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Katharine Henry Teaching

Teaching for the future

One of the most important things we can do as educators is to teach our students to be optimistic about the future so that they can see themselves as builders who can solve, rather than be discouraged by, our biggest challenges. For ideas on how to bring this builder energy into your classroom, check out some of my materials on this page. Feel free to use them in your lesson plans!

Teaching Business

Students tend to enjoy the practical outcomes of learning to write strong resumes and cover letters along with the low-stakes practice of a mock job interview. In addition to these genres, why not also use your business unit to teach students to think like entrepreneurs? 

Sample materials

  • Tyler Cowen, Average Is Over: Powering America Beyond the Age of the Great Stagnation
  • Tyler Cowen and Daniel Gross, Talent: How to Identify Energizers, Creatives, and Winners Around the World
  • Sheena M. Joyce and Don Argott, Framing John Delorean 
  • Peter Thiel, Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future
  • Y Combinator YouTube channel

Teaching Humanities

What the arts do best is reinforce our sense of human connection and gift us with experiences of awe. Well-crafted films can be every bit as profound as literature. Encourage your students to elevate their tastes and cultural appreciation by having them watch films and read texts they might not otherwise have found.  

Sample materials

  • Octavia E. Butler, Dawn
  • The Criterion Channel, a streaming service of arthouse films from around the world
  • Steven J. Dick, “Cosmotheology Revisited: Theological Implications for Extraterrestrial Life”
  • D. W. Pasulka, American Cosmic: UFOs, Religion, Technology 
  • Balaji Srinivasan, The Network State

Teaching STEM

One way to dip into STEM is to explore its most innovative frontiers and discuss how they may change how we see fundamental human experiences. 

Sample materials

  • J. Storrs Hall, Where Is My Flying Car?
  • Lex Fridman Podcast
  • Replit: a fun platform that helps folks learn how to code. 
  • Balaji Srinivasan, “The Purpose of Technology”
  • Robert Zubrin, The Case for Mars

Supporting AI use for students

Whatever you may be teaching, empower your students to gain a basic technical understanding of how large language models work and practice using them to extend their capabilities. Gustav Soderstrom of Spotify does an excellent job of explaining how large language models work in this video. Create assignments that get students prompt engineering with AIs like ChatGPT, Bing AI, and Perplexity and have them reflect on their interactions with the technology. 

Sample AI policy for syllabus 

The philosophy of this class is “For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall much be required; and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more.” (Luke 12:48) We are living in what may be the most exciting time in the history of human intelligence. LLMs are a boon to both students and instructors. Since you have free, 24/7 access to a patient tutor, AI raises the bar of what is expected of you. Though they are not perfect, they do not need to be flawless in order to be useful. Our goal is to employ technology to sharpen, not dull, our intellects. To that end, our class will ask you to engage AI for some assignments and not others. As we explore this technology together, we will reflect on how it makes us rethink creativity, intellectual collaboration, and the research process.