LESLIE REID Professor in Geoscience, University Of Calgary

Growing up, Dr. Reid, 37, knew she wanted to either be a doctor or a teacher. She has a bachelor of science from the University of Ottawa, a master's from the University of Calgary and a PhD in structural geology and Cordilleran tectonics from Calgary and University of Alberta. She is a Tamaratt Teaching professor, a position created to encourage new and creative ways of teaching science. Dr. Reid enjoys hiking, especially with her two sheep dogs.

Why she's good: Dr. Reid has won a number of teaching awards, including the Students' Union award for excellence in undergraduate teaching. Instead of the usual lectures, exams and assignments, she has used video footage of her colleagues in the field, team-based projects and practical questions to get her students thinking and tackling problems as scientists.

Teaching style: "I'm starting to think, well, I want [students] meaningfully engaged with each other, with me and with the material." She and a colleague have created what they call "concept-assessments." At the beginning of each unit, students are asked to respond to open-ended questions on the topic. She reviews the responses and bases her instruction time on them. Students are then asked to modify their assessments at the end of the unit and are graded on it. "It is all part of a student-centred teaching model that focuses strongly on increasing the learning outcomes and using students' prior knowledge to help inform instruction."

On engaging the students: "I hear from my colleagues that you have to be entertaining, you're competing with technology. I strongly believe that students are really interested in us as people and the stories we have to tell. And as scientists I think sometimes, we really focus on the content: 'Here's this content, I'm very divorced from it as a person. I'm basically deconstructing what you've read in your textbook and giving that back to you in a lecture.' That is pretty easy to disengage from. So I'm looking at how do I bring more of my personal experience as a scientist and how I developed my scientific thinking, bring those stories and experience and provide them with meaningful experiences."

DAVID SCOTT Associate professor in Kinesiology, University of New Brunswick

Dr. Scott, 45, is starting his ninth season as a sports psychologist with the NHL.He has bachelor's and teaching degrees from the University of Ulster in Belfast, master's and PhD in sports psychology from the University of Victoria and taught at Brock University before moving to UNB in 1997. Dr.Scott is from a farming community in Northern Ireland and lives with his wife and three children.

Why he's good: Dr. Scott has an ability to connect with his audience, all 200 of them. "He is a masterful storyteller who draws students in, makes them laugh and then connects the story to the subject matter of the day. Students in his classes learn while they are laughing and easily recall the content," says Ryan Hamilton, a kinesiology graduate student.

Teaching style: Moves around the classroom, instead of lecturing from the front. At the beginning of a semester, he goes through the class list, asking his students what they did over the summer and where they're from, jotting down notes and following up with them later. "I don't take myself too seriously. I have no trouble standing up in front of students and saying 'I haven't a clue,'" he says. "For me, I've thought about what I do as being a partnership."

On engaging the students: For a 90-minute lecture, he makes sure to have two different topics. "I think it's important to engage students, to respect their thoughts and opinions and to encourage them to be passionate about what they believe in. For me, the learning environment needs to be fun, exciting, interesting and relevant.

"I try to be accessible. So all my students call me Scotty. Universities are going through a time right now where there seems to be a belief that such institutions should simply be producing graduates for the workplace. I think we are preparing people for the future by making them think about things, getting them to ask questions, to be more understanding. I really try to do those things."

MARC SPOONER Assistant Professor in Education, University Of Regina

Dr. Spooner, 39, enjoys a coffee or a pint of Guinness with just about anybody who wants to talk about education and social justice. He has a bachelor's degree in psychology from Carleton and bachelor's and master's in education from the University of Ottawa, where he did his PhD examining creativity and deviance in young adults. Dr. Spooner has taught at Regina since 2006.

Why he's good: For his innovative teaching style, and what he calls the "unbounded classroom", he's been named a University of Regina teaching and learning scholar twice.

Teaching style: In his graduate classes, he records the lecture in 10-minute clips, so students can later discuss it online. He invites authors and researchers to his classroom through remote connection. For assignments, the students' papers are posted online and they can comment on each other's work. "At first students are reluctant, as you might imagine, because it's a private activity between me and them," he says. "But I can tell you that reluctance quickly wanes."

On engaging the students: "Today's student doesn't want to just be a consumer. They want to be a producer, a co-creator of the knowledge. So what I sometimes get them to do is respond to any concept we've been talking about, by sharing an artifact of their learning in any sign system of their choosing. Once you let the walls that traditionally bound a classroom fall, it opens up a world of possibilities."