Scholars of teaching and learning around the world and in many disciplines have been using the Decoding the Disciplines process to make explicit the mental operations that students must master to succeed. Teachers, as experts in their disciplines, often hold this knowledge in tacit and implicit ways that are not easily accessible to novices, resulting in "bottlenecks" to learning. A key step towards addressing bottlenecks is a Decoding interview in which teachers uncover and unpack crucial thinking with the help of two interviewers outside their field. The interview can yield important insights for teachers, generate data for SoTL work, and also play an important role in developing the community and trust necessary for collaborative teaching and research projects. To illustrate how an interview unfolds, this plenary will feature a live Decoding interview conducted by experienced Decoders from Mount Royal University, with follow-up commentary and discussion facilitated by Dr. David Pace.
