Enhancing Inclusive Instruction

Tracie Addy has become a leading voice in higher education for the use of inclusive teaching practices. I’ve been following her work for a few years now, and when I saw that she and her co-authors have a new book out on inclusive teaching, I reached out to see if they could come on the podcast to talk about the project.

The new book is called Enhancing Inclusive Instruction: Student Perspectives and Practical Approaches for Advancing Equity in Higher Education, and it’s a sequel to their 2021 book, What Inclusive Instructors Do: Principles and Practices for Excellence in College Teaching, both from Routledge. Tracie and her colleagues are throwing a virtual launch event for the new book on February 27, 2024.

Tracie Addy is associate dean of teaching and learning and director of the Center for the Integration of Teaching, Learning, and Scholarship at Lafayette College. Her co-authors on the new book are Derek Dube, associate professor of biology and director of the First Year Seminar Program at the University of St. Joseph, and Khadijah Mitchell, assistant professor in the Cancer Prevention and Control Program at Fox Chase Cancer Center at Temple University.

In the podcast episode, we talk about the origins of the book series, the importance of hearing student voices when practicing inclusive teaching, and how someone like me, who has been practicing active learning instruction for a couple of decades, might want to thoughtfully reconsider a few of his teaching practices. You can listen to my conversation with the authors of Enhancing Inclusive Instruction here, or just search for "Intentional Teaching" in your favorite podcast app.

If you'd like more on the power of student voices, listen to my interview with Rob Eaten and Bonnie Moon, authors of Improving Learning and Mental Health in the College Classroom, from May 2023. And be on the lookout for podcast episode later this spring on a powerful students-as-partners initiative!

Maps as Knowledge Organizations

As part of the current slow ready of my 2019 book, Intentional Tech: Principles to Guide the Use of Educational Technology in College Teaching, I'm sharing a few resources with my Patreon supporters that are on theme for each week of the slow read.

This week, we're reading chapter four of the book, which is about using technology to help students organize their knowledge in a particular domain. Over on Patreon, you'll find a post titled "Maps as Knowledge Organizations" in which I share an infographic about zombies, define the term "map" perhaps more broadly than one would expect, and detail a few examples of instructors using visualization tools to help their students see the big picture in their courses. We have coordinate axes and progress maps and flow charts! It's a visual thinking party.

That post is for Patreon supporters only. Becoming a Patreon supporter is just $3 US per month, and it helps defray costs for the Intentional Teaching podcast and newsletter.

Intentional Tech Slow Read Week 5

The slow read continues next week (the week of February 19th) as we read chapter five ("Multimodal Assignments") together. Here's the teaching principle for chapter five:

When students work with new material using different kinds of media, they are better able to learn that material.

And here are the discussion questions for chapter five:

1. This chapter isn't about making better PowerPoint presentations, but the slides you use when you teach are a great opportunity to leverage the dual coding principle. What are some examples of how the images you use on your slides complement the ideas you're trying to share?
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2. Tia Smith's story in this chapter makes the point that engaging students as creators or producers in a particular genre or medium can help them become more thoughtful and critical consumers. How have you seen that play out in your teaching?
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3. I wasn't aware of the term "unessay" when I wrote Intentional Tech, but it has become a commonly used term for a kind assignment mentioned in this chapter, where students have the option to make an argument or otherwise convey their learning using some medium other than the written essay. What kinds of courses seem most amenable to unessay assignments?
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4. What roles might generative AI tools, especially image generators like Adobe Firefly or Midjourney, play in your students' multimodal assignments?
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5. Near the end of the chapter I write, "An analytic rubric, especially when complemented with the kind of structures activities I've described here, can produce more consistent, if not as impressive work." Do you tend to want to see more consistent work from your students or more surprising work?

You are invited to discuss these questions wherever you'd like, but especially on the Intentional Teaching Patreon.

Thanks for reading!

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