This is the eighth article in our iTeach.MSU playlist for the Spartan Studios Playkit.
There are many potential approaches to research connected to teaching a Spartan Studios course. These include:
- Disciplinary research inspired by the course
- Novel methods, insights, theories, applications, or results inspired by activity in the course that fall within one instructor’s discipline. For example, a student team comes up with a new approach to solving a packaging problem. The packaging faculty member works with those students to write up and publish this innovation.
- Studying institutional or student success outcomes
- Education research on your pedagogical methods and processes
- Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) or Disciplinary‐Based Education Research (DBER) about student learning outcomes.
- Research into student teamwork (for example, by analyzing student communication networks)
- Research on partner or community impacts and outcomes
- See our Appendix for examples of research about Studios and other similar experiential courses
▶️Plan ahead with your team for the kinds of research you’re interested in pursuing. There may be relevant data to collect during the semester, including classroom observations, student interviews/surveys, or specific assignment designs. You will also need to obtain institutional approval as well as consent from students and/or external partners to include their data in your research.
🔧MSU’s Office of Research and Innovation has resources for faculty members to get started on a research project, involving undergraduate students in research projects, and more.
🔧The Hub for Innovation in Learning and Technology has been conducting research on several Studios courses and can share our experiences in that area.
Next Steps
For more information about any of this material or to find out how you can teach your own Spartan Studios course, contact the Hub for Innovation in Learning and Technology (hub@msu.edu). We offer yearly workshops on planning and pedagogy for Studios courses and can consult with any interested units or faculty members. You are welcome to watch our workshop from the Spring Conference on Teaching, Learning, and Student Success (May 7, 2021) where faculty heard more about teaching Spartan Studios courses, got feedback on ideas for course designs, and heard from instructors who have already taught a Studio course.
Photo by hannah grace on Unsplash
