I have been teaching history to undergraduate students for nearly twenty years, in several countries and a range of institutions. Each of these years began, I now realize, with a missed opportunity. Neoliberal universities love generating data about the learning outcomes of taught units (if you’ll excuse my language)—once they’ve been completed. But asking systematically about students’ expectations and mindset coming into a specific class is uncommon, in my experience. So, as campus life resumed after two turbulent years of teaching mostly from home, I decided to circulate a brief, individual and anonymous questionnaire at the first session of a class. It was meant to evaluate and if necessary adjust my teaching methods and the course assignments to students’ interests, skills and circumstances (see the form below).
In doing so I was inspired by two workshops our department recently organised, one entitled “Expansive designs: thinking about accessibility,” led by Cate Denial, and another on “Finding sustenance in the neoliberal university,” led by Kevin Gannon. Both (excellent) speakers sensitized me to the implications of designing courses that, in Denial’s terms, strive to address an apparent intellectual and skills deficit, but which in fact reflect privileged and ablist notions of what constitutes a proper education; or that envisage (in Gannon’s pithy phrase) “younger, smarter and better versions of ourselves” as paradigmatic students. Instead of focusing on what students “lack,” we can meet them where they happen to be when they enter the classroom. The latter, to be sure, is an increasingly transactional space, but that doesn’t mean opportunities for growth and discovery are absent. My goal remains to find ways to share my enthusiasm about a subject, and gain new insights into it together, while building on students’ existing skills and fostering new ones in an open-minded manner.
To be “student ready,” however, requires gathering more information than random insights from last year’s evaluations (which overwhelmed students pay little attention to), coupled with my unchecked assumptions about the incoming class. Like many of my colleagues, I too take an informal temperature check at the beginning of each term, but that (I now realize more fully) greatly favors certain students (extroverted, neurotypical, etc.), and accordingly offers a partial, indeed exclusionary, view of that room. Nor should we rely on touting our own open-door policy when it comes to private feedback, without recognizing that a very uneven path leads to that door. So, a simple, anonymous questionnaire seemed to be an efficient way to check my instinct and start a different conversation.
(For context: the class in point is a third-year historiography course. It is compulsory for History majors but also attracts other majors, history minors and double-degree students. This is the second year I am teaching this class, which is offered twice a year. Around sixty students are signed up this term, which lasts for twelve weeks. Lectures are pre-recorded and we meet weekly for two hours to discuss assigned readings, mostly influential books and articles in history (e.g., J. Scott’s “Gender: A Useful Category of Analysis,” E. Le Roy Ladurie’s Montaillou, D. Chakrabarty’s Provincializing Europe, L. Auslander’s “Beyond Words,” E. Ho’s The Graves of Tarim, B. Pascoe’s Dark Emu). The final assignment is a traditional long-form essay, combining primary and secondary sources, with smaller tasks building up towards its timely completion: two reading journals; a research question and annotated bibliography; and an oral presentation of the work in progress. Outside class, students are also invited to attend the History department’s seminar and watch together the film The Return of Martin Guerre to complement reading Natalie Zemon Davis’s eponymous book.)
The questionnaire comprised a general and a course-specific section, and posed one open-ended question, which is standard practice in evaluation. The questions themselves were pretty straightforward, and teachers could easily imagine how these may help them know their classes better. Students took about 5-10 minutes to fill the questionnaire at the end of the first hour of class. I hope that, however brief, the process of responding to these questions generated self-reflection among students as well. For my part, the hour or so spent reading the responses prompted me to rework and diversify my methods in order to address some common and some specific needs and concerns. That, too, is a process involving trial and error, and time (and feedback) will tell how adequate my responses have been. Meanwhile, here are three things I learned and what I decided to do about them.
1. Skills as levers. The workshops convinced me that I can (and should) do more to help students harness their non-academic skills, interests and passions to improve some traditional academic skills while making new ones relevant. Achieving this, however, requires asking what students think they’re good at, and this is how my questionnaire begins. Inviting students to name their skills creates an important thread in the conversation, and puts some of them at ease about bringing to the table something meaningful and relevant. Responses this year included “problem solving,” “I speak several languages,” “teaching my dog new tricks,” “karate,” “logic and reasoning,” “listening,” and “music.” Many of these can be directly linked to historical research questions and themes and/or relevant methodologies. For instance, someone who sees themselves as a good listener may find oral history especially appealing. A student who is keen on solving problems can learn that bibliographic searches are in certain respects just that. And any undergraduate with advanced reasoning and language skills is already well-placed to carry out historical research. On the other hand, how to link physical activities (karate, dog training) to studying the past? One way is to illustrate and discuss the kind of discipline that is required to excel in a labor-intensive field such as history. Or else, that sports and animals are themselves major topics in cultural and environmental history, as is of course music.
2. Final projects. Long-form essay writing is a crucial skill that History programs teach, so it comes as little surprise that most of my students, who are History majors, declared they’d like to continue developing it through a traditional final essay. But there were others who responded with enthusiasm and indeed relief to developing final projects that weigh in on historiographical (and other) debates in alternative ways, including through prose fiction, podcasts, animation, documentaries, pictorial art, music and dance. Such variety and inclusivity can help reduce tension around the final assessment; attract students outside the history major to learn more about the field in an approachable way; and demonstrate to historians and non-historians alike the resonance of historiographical debates. It also provides an opportunity to identify the long-form essay as the outcome and extension of a certain educational model. The challenge for me in this case, as a product of that educational model, is how to develop relevant and comparable criteria for assessing other types of projects, and consider whether I am the right person to do so. I tentatively decided that those who are serious about alternative final assignments should consider the stated goals and assessment criteria of the traditional paper and have a conversation with me about how what they propose would achieve something similar.
3. Communication. Responses to the questionnaire encourage caution about taking students out of their comfort zone when it comes to interacting with me and fellow students during class. I was curious about how students prefer to engage: not because I can meet everyone’s needs all the time, but rather since their responses can sensitize me to the importance of creating different types of opportunities in each session. This in turn allows diverse voices to surface from different directions. Building trust, inclusivity and harmony is a process. I cannot assume students are comfortable sharing, for instance, that although they’re prepared for class, or have an informed opinion about a topic, they are wary of talking or presenting in public. For my part, I decided to make it explicit that if I ask someone directly for their opinion, my goal is not to embarrass them or put them on the spot, but rather to ensure the conversation is flowing and offer people equal airtime. Understanding my approach does not necessarily alleviate anxiety among all students, however. So I need to remain attentive to their demeanor and think more about how to convince students that they are their own best advocates, rather than interpreting a reluctance to engage as a sign that they came unprepared or are unwilling to put in an extra effort. And as regards formal assignments, I need to be proactive about letting students develop alternatives, for instance pre-recording presentations.
These are decidedly first impressions and decisions. Whatever their merits (and the questionnaire’s in general), they demonstrate that touching base with my students more systematically than before at the beginning of term put me on a different footing with them, now and in the future. In a plug-and-play world, where everyone is somehow expected to hit the ground running, and problems are individuals’ fault and never the system’s, it’s reassuring to know that teachers inquire and care about where students are as part of their own professional development. Hopefully, mainstreaming that approach will allow teachers too to step into the classroom more fully as human beings.
ATS3865 Making History
Instructor: Guy Geltner
Please answer the following questions briefly and to the best of your ability. They are meant to help me design a more suitable learning process and environment.
General
1. What do you consider your special skill/s? This doesn’t have to be an academic one
2. What academic skill/s would you like to improve this semester?
3. Where do you feel especially comfortable at the university (place, activity, company, etc.)? Where less so?
(more) _____________________________ / (less) _____________________________
4. Do you have a preferred method of interaction during class: listening and taking notes; discussing, asking and answering questions online or in small groups; sharing thoughts and raising questions in the general forum? You can underline and/or add more options.
Course-specific
5. What are your goals in attending this class? What would you like to achieve?
6. Would you make use of alternatives to brief written assignments such as video or audio recordings and presentations?
7. Would you prefer alternatives to a formal final essay? What would they be?
8. How many history courses (broadly defined) have you taken so far?
9. Do you have a favorite work of history (in any medium or genre), historian or historiographical approach or School? Don’t worry if not!
10. Is there anything else you think would be important for me to know in leading this unit?
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