Beth McMurtrie has worked for The Chronicle of Higher Education since 1999, where she has covered a range of topics, both as a reporter and an editor. Since 2017 she has written about college teaching and the future of learning. Her reporting during this time has examined how education technology is affecting the classroom, the pivot to online learning during the pandemic, the behaviors and attitudes of Generation Z in the classroom, and how generative AI is reshaping teaching.

Hosted by Eric Mazur, Social Learning Amplified brings candid conversations with educators who are finding new ways to engage and motivate their students inside and outside the classroom. John Warner is a writer, editor, speaker, and author of eight books, most recently More Than Words: How To Think About Writing in the Age of AI. His previous books include Why They Can’t Write: Killing the Five-Paragraph Essay and Other Necessities (Johns Hopkins UP) and The Writer’s Practice: Building Confidence in Your Nonfiction Writing (Penguin).

Hear from students about what reading mean in the age of AI. They’ll discuss the challenges and opportunities of reading in today’s academic landscape—and explore how platforms like Perusall are changing the way they engage with course materials. Moderated by Eric Mazur.

Required reading shouldn't leave students feeling "lost." By using social annotation to map their individual close readings, students can collaboratively create textual "atlases" that help them navigate and deepen their understanding of the text. As they integrate steps of close reading into this process, students practice essential aspects of the writing process—observation, inquiry, and critical response. This collaborative approach not only builds confidence but also...

How do reading and writing change in the age of ChatGPT and other forms of generative AI? This is not the first time humans have faced what feels like monumental changes in technology that organize and present cultural texts. The invention and spread of writing in antiquity is perhaps the first great example. In Plato's Phaedrus, Socrates doubts the moral and educational value of this new form of expression. Rob Nelson, writer of analog.blog and teacher at Penn GSE talks about how Socrates's...

At Akwaaba Freedom School, reading is more than a skill, it is a tool for empowerment, identity, and lifelong learning. We harness the power of culturally relevant reading to enhance literacy engagement. Our six-week Reading Enrichment Summer Program combats summer learning loss through weekly themed readings, storytelling, project-based learning, and experiential activities that make literacy meaningful. With 92% of scholars maintaining or improving their reading levels, we demonstrate the...

At Discover UPC + Minerva, we integrate Perusall to transform reading into a collaborative experience within the flipped classroom model. Students engage with texts before class, fostering discussion and critical thinking. AI tools and learning analytics enable real-time participation tracking and personalized feedback. Additionally, Blackboard Learn, Anthology Ally, and Conversation AI ensure accessibility and continuous support. This scalable and flexible model, adaptable to in-person, ...

In this video submission, a psychology professor will facilitate a discussion with three students about their experiences using Perusall in a doctoral-level psychology of gender course. Students will discuss how using Perusall helped facilitate their learning, deepened their understanding of complex course material, and sustained community in and beyond the classroom. Students will share accounts of the ways their reading comprehension was enhanced by the opportunity to discuss course material..

This presentation explores how Perusall transforms reading engagement across multiple education courses. As a clinical instructor, I'll demonstrate how this collaborative annotation tool creates a dynamic space for students to make text-to-text, text-to-self, and text-to-world connections while engaging with diverse materials including textbooks, OER, podcasts, and videos. I'll share practical strategies for managing instructor time while maximizing meaningful interactions, and discuss how emerg

This paper explores the integration of Perusall into an asynchronous course on the topic of Business of American Healthcare. By embedding guided questions within scientific articles, we measure student engagement through comment frequency and depth of discussion. This strategy fosters close reading, critical thinking, and academic discourse in an online environment. We share insights on how Perusall enhances the learning experience of students by promoting active...

How can we transform reading into an engaging, analytical process for students who struggle with complex texts? This session presents insights from implementing Pre￾Texts—an arts-based methodology—in an Applied Economics seminar. By using creative reinterpretations, such as storytelling and role-playing, students moved from passive reading to active discussion, improving comprehension and critical thinking. Initially reluctant, they later valued debates and collaborative analysis. We will...

Our keynote event for Perusall Exchange® 2025: Why Reading Matters to the Future of Learning with presenter, Maryanne Wolf. Maryanne Wolf is a scholar, teacher, and global advocate for literacy. Wolf completed her doctorate at Harvard University, in the Department of Human Development and Psychology, where she began her work in cognitive neuroscience and psycholinguistics on the reading brain, language, and dyslexia. She directs UCLA’s Center for Dyslexia, Diverse Learners, and Social Justice. She has published four books connecting reading with brain science: Reader, Come Home: The Reading Brain in a Digital World, Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain, Tales of Literacy for the 21st Century, and Dyslexia, Fluency and the Brain. She was elected a permanent member of the Pontifical Academy of Science.

A case study was done on using Persuall in an online, asynchronous 8-week course for sign language interpreting students. Currently, no other studies have looked at social annotation tools in interpreter education. The study involved 11 undergraduate students who were both Deaf and hearing. Data included Perusall analytics, student annotations, and a post-course survey. There was support for a social constructivist approach through the use of Perusall. Of particular interest were the findings...

Do you remember learning to read? I do. Labeled a “slow learner” in my early school years, I nearly fell through the cracks more than once in my academic career because of my struggles as a reader. I share my story to demonstrate the transformative power of reading skills and underscore why it’s essential that we invest in teaching these skills now more than ever. My experience highlights the importance of not making assumptions about students’ reading abilities based on grade level and...

College teachers have been doing a lot of hand-wringing about declining reading among students, but the truth is that they are still reading plenty of things. It’s just not the transformative reading that we want. Rather than focusing entirely on accountability — essentially forcing students to do the reading — we might have more success if we try to shift students’ relationship with reading itself. I argue that social annotation tools like Perusall can help achieve this shift...

This presentation will explore the relationship between a liberated focus on learning, from both instructor and student perspectives, that is facilitated by an “ungrading” practice in an undergraduate Humanities course that is structured partially by readings on Perusall. Rather than a hyper-focus on metrics or grades, a grade-free course has the potential to free students and instructors from the traditional trappings of extrinsic motivators (e.g., grades, points, scores), and instead shift...

Reading extends beyond written texts—students can develop critical reading and analytical skills through music, lyrics, and video storytelling. This presentation, featuring instructor and student, explores how structured listening, annotating music videos, blogging curated playlists, and artist interviews deepen engagement with course material. Students analyze culture, discuss stereotypes, and reflect on artistic processes, treating these discursive materials as academic texts. The student...

I report findings from a Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) study that assigns roles to students in Perusall assignments. Students are either discussion leaders or regular participants. Leaders must make more annotations and are assigned the responsibility to engage the regular participants. Regular participants have only a mild annotation requirement. The aim is to see if this intervention generates more authentic engagement in settings where students might otherwise annotate perfun...

I have been using Perusall extensively since the COVID crisis in Spring 2020. I have been identified by Perusall as clocking some of the platform’s highest student engagement numbers. This presentation will summarize different aspects of my use of Perusall that combine to both encourage and require high levels of student engagement. These include: heavy weighting of Perusall grades, merger of undergraduate and graduate sections, settings for automated scoring and time-limited partial credit,...

My institution is committed by its mission to teaching difficult medieval texts to many first-generation and ESL students. I previously used reading quizzes to incentivize engagement, but these suffered from two difficulties. First, the level was often too easy (skimmable or answerable by ChatGPT) or too difficult (discouraging engagement) for any given student. Second, students had difficulty moving from the simple memory skill to the more complex analytic skills required for the term paper...