Popular in Professional

Human Rights Law

Human Rights and Corruption: Problems and Potential of Individualising a Systemic Problem

Max Planck Institute Anne Peters

Law

A statistical approach to law school citation rankings

University of Virginia Joshua Fischman

Education

High school change

Boston College Andrew Hargreaves

Constitutional Law

What is constitutional ideology?

University of Oxford Nick Barber

Civil Procedure Law

Politics, Identity, and Class Certification on the U.S. Courts of Appeals

University of Pennsylvania Sean Farhang

Culture and Society

The City as a Growth Machine: Toward a Political Economy of Place

New York University Harvey Moltoch

Education

The Role of Education in Reducing Racial Inequality

University of Southern California Pedro A. Noguera

What Relevant Teaching Means, How It Feels, Why It Matters, and What It Requires

View more insights in Professional - Education - Pedagogy

View more figures from Boston College

View the page of Jean M. Bartunek

Read the Study

Next in Education

Still going… sometimes in the dark”: Reflections of a woman of color educator

Yolanda Abel | Johns Hopkins University

High school change

Andrew Hargreaves | Boston College

Jean Bartunek discusses what research relevance means in management teaching and highlights the insufficient attention that has been given to the meaningful and emotional aspects of relevance in classroom settings.

Image courtesy of interviewee. January 15, 2024

Log-in or Sign-up to Faculti
Currently viewing this subject insight as a guest. You have insight(s) remaining for this month. Login to view 8000+ figures on the platform.

Generating Workspace...

Export as PDF

This video video recounts a discussion about the motivations and insights behind a joint paper authored by the speaker and Isabelle Wr, a former doctoral student. The authors emphasize that curriculum reform is often narrowly focused on content delivery without considering the emotional and personal meanings that educational items may evoke for students. They argue that discussions surrounding topics such as diversity, equity, and inclusion can generate strong emotional reactions and shape student experiences in significant ways.

Through reflections on past studies and classroom experiences, particularly in management and organizational behavior courses, the authors highlight that instructors often overlook the importance of engaging with students' feelings and perspectives. They discuss various types of knowledge utilization, including instrumental, conceptual, and symbolic uses of research findings, which can influence student reactions and engagement.

One notable vignette involves Isabelle’s online class during COVID, where discussions of diversity led to rich emotional exchanges among students, contrasting with less engaging methods that delivered information without interaction. The authors stress the need for instructors to be attentive to student reactions, understanding that emotional engagement can enhance learning and meaning-making beyond simple content comprehension. Overall, they advocate for a more reflective teaching practice that considers students' experiences and feelings in relation to the curriculum.

Language:

Export as PDF

X-TIMESTAMP-MAP:LOCAL=00:00:00.000,MPEGTS=900000

00:00.115 --> 00:02.445
What motivated it was a few things.

00:02.805 --> 00:04.645
Actually. Let, let me say first of all

00:04.645 --> 00:07.325
that this is a joint paper with Isabelle Wr,

00:07.465 --> 00:10.205
who is a former student of mine, doctoral student of mine,

00:10.705 --> 00:13.685
who is now on the faculty at Montclair State University.

00:14.225 --> 00:16.085
And she was very much,

00:16.965 --> 00:19.485
a co-partner in this whole process.

00:20.915 --> 00:24.725
What motivated, it was several experiences

00:25.685 --> 00:27.495
that made us aware that when

00:28.255 --> 00:30.915
people talk about curriculum reform,

00:32.115 --> 00:35.485
they are completely missing the fact that any item

00:35.505 --> 00:40.005
that's in the curriculum may have some kind

00:40.005 --> 00:41.245
of particular meaning

00:41.425 --> 00:44.125
or evoke particular emotions for students.

00:46.495 --> 00:49.745
When people talk about curriculum form, they basically say,

00:50.925 --> 00:52.425
you have to teach this item,

00:53.485 --> 00:56.025
or you may not teach this item.

00:56.735 --> 00:59.945
Like one of the, conflicting issues

00:59.945 --> 01:02.905
that's going on in the United States these days is

01:02.905 --> 01:05.185
what should be done in terms of teaching diversity,

01:05.365 --> 01:06.625
equity, and inclusion.

01:07.645 --> 01:11.845
And some states are saying, don't do that,

01:12.345 --> 01:15.205
or, the only place you could do that is in the curriculum.

01:15.465 --> 01:18.325
So, so this was the starting point, the awareness

01:18.475 --> 01:21.885
that everybody's talking about curriculum when they talk

01:21.885 --> 01:23.405
about educational change.

01:24.285 --> 01:26.325
Nobody's talking about anything

01:26.385 --> 01:28.205
beyond just conveying the content.

01:30.175 --> 01:32.595
I'd been part of a study a few years

01:32.595 --> 01:35.835
before in which my co-authors

01:35.855 --> 01:39.355
and I had just asked students

01:39.975 --> 01:43.355
to comment on, to think about, to comment on,

01:46.915 --> 01:48.045
well, a number of things.

01:48.185 --> 01:52.785
But one of them was the, the finding in a number

01:52.785 --> 01:56.455
of studies that the more intelligent you are,

01:56.755 --> 01:59.415
the more likely you are to be a success at work.

02:01.395 --> 02:05.775
And what we had found in those studies was that

02:06.455 --> 02:10.415
a statement like that isn't just a factual statement.

02:10.995 --> 02:15.135
It evokes all kinds of reactions on the part of students.

02:16.405 --> 02:20.025
If, if, if I think I'm intelligent, then I say, well,

02:20.025 --> 02:22.425
of course, and let me give you six examples of

02:22.445 --> 02:24.745
how my intelligence showed through.

02:26.085 --> 02:30.865
If I know I don't do well at school, I know I, you know, I,

02:30.985 --> 02:34.745
i, don't have great grades, then my reaction is,

02:36.105 --> 02:37.195
well, that's stupid.

02:37.975 --> 02:40.755
And it's stupid because look at what good work I've done,

02:40.785 --> 02:42.195
even though I'm not intelligent.

02:43.295 --> 02:47.515
So we had become aware that,

02:48.665 --> 02:51.315
that a lot of, not, maybe not a lot,

02:51.335 --> 02:54.395
but a good deal of curriculum and organizational behavior

02:54.455 --> 02:58.595
and management courses is likely to touch

02:58.695 --> 03:01.025
On how students feel about themselves.

03:01.965 --> 03:06.105
And it's, and how they will respond to it will depend,

03:07.175 --> 03:09.905
will depend then, not just on what the topic is,

03:10.285 --> 03:11.585
but what it evokes in them.

03:11.985 --> 03:14.625
I don't have any particular critique of

03:15.365 --> 03:16.665
the curriculum itself,

03:18.385 --> 03:22.285
but the critique is of what professors think they're doing

03:22.595 --> 03:23.805
with the curriculum.

03:24.585 --> 03:27.285
Are they just, as my friend Jane McKenzie says,

03:27.385 --> 03:29.805
are they just deliverers of the curriculum?

03:30.465 --> 03:31.965
And that's the only thing they have to do.

03:33.825 --> 03:37.005
The the critique is based on the,

03:37.545 --> 03:40.125
on our experiences.

03:40.485 --> 03:43.445
Isabelle said, my experiences like in that study

03:43.545 --> 03:46.125
and a couple other things, that

03:46.905 --> 03:49.525
you can't just convey information

03:49.705 --> 03:51.165
and assume that it's all equal

03:52.025 --> 03:55.125
and that as long as students get something right on a test,

03:55.285 --> 03:56.405
everything as well.

03:57.095 --> 04:01.365
How's critique, as you mentioned, was published in 1978,

04:01.465 --> 04:04.445
and it was actually part of a chapter, which is

04:06.185 --> 04:09.245
not noticed anywhere near as much as it should be.

04:10.185 --> 04:14.285
But what he, what he was focusing on is what are uses

04:14.285 --> 04:15.805
of scholarly research?

04:17.185 --> 04:20.045
And he described three different uses.

04:20.705 --> 04:22.125
One of them is instrumental.

04:23.025 --> 04:27.435
So for example, I reach a conclusion, say that

04:28.575 --> 04:30.275
the high, more intelligent you are,

04:31.015 --> 04:33.195
the more successful you're going to be at work.

04:34.645 --> 04:37.705
So instrumental says something like,

04:39.985 --> 04:44.075
well, I'm not that smart, so I better not go into a job

04:44.075 --> 04:45.595
that requires high intelligence.

04:45.915 --> 04:47.715
I mean, I'm, I'm being a little facetious,

04:47.735 --> 04:49.475
but this is, it's simple, straightforward,

04:49.705 --> 04:53.035
does the research give you some specific clues

04:53.135 --> 04:54.755
and cues about what to do next?

04:56.425 --> 04:57.885
The second one is conceptual.

04:58.185 --> 05:00.525
And that has, the contribution has to do

05:00.525 --> 05:03.805
with helping you think more broadly about topics

05:03.985 --> 05:05.645
to understand them in more depth.

05:06.505 --> 05:09.005
And classes often are designed

05:09.305 --> 05:11.885
to help students get deeper insight

05:12.675 --> 05:14.325
into something that's going on.

05:15.505 --> 05:17.205
Um, so it, so it,

05:17.385 --> 05:20.445
it should be not just I teach you specific skills

05:20.445 --> 05:21.525
that you can use tomorrow,

05:21.745 --> 05:23.645
or I teach you things you should or shouldn't do.

05:24.355 --> 05:27.685
It's also, I help you understand in much more depth

05:28.035 --> 05:29.285
what something is about.

05:30.625 --> 05:35.345
And the third one is what he called symbolic, which is that

05:36.345 --> 05:37.905
I see a piece of information

05:38.445 --> 05:40.745
and great, it's what I'm planning on doing anyway.

05:40.885 --> 05:44.745
So, so I could use that very well

05:45.125 --> 05:49.585
as a justification for my brilliant decisions to do that.

05:49.745 --> 05:51.465
I first of all just like

05:51.465 --> 05:55.465
to mention a little bit about the second vignette, which had

05:55.465 --> 05:57.885
to do with Isabelle's experience teaching a class.

05:58.825 --> 06:01.565
So this, this article came out in 2022,

06:01.705 --> 06:05.805
and it was, the, the class Isabelle,

06:05.945 --> 06:08.205
the particular class Isabelle was teaching

06:08.205 --> 06:11.205
that we wrote about was one that was online

06:11.235 --> 06:12.805
because it was during COVID.

06:13.505 --> 06:17.605
And one of the things she often does

06:18.145 --> 06:21.405
in order to make academic material interesting

06:21.405 --> 06:24.245
and relevant for her students is take short

06:24.845 --> 06:26.285
research highlights of articles

06:26.785 --> 06:28.765
and assign them to students to read.

06:29.065 --> 06:32.005
So it's not a full 30 page article

06:32.505 --> 06:35.085
and the Academy of Management Review,

06:35.085 --> 06:37.285
which is unintelligible to most human beings,

06:37.745 --> 06:39.445
but it's short research highlights.

06:39.705 --> 06:42.045
So this was one class he was teaching on diversity,

06:42.345 --> 06:45.125
and she had chosen four possible

06:46.505 --> 06:48.945
articles on different aspects of diversity

06:49.565 --> 06:50.585
for students to read.

06:50.725 --> 06:52.625
And they had to pick one of those articles

06:52.805 --> 06:54.625
and comment on it in an

06:55.225 --> 06:57.305
asynchronous online discussion group.

06:58.435 --> 07:02.975
And the one most of them picked was an article

07:03.045 --> 07:07.615
that was adapted from, a very interesting paper

07:08.355 --> 07:12.015
in the Academy of Management Annals that

07:12.965 --> 07:16.655
basically said, with much more, with a great deal of

07:17.565 --> 07:22.175
scholarly finding research behind it that people

07:22.275 --> 07:24.495
who start out being very poor

07:25.855 --> 07:28.965
often have a more difficult time throughout their life

07:29.505 --> 07:31.045
in career progressions.

07:32.005 --> 07:35.325
I mean, it's obviously a much more sophisticated complex

07:35.325 --> 07:36.525
article and that, but,

07:36.905 --> 07:41.245
but the basic notion was, if you start out being poor

07:41.315 --> 07:43.325
with fewer opportunities, that's gonna last.

07:44.775 --> 07:48.035
So as I'm Montclair State has a,

07:48.135 --> 07:51.795
has students from a variety of economic backgrounds from it,

07:52.255 --> 07:54.035
and that probably makes a difference,

07:54.135 --> 07:55.395
and it's probably important.

07:56.785 --> 08:01.605
So this, this article evoked an enormous amount

08:01.785 --> 08:05.645
of emotional reaction when students had to discuss it

08:06.595 --> 08:10.845
had to say something about it online, a asynchronously,

08:11.785 --> 08:13.925
and then the,

08:14.235 --> 08:17.085
when Isabel taught the class online

08:17.705 --> 08:20.725
and the students could talk together about the article,

08:21.545 --> 08:23.805
it also evoked a lot of discussion.

08:23.805 --> 08:27.085
People say, yes, this is true. No, this is not true.

08:27.705 --> 08:30.045
Gee, this is true, and I feel terrible about it.

08:30.395 --> 08:32.525
Well, that's just the way things are. Who caress?

08:33.025 --> 08:35.725
Um, I'll, I'll, I'm, again, I'm

08:36.765 --> 08:38.165
summarizing this way too much,

08:38.745 --> 08:43.205
but the important issue is that it wasn't just,

08:43.555 --> 08:46.805
here is this fact presented to this driveway,

08:46.955 --> 08:48.325
just accept it is correct.

08:49.105 --> 08:50.565
It evoked all this feeling.

08:51.625 --> 08:53.705
So one of the things

08:54.285 --> 08:57.885
Isabel did make a good instructor was tried teaching the

08:58.125 --> 09:02.205
articles different ways, one, without discussion one,

09:03.145 --> 09:05.085
and, and that we didn't write about,

09:05.385 --> 09:07.805
but the one that nobody could discuss anything,

09:08.395 --> 09:10.405
they just said, okay, that's the finding.

09:10.545 --> 09:13.805
So what, let's move on. What's, what's gonna be on the test?

09:15.505 --> 09:19.285
So one of the things we became aware of

09:20.275 --> 09:24.405
from her exper from her reflected on experience, and,

09:24.425 --> 09:27.125
and this is a very important dimension of the whole thing,

09:28.925 --> 09:33.385
was that how instructors teach a particular topic

09:34.055 --> 09:35.105
matters a lot.

09:36.605 --> 09:40.125
And that it's possible

09:40.125 --> 09:42.765
to teach a topic in a way that's pretty meaningless.

09:43.705 --> 09:45.965
You know, like, okay, here's the fact who caress.

09:46.795 --> 09:50.205
It's also possible to teach a topic in a way

09:50.205 --> 09:54.125
that evokes students engagement in the topic,

09:55.815 --> 09:59.475
evokes their meaning making about the topic,

10:01.115 --> 10:03.815
evokes their feelings about the topic,

10:05.375 --> 10:08.075
and does this in a way that

10:08.855 --> 10:10.475
it involves a whole class.

10:11.695 --> 10:15.435
So it's not just me personally thinking this,

10:16.225 --> 10:20.355
it's me within a setting that, that

10:21.095 --> 10:23.275
I'm talking about it, other people agree with me,

10:23.275 --> 10:24.515
other people disagree with me,

10:24.515 --> 10:26.395
other people have radically different experiences.

10:27.095 --> 10:31.955
So the question then is, what does an instructor do

10:33.335 --> 10:38.125
if they want to get the material engaged

10:38.155 --> 10:39.325
with and meaningful?

10:39.945 --> 10:42.285
And how do you do that? So it's not destructive.

10:43.645 --> 10:48.625
And one of the ways, one of the ways, one of the ways

10:48.645 --> 10:52.985
to do that, for example, is to present a balanced position

10:54.135 --> 10:56.345
with regard to the first thing we talked about.

10:56.615 --> 11:00.385
That the, the findings are clear from this one study

11:00.385 --> 11:01.905
that the more intelligent you are,

11:01.905 --> 11:03.345
the more successful you're gonna be.

11:03.915 --> 11:06.705
There are other findings that say,

11:07.605 --> 11:09.385
who cares about how smart you are?

11:10.085 --> 11:12.465
The more emotionally intelligent you are,

11:12.465 --> 11:14.945
the better you're gonna be and something like that.

11:15.085 --> 11:17.545
So one is to present a balanced perspective

11:17.655 --> 11:20.905
that doesn't just say X leads to Y,

11:21.645 --> 11:24.625
but gives people the per the opportunity

11:25.045 --> 11:27.785
to reflect on different ways of thinking about

11:27.785 --> 11:28.825
what affects something.

11:29.525 --> 11:31.945
So that, that's one of the major things is

11:33.035 --> 11:35.935
how do you present something so it engages students,

11:36.835 --> 11:40.215
but isn't is

11:40.215 --> 11:42.135
conceptually stimulating for them?

11:42.725 --> 11:45.335
Does it make them think, my only option is this,

11:45.835 --> 11:48.775
my only instrumental option is this, but,

11:49.235 --> 11:53.595
but that, or it,

11:53.615 --> 11:56.675
or that isn't symbolic, so well, of course I already do

11:56.675 --> 11:59.155
that, so I i I do well from the system.

11:59.295 --> 12:00.675
So yeah, that's a great finding.

12:01.215 --> 12:05.075
Um, so, so a instructor should be aware

12:05.135 --> 12:08.635
of those potentials and of the importance of engagement

12:08.695 --> 12:11.955
and how to do it in a way that's helpful for students.

12:12.695 --> 12:15.555
Let me just say a little bit about the third vignette.

12:15.945 --> 12:19.315
Okay, because I, I was supposed to give a,

12:19.635 --> 12:23.435
a talk at a conference, about three or four years ago,

12:23.735 --> 12:27.245
and I, I wasn't sure exactly what to talk about.

12:27.905 --> 12:32.645
So I just, I just took three different classes

12:32.795 --> 12:34.365
that were introductory classes

12:35.505 --> 12:38.525
and handed out a piece of pa literally a piece of paper

12:38.555 --> 12:41.645
that students could literally write on, which is something

12:41.645 --> 12:43.045
that nobody ever does anymore.

12:43.505 --> 12:46.605
And this was a way to literally, to maintain anonymity

12:46.915 --> 12:49.565
because nobody would recognize their writing running

12:50.425 --> 12:52.725
and then just had them write out something

12:52.725 --> 12:54.645
that had been meaningful for them in their class

12:55.145 --> 12:56.365
and how they felt about it.

12:57.585 --> 13:01.565
And then looked at what were the topics that were meaningful

13:02.545 --> 13:05.045
and looked at the variety of feelings they had.

13:05.625 --> 13:09.845
So one of the reasons this is important for me,

13:10.025 --> 13:14.085
and I think it gets at your question a little, is that

13:15.285 --> 13:19.915
it says that even when instructors think they're just

13:20.515 --> 13:23.115
teaching facts, there is something going on

13:23.975 --> 13:25.595
in the class that's meaningful.

13:26.025 --> 13:29.755
Well, it might be meaningful because it's so unmeaningful

13:30.945 --> 13:32.955
because it's so remote from

13:32.955 --> 13:36.825
what anybody's thinking about it might be.

13:37.985 --> 13:40.485
And, and if, and if it's so remote from every,

13:40.485 --> 13:43.405
what everybody's thinking about, they might be bored.

13:44.345 --> 13:47.245
And that is a very important feeling.

13:49.145 --> 13:53.475
It's a nonactivated negative feeling.

13:55.015 --> 13:58.755
So it, in the case Isabel was talking about,

13:59.545 --> 14:01.575
there were a lot of negative feelings

14:01.575 --> 14:05.535
that were very activated, that it came with a lot of energy.

14:06.485 --> 14:10.745
And that is partly what was involved in the, the discussion

14:10.745 --> 14:11.825
that the students had.

14:13.765 --> 14:18.445
WW but at any topic that we teach, there is going

14:18.445 --> 14:20.045
to be some type of feeling

14:20.145 --> 14:24.395
and energy that we can, we can try to pay attention to.

14:25.925 --> 14:30.665
And so I guess one of the things I would say is a,

14:31.365 --> 14:34.985
is an implication for all this is for instructors

14:35.525 --> 14:40.405
to pay attention to student reactions in class

14:40.625 --> 14:44.045
in a way that takes into account more than just,

14:44.355 --> 14:46.685
does it look as if they understand the material?

14:48.155 --> 14:50.365
Does the material engage them?

14:51.355 --> 14:55.375
Does that engage them because of what kind of usefulness?

14:56.245 --> 14:57.575
Because they're excited,

14:57.575 --> 14:59.775
because they see something more deeply now

15:00.125 --> 15:03.215
because they're excited, as in the, some

15:03.215 --> 15:05.735
of the cases I mentioned in the third vignette,

15:06.165 --> 15:09.655
because now they see a path forward for their future,

15:09.995 --> 15:11.975
future, something that they could actually do.

15:13.265 --> 15:15.485
So I, I think guess that would be the,

15:16.265 --> 15:18.845
the most straightforward implication for all this,

15:18.945 --> 15:21.685
for the instructor, for any instructor to,

15:23.765 --> 15:25.745
to pay much more attention to what goes

15:25.745 --> 15:27.745
beyond the curriculum, to how it,

15:28.325 --> 15:33.225
how it makes students feel, how it makes students think,

15:33.695 --> 15:36.825
what is it in the discussion of the curriculum topic

15:36.855 --> 15:40.975
that matters, a whole bunch of things like that.

15:41.075 --> 15:43.805
But, but for that to happen,

15:45.815 --> 15:47.755
the instructors have to be pretty reflective

15:49.165 --> 15:51.275
about what's going on in their classes.

Curriculum Reform: Emotions and Self-Perception

00:00:00 - What motivated it was a few things. Actually. Let, let me say first of all that this is a joint paper with Isabelle Wr, who is a former student of mine, doctoral student of mine, who is now on the faculty at Montclair State University. And she was very much, a co-partner in this whole process. What motivated, it was several experiences that made us aware that when people talk about curriculum reform,
00:00:35 - that's in the curriculum may have some kind of particular meaning or evoke particular emotions for students. When people talk about curriculum form, they basically say, you have to teach this item, or you may not teach this item. Like one of the, conflicting issues that's going on in the United States these days is
00:01:05 - equity, and inclusion. And some states are saying, don't do that, or, the only place you could do that is in the curriculum. So, so this was the starting point, the awareness that everybody's talking about curriculum when they talk about educational change. Nobody's talking about anything beyond just conveying the content. I'd been part of a study a few years before in which my co-authors
00:01:39 - to comment on, to think about, to comment on, well, a number of things. But one of them was the, the finding in a number of studies that the more intelligent you are, the more likely you are to be a success at work. And what we had found in those studies was that
00:02:10 - It evokes all kinds of reactions on the part of students. If, if, if I think I'm intelligent, then I say, well, of course, and let me give you six examples of how my intelligence showed through. If I know I don't do well at school, I know I, you know, I, i, don't have great grades, then my reaction is, well, that's stupid.
00:02:40 - even though I'm not intelligent. So we had become aware that, that a lot of, not, maybe not a lot, but a good deal of curriculum and organizational behavior and management courses is likely to touch On how students feel about themselves. And it's, and how they will respond to it will depend, will depend then, not just on what the topic is,

Critique of Curriculum Delivery Methods

00:03:11 - I don't have any particular critique of the curriculum itself, but the critique is of what professors think they're doing with the curriculum. Are they just, as my friend Jane McKenzie says, are they just deliverers of the curriculum? And that's the only thing they have to do. The the critique is based on the, on our experiences.
00:03:43 - and a couple other things, that you can't just convey information and assume that it's all equal and that as long as students get something right on a test, everything as well. How's critique, as you mentioned, was published in 1978, and it was actually part of a chapter, which is not noticed anywhere near as much as it should be. But what he, what he was focusing on is what are uses
00:04:17 - And he described three different uses. One of them is instrumental. So for example, I reach a conclusion, say that the high, more intelligent you are, the more successful you're going to be at work. So instrumental says something like, well, I'm not that smart, so I better not go into a job that requires high intelligence.
00:04:47 - but this is, it's simple, straightforward, does the research give you some specific clues and cues about what to do next? The second one is conceptual. And that has, the contribution has to do with helping you think more broadly about topics to understand them in more depth. And classes often are designed to help students get deeper insight into something that's going on. so it, so it,
00:05:20 - that you can use tomorrow, or I teach you things you should or shouldn't do. It's also, I help you understand in much more depth what something is about. And the third one is what he called symbolic, which is that I see a piece of information and great, it's what I'm planning on doing anyway. So, so I could use that very well as a justification for my brilliant decisions to do that.
00:05:51 - to mention a little bit about the second vignette, which had to do with Isabelle's experience teaching a class. So this, this article came out in 2022, and it was, the, the class Isabelle, the particular class Isabelle was teaching that we wrote about was one that was online because it was during COVID. And one of the things she often does in order to make academic material interesting

Engaging Students Through Diverse Articles Discussion

00:06:24 - research highlights of articles and assign them to students to read. So it's not a full 30 page article and the Academy of Management Review, which is unintelligible to most human beings, but it's short research highlights. So this was one class he was teaching on diversity, and she had chosen four possible articles on different aspects of diversity for students to read. And they had to pick one of those articles
00:06:55 - asynchronous online discussion group. And the one most of them picked was an article that was adapted from, a very interesting paper in the Academy of Management Annals that basically said, with much more, with a great deal of scholarly finding research behind it that people who start out being very poor
00:07:29 - in career progressions. I mean, it's obviously a much more sophisticated complex article and that, but, but the basic notion was, if you start out being poor with fewer opportunities, that's gonna last. So as I'm Montclair State has a, has students from a variety of economic backgrounds from it, and that probably makes a difference, and it's probably important.
00:08:01 - of emotional reaction when students had to discuss it had to say something about it online, a asynchronously, and then the, when Isabel taught the class online and the students could talk together about the article, it also evoked a lot of discussion. People say, yes, this is true. No, this is not true.
00:08:30 - Well, that's just the way things are. Who caress? I'll, I'll, I'm, again, I'm summarizing this way too much, but the important issue is that it wasn't just, here is this fact presented to this driveway, just accept it is correct. It evoked all this feeling. So one of the things Isabel did make a good instructor was tried teaching the
00:09:03 - and, and that we didn't write about, but the one that nobody could discuss anything, they just said, okay, that's the finding. So what, let's move on. What's, what's gonna be on the test? So one of the things we became aware of from her exper from her reflected on experience, and, and this is a very important dimension of the whole thing,

Engaging Students Through Meaningful Teaching

00:09:34 - matters a lot. And that it's possible to teach a topic in a way that's pretty meaningless. You know, like, okay, here's the fact who caress. It's also possible to teach a topic in a way that evokes students engagement in the topic, evokes their meaning making about the topic,
00:10:05 - and does this in a way that it involves a whole class. So it's not just me personally thinking this, it's me within a setting that, that I'm talking about it, other people agree with me, other people disagree with me, other people have radically different experiences. So the question then is, what does an instructor do
00:10:38 - with and meaningful? And how do you do that? So it's not destructive. And one of the ways, one of the ways, one of the ways to do that, for example, is to present a balanced position with regard to the first thing we talked about. That the, the findings are clear from this one study that the more intelligent you are, the more successful you're gonna be.
00:11:07 - who cares about how smart you are? The more emotionally intelligent you are, the better you're gonna be and something like that. So one is to present a balanced perspective that doesn't just say X leads to Y, but gives people the per the opportunity to reflect on different ways of thinking about what affects something. So that, that's one of the major things is how do you present something so it engages students,
00:11:40 - conceptually stimulating for them? Does it make them think, my only option is this, my only instrumental option is this, but, but that, or it, or that isn't symbolic, so well, of course I already do that, so I i I do well from the system. So yeah, that's a great finding. so, so a instructor should be aware of those potentials and of the importance of engagement
00:12:12 - Let me just say a little bit about the third vignette. Okay, because I, I was supposed to give a, a talk at a conference, about three or four years ago, and I, I wasn't sure exactly what to talk about. So I just, I just took three different classes that were introductory classes and handed out a piece of pa literally a piece of paper that students could literally write on, which is something

Understanding Student Emotions in Curriculum Discussions

00:12:43 - And this was a way to literally, to maintain anonymity because nobody would recognize their writing running and then just had them write out something that had been meaningful for them in their class and how they felt about it. And then looked at what were the topics that were meaningful and looked at the variety of feelings they had. So one of the reasons this is important for me, and I think it gets at your question a little, is that
00:13:20 - teaching facts, there is something going on in the class that's meaningful. Well, it might be meaningful because it's so unmeaningful because it's so remote from what anybody's thinking about it might be. And, and if, and if it's so remote from every, what everybody's thinking about, they might be bored. And that is a very important feeling.
00:13:55 - So it, in the case Isabel was talking about, there were a lot of negative feelings that were very activated, that it came with a lot of energy. And that is partly what was involved in the, the discussion that the students had. WW but at any topic that we teach, there is going to be some type of feeling
00:14:25 - And so I guess one of the things I would say is a, is an implication for all this is for instructors to pay attention to student reactions in class in a way that takes into account more than just, does it look as if they understand the material? Does the material engage them?
00:14:56 - Because they're excited, because they see something more deeply now because they're excited, as in the, some of the cases I mentioned in the third vignette, because now they see a path forward for their future, future, something that they could actually do. So I, I think guess that would be the, the most straightforward implication for all this, for the instructor, for any instructor to,
00:15:49 - beyond the curriculum, to how it, how it makes students feel, how it makes students think, what is it in the discussion of the curriculum topic that matters, a whole bunch of things like that. But, but for that to happen, the instructors have to be pretty reflective about what's going on in their classes.

Faculti AI can make mistakes

Faculti

Popular in Professional

Human Rights and Corruption: Problems and Potential of Individualising a Systemic Problem

A statistical approach to law school citation rankings

High school change

What is constitutional ideology?

Politics, Identity, and Class Certification on the U.S. Courts of Appeals

The City as a Growth Machine: Toward a Political Economy of Place

The Role of Education in Reducing Racial Inequality

What Relevant Teaching Means, How It Feels, Why It Matters, and What It Requires

Next in Education

Guide

Platform and Category Pages

Contact Us

FAQs

What is Faculti?

How do you select interviews?

Interview Process

Page Structure

Popular in Professional

Guide

Platform and Category Pages

Contact Us

FAQs

What is Faculti?

How do you select interviews?

Interview Process

Accessibility Options

Contrast Adjustment

Text Size Adjustment

Text Spacing Adjustment

Line Height Adjustment

Cursor Size Adjustment

Page Structure Options

Page Structure