The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) is an emerging movement of scholarly thought and action that draws on the reciprocal relationship between teaching and learning at the post-secondary level (Boyer, 1990). An important goal of SoTL is to enhance and augment learning amongst and between individual learners by investigating the many features of discipline specific expertise and best pedagogical practice (McKinney, 2006). 

Peter Felten wrote in Principles of Good Practice in SoTL that there are five principles to make the scholarship of teaching and learning meaningful, impactful, and excellent in order to increase the empirical knowledge of teaching and learning. These principles are 1) inquiry focused on student learning, 2) grounded in context, 3) methodologically sound, 4) conducted in partnership with students, and 5) appropriately public (2013, p.122). To this end, these principles will allow the intellectual work of our faculty to be rigorously tested by a set of norms that extend the scholarship of teaching and learning on our campus and beyond.

Getting Started

Vanderbilt’s Center for Teaching provides excellent information towards the scholarship of teaching and learning. Check out the excellent work at the link to learn more about SoTL. It does not matter where you attain the information and knowledge about SoTL, the end result is that the inquiry, discovery and publication of results are offered towards extending knowledge about teaching and learning as scholarly teachers.

Discipline-Specific Journals on the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning

• Accounting to Computer Science
• Economics to Information Systems
• Mathematics to Political Science 
• Psychological Science to Theater

More Resources

• SOTL Research - General journals for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning
• SOTL Conferences - Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Conferences
• Dalhousie University - Research User Guide for SOTL
• Kennesaw State University - Teaching Journals Directory
• A “how to” guide for developing a publishable Scholarship of Teaching project