Education Commons^™

Play As Curriculum, Drew Chappell

Theatre Faculty Books and Book Chapters

Play as an academic field comprises multiple disciplines, definitions, and objectives and acknowledges a link between play and learning. Historically and in contemporary societies, play has been used as a teaching methodology; this occurs in formal classroom pedagogy as well as outside the classroom as part of informal and improvisational curriculum. Because play generally includes a component of pleasure, as a methodology it compels entry into learning in a way other practices do not. Yet this playful learning can be problematic, depending on outcomes and structures that define the play/learning experience through narrative and power dynamics. Scholars may analyze various …

To Be Or Not To Be…Humorous: Personalize And Perform Humor Mindfully, Julie Artman

Library Books and Book Chapters

"This chapter will address some of the pitfalls (and positive results) of using humor as part of your teaching method. We will explore the acting techniques of personalization and improvisation; and mindful tools to prepare mentally with attention, awareness, and intentionality. Key takeaways from mindfulness and the craft of acting will embolden you to discover how to personalize your own sense of humor, and demonstrate authenticity, caring, and trust--critical factors for student acceptance and engagement--within the learning environment. You will not only survive the instruction session; you will also feel enlivened and more attuned to your teaching purpose during the …

Examining An Activity System Of Learners, Tools, And Tasks In A Video Club, Tara Barnhart

Education Faculty Books and Book Chapters

"One skill that is integral to instruction centered around students’ thinking is attending to, interpreting, and responding to students’ thinking, a cluster of skills referred to as noticing (Luna & Sherin, 2017; Mason, 2002; Stroupe, 2014; Thompson et al., 2016). Video clubs, in which groups of teachers meet to analyze recordings of classroom practice, have been shown to be effective in supporting teachers in developing noticing of students’ ideas and adopting an interpretive lens to make sense of students’ ideas (Johnson & Mawyer, 2019; Luna & Sherin, 2017). However, simply gathering teachers together to analyze videos of teaching is not …

Scallywag Pedagogy, Peter Mclaren, Petar Jandrić

Education Faculty Books and Book Chapters

This chapter explores the dynamic between truth and deceit in twenty-first-century transnational capitalism, emerging neo-fascist movements, and post-truth media landscapes marked by the Covid-19 pandemic and the anthropogenic bioinformational challenge. It establishes the centrality of the concept of truth in revolutionary critical pedagogy and underscores the importance of linking true words with true actions in the formation of critical praxis. Revolutionary praxis consists of the dialectical process of self and social formation, while critical educators are situated as protagonistic agents who work in and through history. Truth is therefore not about a timeless or objective state we name history. Action …

“It Was Time For Us To Take A Stand”: An Ethnic Studies Classroom And The Power Of Student Voice, Jorge F. Rodriguez, Carah Reed, Karen Garcia

Education Faculty Books and Book Chapters

"In this chapter, we invite you to join us—a high school graduate, an Ethnic Studies teacher, and a university ally—as we reflect on a story of student mobilization for change. Some of us will share firsthand narratives while others, such as the university ally, will contribute an interpretive analysis. We all grew up in the region where our story takes place. This affords us a personal understanding of the cultural and political dynamics described in our story. To protect identities, we use pseudonyms for students and teachers."

Digital Cs1 Study Pack Based On Moodle And Python, Atanas Radenski

Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Science Faculty Books and Book Chapters

We believe that CS1 courses can be made more attractive to students:

• by teaching a highly interactive scripting language – Python
• by using an open source course management system - such as Moodle - to make all course resources available in a comprehensive digital study pack, and
• by offering detailed self-guided online labs

We have used Moodle [1] and Python [2] to develop a "Python First" digital study pack [3] which comprises a wealth of new, original learning modules: extensive e-texts, detailed self-guided labs, numerous sample programs, quizzes, and slides. Our digital study pack pedagogy is described in recent ITiCSE …

Best Practices In Writing Assessment, Robert C. Calfee, Roxanne Greitz Miller

Education Faculty Books and Book Chapters

Our assignment in this chapter is to discuss best practices in writing assessment, a task that poses a twofold challenge for teachers-first, the task of providing authentic opportunities for students to acquire skill in writing while covering an ever-increasing array of other curriculum demands; second, the overriding pressures to ensure that students perform well on the standardized tests that have become the primary accountability index. As we complete this chapter, few state testing systems rely to any significant degree on performance tests for measuring student achievement. Multiple-choice tests dominate, and on-demand writing tests (including the SAT) generally contravene the counsel …