ELI 2010: the "UO Experience"
The third in a short series of my picks for presentations at ELI 2010 that broke new ground.
A colleague at ELI told me that Prof. Michael Wesch (a.k.a. "The Explainer") has been known to open his classes with the following question:
How are we going to change the world by the time this class is over?
Now that is a good way to introduce a class! An intro like this establishes from the get-go that:
- the course will be connected with real world challenges
- learning will not necessarily be "time-bound" by a 15 week semester
- students will be working together to make a contribution
Wesch's inspiring course intro came to mind as I was watching the University of Oregon's ELI presentation, Rebooting the Past, Uploading the Future, which gave an overview of their Freshman Interest Group (FIG) project, Hidden History: Documenting Freshman Year.
In this FIG project, students document their university experience in a variety of formats - from handwritten journals and collages, to blogs and online photo albums. Through the project, they learn what it means to both "think like a historian" and to go through the process themselves of making history. At the end of the course, student creations are gifted to the University archives, becoming an official part of the University's historical record.
The presenters explain that the project:
- introduces first-year students to the essential questions and methodologies of specific disciplines and fields of study, and promotes interdisciplinary study and research.
- fosters a dynamic partnership between librarians, archivists, and faculty (as well as, I would add from watching the presentation, students and student-instructors)
- stimulates higher-order reasoning skills (independent inquiry, critical thinking, problem solving, and expository writing)
I think it is easy to see the connections between this project and our recent discussions about promoting high impact practices at UW-Madison.
The project was inspiring, and left me with a few questions about our own work here at UW-Madison:
- To what extent are we giving our students the skills, tools, and opportunities they need to document, share, and discuss their Wisconsin Experience?
- Are we keeping track of the historical record our students are already creating on their own using third-party tools? Take, as just one notable example the ASM: Student Voice blog, hosted not wisc.edu, but at wordpress.com.
- Equally important: Are we featuring (and encouraging) these contributions as a part of the University story?
- How can we better leverage partnerships between faculty, librarians, instructional staff, and students to provide student learning experiences and communities that have a lasting impact beyond the confines of the semester?
Comments
fantastic!
I like everything about this project: the fact that students are able to be historians while they learn about history; the fact that they're immediately contributing to their campus (and forever! Think of the potential for their alumni association!); tapping into web 2.0 technologies; and of course, immediately documenting and creating their own WI Experience (well, Oregon experience...).
More generally, this project uses a technique that, as far as I know, was begun about 30 years ago by science education reformers who began exploring ways for students to learn science by doing science. That's a fundamental we now take for granted in many of our upper level sciences courses, though we don't always see it in our intro courses. But we could, just as this FIG illustrates. And it's also illustrated in one of our intermediate level history courses that Bill Cronon teaches on methods in history (take a look at https://tle.wisc.edu/solutions/engagement/designing-public-web-site-classroom-projectand-teaching-undergrads-how-do-histo).
But what I really would love to see is this concept applied generally. Some of these courses are easy to imagine--poetry, certain social work courses in my own department, calculus. But what would a Shakespeare look like if you learned Shakespeare by "doing" Shakespeare? What about ag economics? nutritional science? literary criticism? art history? We think students need the boring foundations before they can get their hands dirty. But I wonder if that's really true.
Thanks, Doug, for this post.