For our second meeting we discussed the brief chapter “Engaged Pedagogy.” Guiding questions to consider ahead of time were:

• hooks states that, “Engaged pedagogy begins with the assumption that we learn best when there is an interactive relationship between student and teacher.” and that, “…the classroom functions … like a cooperative where everyone contributes to make sure all resources are being used, to ensure the optimal learning well-being of everyone.”
  • What is your response to hooks’ view of an optimal learning environment?
  • What are the implications of our current “distance learning” mode for enacting engaged pedagogy?

Over the course of this meeting, several participants shared methods and strategies they’d been using to foster classroom community, to create opportunities for students to work collaboratively, and to integrate students’ unique identities and personal expression into course activities and assignments. Some of the ideas shared were:

• In a bio class – students are Citizen Scientists. Small groups collect and analyze data; they work from shared Excel documents.
• In a children’s literature class – the professor texts students a video of herself reading a book aloud each week, then students create videos of themselves reading aloud and share them with the class
• In an early childhood music education class – students are invited to bring their own young family members to join in a weekly Zoom sing along.
• Other strategies included: assigning and exchanging lots of personal writing, participating in surveys about personal interests and experiences, using Zoom breakout rooms, using googledocs and Bb Discussion Board, creating class Facebook pages, and students and instructors posting videos on Bb in order to introduce themselves

We also discussed how our institutional context impacts our work. Some participants felt that there should be more support for faculty to create their own platforms, rather than having to deal with the limitations of Blackboard. Some voiced the perspective that faculty are not adequately perceived by administration as having useful knowledge about how our college can and should approach distance learning. The issue was also raised of a lack of structures that invite communication and collaboration between faculty and advisors, even though advisors know their students well.

Following this meeting, a number of resources related to the discussion were shared:

• A guide to incorporating social/emotional learning into the college classroom, from the Society for the Teaching of Psychology
• A New York Times article from an anthropology professor at Queens College:  “What We Lose When We Go from Classroom to Zoom”
• An article in Liberal Education, from group member Professor Jason Leggett, about how collaboration can drive virtual spaces
• An open courseware website from MIT that makes the materials used in the teaching of MIT’s subjects available on the Web