Challenge Accepted: a Critical Approach to Course Participation

2015 Pedagogy in Practice and Philosophy Conference

Mikayla Beaudrie

Jamie Lee Marks

check in:

How do you assess and foster

critical thinking

meaningful participation

What are Course Challenges?10 –week long, student generated, curated, and coordinated mini-projects

that

1. connect course goals to students’ lived experiences

2. allow for multiple modalities of learning3. allow students to decide how to

participate and engage outside of the classroom

4. [at best] foster creative and critical thinking skills that are important to argumentative writing and projects across the disciplines

5. carve out official time/space for fun student projects thatcould serve as gateways to research and practical projects JLM

What are Course Challenges?

students are

1. given a list of options that are open-ended to varying degrees

2. encouraged to modify and design their own course challenge in conversation with the course leader (and readings in pedagogy

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Ethnographic Short (ENC1101: Writing about Hip-Hop Culture)Research The Hip-Hop Collective, a UF organization centered on hip-hop. Then, attend one of their sponsored events or conduct an interview with a chair member. Your response will be a short ethnography about The Hip-Hop Collective. Like any other ethnography, your response should express the organization's roles regarding UF, Gainesville, Florida, the US, hip-hop, the world, etc. For a further understanding of this genre, read Brian A. Hoey's definition.

ex. 1

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Joint Itineraries (ENC2305 and Anthropology of Sustainability)Locate yourself as a UF student in a community that exists outside of the university. Select an RTS route that runs at least partially off campus. Get online and determine where the route begins and ends. Hop on the bus at a stop of your choosing (this is free to you as a UF student) and take it to the end of its route and back. Plan for adequate time, as bus routes can often take one or more hours to complete. Take notes about who gets on and off and any interactions that that transpire. Take notes about parts of Gainesville you encounter. Have you been there before? What did you feel/experience? Then, compose a 2-3 double-spaced page report that 1) details what you saw, heard, felt, thought, imagined, and/or daydreamed about when you were there and 2) connects with course concepts about alterity and community or transport policy. Are there any challenges to transportation accessibility you noticed? Draw on the excerpt by Augé’s for inspiration as needed. JLM

ex. 2

Addressing Difficulties in the First-Year Classroom

Instructors are tasked with "fostering critical thinking skills”

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Addressing Difficulties in the First-Year Classroom

Instructors are tasked with "fostering critical thinking skills”

Approaching student resistance in a class that tends to value experienced knowledge

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Addressing Difficulties in the First-Year Classroom

Instructors are tasked with "fostering critical thinking skills”

Approaching student resistance in a class that tends to value experienced knowledge

Experienced knowledge provides access to skills necessary to think critically

MB

Addressing Difficulties in the First-Year Classroom

Instructors are tasked with "fostering critical thinking skills”

Approaching student resistance in a class that tends to value experienced knowledge

Experienced knowledge provides access to skills necessary to think critically

Creating approachable course content for STEM students

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Promoting Civic and Critical Engagement

Carla Golden’s “Seven Point Plan”

“I want my students1. …to experience learning and thinking as exciting and challenging and to know that reading and discussing issues and ideas can enrich their lives2. …to learn that to write will is both necessary and important3. … to feel comfortable when speaking4. …to learn that thinking for themselves is crucial5. …to learn that discipline is important6. …to examine their own lives7. …to be socially responsible and concerned [at least partially] as a result of taking my classes”

Golden, Carla. "The Radicalization of a Teacher." The Feminist Teacher Anthology. Ed. Gail E. Cohee, Elisabeth Daümer, Theresa D. Kemp, Paula M. Krebs, Sue A. Lafky, Sandra Runzo. New York: Teachers College Press, 1998. 13-23.

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design + implementation

1. designing Challenges (include an open ended option)

2. assigning a points value (over half a letter grade)

3. timelines (start date, check ins)

4. the final write up (2-3 double spaced pages)

assessment + assessment challenges

examples

fyc student examples

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1. Enhancing digital literacya. Websiteshttps://sites.google.com/site/firstyearengineersuf/https://enc3246firstyearengineering.wordpress.com

b. Professional writing 2. Translating and remixing language3. Creating musical productions4. Performing literary analyses5. Self-assessment of communication practices

[ENC2305, ENC1102, Anthropology]

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1. Getting Involved in Local Movements/Issues2. Pop culture analysis. Ads, Film (Lego, Hunger

Games), novels (Queen of the South, , short stories) Analysis

3. Connecting Critical Theory to Popular Culture (Lego Movie, Grand Theft Auto, Queen of the South, The Hunger Games, The Purge)

4. mixtapes (Sustainability and Bad Guys examples)a. Honey and Sorrow Mixtape.

https://soundcloud.com/cobbsnobb/sets/ant2402b. http://open.spotify.com/user/1237832879/

playlist/0TOurStHn8OlM7pC11Q5xD5. Space/Place Challenges (journaling/Instagram) /

habitus challenges6. Design your own: play through and/or create video

games (procedural rhetoric); art projects (mask)

Honey and Sorrow Mixtape

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Intro

“My mixtape challenge, dubbed Honey and Sorrow , is a progressive collection of

electronic, deep house, and trance music with infusions of tribal, soul, instrumentals

and R&B. The collection is meant to take the listener on a journey, beginning with our

first class discussion on “What is Nature?” which disturbed what I had assumed about

man and nature as separate, to cascading through the challenges faced by third

world activists, and ending on a positive note that together, change is possible. I hope

that my audience enjoys the message as well as the unique acoustics that only

instrumentally infused electronic music can bring.”

final comments

Opportunities for student engagement multimodalitycivic engagement/social justicedigital citizenship

Cross-discipline pedagogical practice

Community involvement and Self-discovery

acknowledgements

Dr. Creed Greer

Dr. Alison Reynolds

Dr. Jennifer Coenen

and a special thank you to…

Justin Grant

cat + pictures

students who agreed to share their work

questions/contact info

Jamie Lee MarksJamie.Marks@gmail.com

Mikayla Beaudrie Mikayla528@ufl.edu