Topic Area: Information Session
Presented by: Ellie Louson, Caroline Blommel, Aalayna Green, Nick Young
Abstract:
This workshop shares how instructors can design, implement, and assess experiential, interdisciplinary, and/or project-based learning in courses. This approach empowers and equips instructors to leverage high-impact practices in their own teaching. We introduce an evidence driven framework for these complex learning experiences and share stories from students and faculty about how it works from the past 3 years of the Spartan Studios project in the Hub. A key outcome of this work is our Playkit: a combination playbook and toolkit that is a resource for faculty members. In this pedagogical framework coaching was a critical feature of the success of these courses. Participants will learn the strategy of pivoting to a coaching role, the gains for student autonomy and ownership, the value of not solving students’ problems, and how students experience this new way of teaching. Another key feature of this framework is the use of reflection at multiple points throughout the course experience, benefiting both student learning and teaching approaches. Through facilitated conversations, participants will apply this framework to design their own experiential, project-based, and/or interdisciplinary courses. Participants can also implement à la carte one or more of these elements into their teaching practice without developing an entirely new experiential course and still obtain benefits for student learning outcomes. Participants should bring a syllabus or course-level topic to develop during the workshop.
Session Resources: Spartans Studio Playlist - Introduction
