I have written about transformative experiences (wave watching! When you suddenly see the world with new eyes) and transformative learning (with my favourite head-hands-heart model) before, but here comes the transformative sustainability learning theory (Michel et al., 2020)!
We often discuss teaching and learning formats, and now there is a nice study that compares face-to-face, synchronous online, and asynchronous online in the same introductory physics course: Both stated student preferences at the beginning of the semester, what they actually end up doing, and what they think benefits and pitfalls are. Very interesting!
My awesome colleague Rachel Forsyth (of our amazing “trust” paper) sent me a message saying “unsurprising but important research” and then a link to Wang et al. (2024), and that is a good summary. In a study of more than 30 million grading records in a Learning Management System, Wang et al. (2024) find that students with surnames later in the alphabet (and thus graded later in the sequence) a) get lower grades, b) get more negative and impolite comments, and c) are complaining more about their grades to the relevant authority. This happens across subjects, and accumulates for students in such a way that it shows up in final grades and can thus potentially even influence job opportunities. So what should we do?
The more I am reading about activism, the more I become aware of how my thinking is constrained by the images that I have accepted as ways to simplify a complex world. For example, the pyramid view of society with some king/head of state/CEO at the top, supported by a small elite of sorts, supported by a large mass of ordinary people makes change only possible if, somehow, the elite and head are reached and convinced to change (or violently exchanged, but I prefer the non-violent way). But the pyramid is really only an image, one very simplified representation of reality of many, and seeing the world this way mostly serves to keep things the way they are since challenging them, in this image, seems impossible. Whereas if you think about the upside-down pyramid supported by pillars (as suggested already in the readings last time), suddenly many opportunities open up!
In this post, I am bringing together a bunch of thoughts and literature, and try to provide an idea of how to assess key competencies in sustainability. Wish me luck! And I welcome feedback! :-)
“Motivation is left, right and centre in learning. Self Determination Theory’s (SDT) is one of the main theories of motivation, and its two founders, Ryan and Deci, are number 6 and 16, respectively, on the list of the most cited researchers in the world. (They have a staggering 1 148 467 citations between them as of today.) Can SDT give us ideas for how to support students’ motivation to perform academically?” This is the start of Mattias Lundmark‘s guest post about an iEarth Journal Club article, and of course he will answer that question!
“Sustainable assessment” is about making assessment useful to learning beyond the frame of the course it is related to, not just in terms of retaining the learnt information and skills for longer, but to support future learning. Resource-intensive courses or practices might become more sustainable if they have far-reaching consequences beyond just the course, and really sustainable if they educate self-managing, learning stake-holders who will act responsibly and competently in society in a challenging future. Teachers are likely intending that long-term impact with their teaching already, but how can it also be supported through assessment design? My summary of Boud & Soler (2016) below.
I recently rediscovered the article by Land (2001) on how different orientations to academic development can be put into relation to each other. And I find it so helpful to think in those terms to understand better why some colleagues do what they do!
Yesterday I was one of those annoying people on their laptop during a seminar, taking notes during Maria Weurlander’s presentation on “When learning becomes difficult: Emotional challenges in education”, and then our discussions on the topic. But it was just too interesting and relevant not to!
We’ve been given quite a substantial reading/watching list for the “Climate Activism 101” course, so let’s start with two things that aren’t actually on it, but maybe should be, before actually digging into the list. My summary of all of it here!