NORMAL, Ill. – Dr. Cheri Simonds presented her Distinguished Professor Lecture on Monday. The lecture is titled “Cursed with Knowledge: Breaking the Spell.”
Simonds teaches communication pedagogy and instructional communication and is a director of COM 110. As director, she is responsible for hiring, training, and supervising a staff of 50-60 instructors who teach in the general education program at Illinois State University.
In the lecture, Simonds argued that teacher training affords all instructors the opportunity to vanquish the curse between their content expertise and student learning through the lens of communication.
Her audience consisted of students, colleges, current faculty and other Distinguished Professors. Simonds shares what she hopes students in her audience will take away from her lecture.
“Every student at our university has been a COM 110 student. They’ll understand a lot more about the training that goes into preparing the instructors that they have in class.”
She is a teacher, researcher, and author. She shared advice for students in the School of Communication.
“I always provide this advice as I’m assigning certain tasks to students and I’ll say, ‘It’s just as easy to do the assignment on the day that it is assigned than the day before its due.’ If they have any challenges meeting that expectation, they should certainly communicate with their instructor.”
Simonds said that her greatest accomplishment was receiving the Inaugural Program of Excellence for the National Communication Association Introductory Course Program in 2008.