practical, policy-orientated applications of the knowledge garnered from these outcomes – so too should students test-and-learn the field itself. Studying and practicing behavioral economics should occur simultaneously, which in turn requires a practicum more than it does a traditionally styled textbook.

A Practicum in Behavioral Economics takes a new approach to the style of academic textbooks. Based upon the author’s personal teaching experiences over the past 25+ years, and feedback from peers and students, it is clear that traditional theory-based textbooks in behavioral economics insufficiently stimulate the student, and thereby fail to connect the student viscerally and meaningfully to what has become an enticing canon of economic thought, inquiry, and practice. Because it is a practice-based text, A Practicum in Behavioral Economics promotes active learning and engagement with the realities of behavioral economics in the moment, and encourages students to think like behavioral economists rather than just passively learn about the body of theoretical, experimental, and empirical work economists have produced. The student’s imagination is sparked, which in turn sparks group discussion and discernment.

The book consists of four sections that, taken together, portray in full the eclectic methodologies comprising the field of behavioral economics. Sections 1 and 2 present the thought and laboratory experiments that have formed a key pillar of the field. The thought experiments are, for the most part, re-castings of the simple cognitive tests devised by psychologists and economists over the past three-to-four decades to illustrate the fallacies, miscalculations, and biases that distinguish homo sapiens from homo economicus; experiments compiled in Daniel Kahneman’s 2011 bestseller Thinking, Fast and Slow. Similarly, the laboratory experiments are, for the most part, re-castings of the seminal experiments conducted by Kahneman and Tversky (among others) that help motivate the revised theories of human choice behavior, such as Tversky and Kahneman’s (1979) Prospect Theory, that form another pillar of behavioral economics. Alongside these experiments, Section 2 presents the revised theories of choice behavior with varying degrees of rigor.

Section 3 submerses the student in the world of behavioral game theory. Here, we follow the lead of Colin F. Camerer’s 2003 graduate-level textbook Behavioral Game Theory: Experiments in Strategic Interaction and William Spaniel’s 2011 Game Theory 101: The Complete Textbook, first by characterizing the games analytically, i.e., identifying solution, or equilibrium, concepts that are predicted to result when members of homo economicus play the games, and then by discussing empirical results obtained from corresponding field experiments conducted with homo sapiens. It is within the context of these experiments that theories of social interaction are tested concerning inter alia trust and trustworthiness, honesty, fairness, reciprocity, and more. As with the thought and laboratory experiments presented in Sections 1 and 2, the classic games of iterative dominance and simultaneous moves presented in Section 3 are meant to be replicated with students as subjects and the instructor as experimenter, or researcher.

Finally, Section 4 wades into the vast sea of empirical research and choice architecture. Here students explore studies reporting on (1) the outcomes of actual policy nudges, some of which are featured in Richard H. Thaler and Cass Sunstein’s 2008 bestseller Nudge, (2) published studies based on analyses of secondary datasets that test for choice behavior consistent with the new theories of behavioral economics, and (3) published studies based on analyses of primary datasets obtained from novel field experiments to further test the revised theories. The main purpose of this section is not only to introduce the student to interesting empirical studies in behavioral economics, but also, in the process, to incubate in the student an abiding appreciation for the obscure settings that sometimes lend themselves to such study.

In the end, the content of A Practicum in Behavioral Economics is based upon sound pedagogical and scientific foundations that aim to support students in learning quickly and efficiently. The book promotes a practice-based approach, which is naturally consistent with the trial-and-error of everyday life. As a result, the approach goes beyond understanding and knowing. It requires using, applying, and acting. The method requires practice. It is this approach that is the most effective in teaching the many facets of behavioral economics to students.

Word Count: 145583

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Resilient Pedagogy offers a comprehensive collection on the topics and issues surrounding resilient pedagogy framed in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic and the social justice movements that have swept the globe. As a collection, Resilient Pedagogy is a multi-disciplinary and multi-perspective response to actions taken in different classrooms, across different institution types, and from individuals in different institutional roles with the purpose of allowing readers to explore the topics to improve their own teaching practice and support their own students through distance, disruption, and distraction.

Short Description:
The title of this book is Speaking of Culture and its purpose is to define culture and many other concepts associated with it. My hope is that the readings in this book will help you to better understand the breadth of the concept of culture and provide you with a vocabulary for discussing it more articulately. Culture is one of those broad concepts that is used widely, although somewhat imprecisely, in everyday English. It also cuts across many academic disciplines, and this book draws on many of them. It touches, for instance, on anthropology, biology, history, mythology, political science, psychology, and sociology.

Long Description:
“Speaking of Culture” is a collection of instructor-authored background readings intended to accompany other activities, discussions, experiences, projects, and readings for IELI 2470 – Cross-Cultural Perspectives, a course offered by faculty in the Intensive English Language Institute at Utah State University. Its main purpose is to define culture and other concepts often associated with it.

Word Count: 46356

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