In my classroom, you should expect to take risks and encounter challenges. You can also expect me to respect the life experience you bring to class; you are not a blank slate, and we’ll strive together to build on your prior knowledge and wisdom.
For this purpose, I am less a “teacher” than a choreographer and facilitator of learning experiences.
I encourage, equip, and empower you to direct your own learning; I also engage both your head and your heart. In the classroom, virtual or physical, you will find me relational and interactive. I provide frequent, formative feedback to support your learning.
This entails rich, complex interactions among knowledge, reflexivity, and personhood. You will explore how to understand, remember, apply, integrate, and synthesize foundational knowledge. In the process, you will learn about yourself and others in relation to that knowledge and develop new feelings, interests, and values because of what you learn [1].
For this purpose, I am less a “teacher” than a choreographer and facilitator of learning experiences.
I encourage, equip, and empower you to direct your own learning; I also engage both your head and your heart. In the classroom, virtual or physical, you will find me relational and interactive. I provide frequent, formative feedback to support your learning.
This entails rich, complex interactions among knowledge, reflexivity, and personhood. You will explore how to understand, remember, apply, integrate, and synthesize foundational knowledge. In the process, you will learn about yourself and others in relation to that knowledge and develop new feelings, interests, and values because of what you learn [1].
As your learning partner, I want you to master the basics, broadly conceived. I also want you to connect our learning to your own interests, experiences and communities; engage in creative practices of care; and—with growing consistency—think critically about course material and diverse human experiences.
I ask you to engage critically with your inherited ideas about people, develop clear and intentional norms for care, and make use of practices that support communal, contextual, and intercultural approaches to care.
We learn these things better to promote flourishing among all people and the cosmos as a whole.
I ask you to engage critically with your inherited ideas about people, develop clear and intentional norms for care, and make use of practices that support communal, contextual, and intercultural approaches to care.
We learn these things better to promote flourishing among all people and the cosmos as a whole.
Strategies
Given these values, I plan a course by first identifying two or three ways I hope it will influence your leadership and professional practice three to five years after graduation. Course structures and individual lesson plans aim toward these goals.
Not all learners are the same; therefore, I mix teaching strategies during each class period (typically brief lecture, discussion, and an assessment activity or problem-solving exercise), changing tactics every 20 to 30 minutes.
My courses typically include one or two assessment activities required for every student, plus a menu of activities that allow students to address personal learning goals and “play to their strengths.”
For example, sometimes students propose and complete a final creative project (with student-identified learning outcomes and grading criteria) that “counts” for 25 percent of the final grade; for another 50 percent of the final grade, they choose two activities from among four options (a professional article, a professional memo, a critical essay, or an op-ed column).
The rest of the final grade consists of a self-evaluation of participation and preparation that looks at four criteria: contributions, relevance, quality of expression, delivery, and initiative.
Not all learners are the same; therefore, I mix teaching strategies during each class period (typically brief lecture, discussion, and an assessment activity or problem-solving exercise), changing tactics every 20 to 30 minutes.
My courses typically include one or two assessment activities required for every student, plus a menu of activities that allow students to address personal learning goals and “play to their strengths.”
For example, sometimes students propose and complete a final creative project (with student-identified learning outcomes and grading criteria) that “counts” for 25 percent of the final grade; for another 50 percent of the final grade, they choose two activities from among four options (a professional article, a professional memo, a critical essay, or an op-ed column).
The rest of the final grade consists of a self-evaluation of participation and preparation that looks at four criteria: contributions, relevance, quality of expression, delivery, and initiative.
Goals for Learning
I facilitate your personal learning goals and also set some goals for you.
On the first day of class, I often ask students to respond in writing to the prompt, “Three things I need to ‘get’ out of this course to consider it a success include . . . .” Toward mid-term, I ask them to write about three ways they have worked to meet these informal goals and to identify two additional actions they can take for the rest of the semester to ensure that they get what they need from the class.
These exercises help students to clarify their reasons for being in the class, take responsibility for their learning, and articulate how a course creates shifts in their identities.
Often, I assign a “flash paper” in which students write for three minutes about the most important thing they learned during a particular class session, the concepts that are most confusing to them, the most helpful aspect of class that day, or one thing they have done that week to improve their learning; these exercises invite students to reflect on my teaching and their learning and notice what they do to “get smarter” during the semester.
On the first day of class, I often ask students to respond in writing to the prompt, “Three things I need to ‘get’ out of this course to consider it a success include . . . .” Toward mid-term, I ask them to write about three ways they have worked to meet these informal goals and to identify two additional actions they can take for the rest of the semester to ensure that they get what they need from the class.
These exercises help students to clarify their reasons for being in the class, take responsibility for their learning, and articulate how a course creates shifts in their identities.
Often, I assign a “flash paper” in which students write for three minutes about the most important thing they learned during a particular class session, the concepts that are most confusing to them, the most helpful aspect of class that day, or one thing they have done that week to improve their learning; these exercises invite students to reflect on my teaching and their learning and notice what they do to “get smarter” during the semester.
In addition to “learning how to learn,” you need ethical integrity, practical wisdom, and intercultural understanding to be an effective leader with persons and communities.
Therefore, my courses explore diverse ways to think critically about content; prepare you to respond appropriately to common leadership situations across diverse contexts; and provide basic training in listening, relational, and conversational skills.
Intersectional analysis stands at the center of these inquiries; students must be able to identify how race, ethnicity, gender, socioeconomic class, sexuality, geographical origin, spirituality, and other social identities affect both leaders and their communities.
Therefore, my courses explore diverse ways to think critically about content; prepare you to respond appropriately to common leadership situations across diverse contexts; and provide basic training in listening, relational, and conversational skills.
Intersectional analysis stands at the center of these inquiries; students must be able to identify how race, ethnicity, gender, socioeconomic class, sexuality, geographical origin, spirituality, and other social identities affect both leaders and their communities.
Self-reflexivity
I reflect on my own identities regularly as I work to be a more skilled facilitator of learning. Teaching from 2020-2022, in the midst of pandemic (viral, white supremacist, and authoritarian-totalitarian), unveiled how deeply whiteness-normed-by-middle-class-patriarchy shapes some of my subconscious pedagogical assumptions.
This can lead my courses to promote, implicitly, ideas and values that I don’t consciously advocate: that extended, multigenerational family doesn’t exist or isn’t a priority; that people should value self-sufficiency; that everyone has equal access to time as a resource; that everyone enjoys or strives for middle-class norms and resources; that the United States offers safety (or feels safe) to all students; and more.
I’ve worked for years to decolonize the content and processes of my teaching in the classroom and in clinical training and supervision; now I want to look closely at the values embedded in course structures and policies that promote the formation of “white self-sufficient men and a . . . racial and cultural homogeneity that yet performs the nationalist vision of that same white self-sufficient man.”[2]
Identifying and remediating these distorting norms stands at the center of my future course planning and design. Decolonizing (and decolonializing) ourselves as faculty-scholar-mentors (and as students, leaders, and professionals) takes time and energy.
It’s a never-ending process, and it doesn't just happen. We have to work at it.
This can lead my courses to promote, implicitly, ideas and values that I don’t consciously advocate: that extended, multigenerational family doesn’t exist or isn’t a priority; that people should value self-sufficiency; that everyone has equal access to time as a resource; that everyone enjoys or strives for middle-class norms and resources; that the United States offers safety (or feels safe) to all students; and more.
I’ve worked for years to decolonize the content and processes of my teaching in the classroom and in clinical training and supervision; now I want to look closely at the values embedded in course structures and policies that promote the formation of “white self-sufficient men and a . . . racial and cultural homogeneity that yet performs the nationalist vision of that same white self-sufficient man.”[2]
Identifying and remediating these distorting norms stands at the center of my future course planning and design. Decolonizing (and decolonializing) ourselves as faculty-scholar-mentors (and as students, leaders, and professionals) takes time and energy.
It’s a never-ending process, and it doesn't just happen. We have to work at it.
______________________________________________
[1] These categories relate to L. Dee Fink’s work on significant learning.
[2] Jennings, W. J. (2020). After whiteness: An education in belonging (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans), 7.
[1] These categories relate to L. Dee Fink’s work on significant learning.
[2] Jennings, W. J. (2020). After whiteness: An education in belonging (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans), 7.