with Claire Major and Paul Hanstedt, from the 2021 AAC&U conference on General Education, Pedagogy, and Assessment

1. Nudging Student
Agency in the Gen Ed
Classroom: Three
Small Techniques for
Deepening Learning,
Self-Direction, and
Healing
Paul S. Hanstedt
Bruce Umbaugh
Claire Major

2. Claire Major
Professor, Higher
Education
The University of
Alabama
@ClaireHMajor

3. Good Ole’
Discussion
Boards

4. How we like to think of students feel about doing discussion boards

5. How students (often) really feel about discussion boards

6. Am I joking?
What students have to say

10. Why?
What’s Wrong with
Discussion Boards?

11. Well, nothing necessarily.
Problems can arise, though, when…

12. They aren’t really
discussions

15. They are too formulaic

18. They don’t
really provide
interaction and
relationship
building

22. Jesse Stommel
and Sean
Michael Morris
of Hybrid
Pedagogy write:

23. How do we end
Death by Discussion Board?

24. A few things I do
(to bend the boards)

25. Student
Choice on
How to
Respond
(self-
direction)
Post a 1 minute video
introduction
Write a short
autobiographical reflection
Create a set of DIY badges
that highlight your
accomplishments related
to the course topic.

26. Open Boards
(community,
care, healing)
“Asking questions helps us
think more critically about
information. This is your
chance to think about what
you have our module topic
and to ask questions or
make comments.”

27. Galleries for Student Work
(deep learning)

28. Multiple
task
mastery
checklist
(deep
learning)

29. These are an attempt
to provide students
Autonomy/self direction
Nudges to engage in deeper learning
Opportunities for community building and support

30. The discussion forum is dead;
long live the discussion forum
Morris & Stommel (2013)

31. Paul Hanstedt
Professor, Education Studies
Director of the Harte Center for Teaching and Learning
W&L
@curriculargeek
phanstedt@wlu.edu

32. Good Ole’
Academic Writing

33. Writer/Speaker Audience
Topic

34. A student
with
limited
expertise
A professor
with unlimited
expertise
(and a grade
book)
A topic discussed by
experts in the field

35. Subject
Professor
Student

36. Subject
Less
informed
audience
Student

37. Biology:
Create an informational pamphlet on an
emerging infectious disease, pitched to
parents of small children. Include
causative agent and vector, threat to local
population, and possible measures to
reduce risk.

38. Nutrition:
The government of South Carolina
is developing a list of
recommendations regarding the
lifestyles of primary-school age
children.
Choose a particular region of the
state and develop an appropriate
menu for breakfast, providing a
carefully researched rationale
that takes into consideration
BOTH nutritional and cultural
factors

39. Literature
The business department is revising its
major. Provide a rationale for the
inclusion of a literature course in this
curriculum, citing and carefully analyzing
three works we’ve discussed in this class.

40. Business
The English department is revising its major.
Provide a rationale for the inclusion of a
marketing course in this curriculum, citing
and carefully analyzing three theories we’ve
discussed in this class.

41. Why, you ask?

42. Sciences
Social
Sciences
Arts and
Humanities
General Education 1.0

43. Sciences
Social
Sciences
Arts and
Humanities
General Education 2.0
Political
Life
Family
Life
Career
Goals
Media

44. Different audiences require
a move to the conceptual:
Charlotte Bronte
Rochester
Gender
1847
Class
Jane Eyre
St. John Helen
Lowood

45. Charlotte Bronte
Rochester
Gender
1847
Class
Jane Eyre
St. John Helen
Lowood
Careful Reading
Historical
Context
Reading as
construction of
meaning

46. Content-level
Details
Concept
Other
Fields
Different
Contexts

47. Further . . .
Transfer actually strengthens
content mastery.
(Ambrose et. al. How
Learning Works, 2010)

48. Philosophical
Correspondence for
Learning, Agency, and Care
Bruce Umbaugh
Professor and Chair, Philosophy
Director, Global Citizenship Program
Webster University
bumbaugh@webster.edu

49. Philosophical Correspondence
• Stolen from Larry Jorgenson’s “Republic of Letters” assignment
• In my version: “Over the course of the semester, you will engage in
philosophical correspondence with your classmates. I will assign you
partners, and you will write them letters. Try to respond to arguments
and ideas in our readings and discussion and also to the ideas and
arguments raised in previous correspondence. Try to make your
interaction get to the heart of ideas and arguments in ways that
advance our shared, philosophical understanding. Try to get your
correspondent to think harder. Give reasons for your own claims and
insist that your correspondents do the same.”
• Second step: "Correspondence reviewers" vet the letters for adequacy
(reject anything unserious or trivial) and nominate a select few for
bonus points.

50. Pat
Kerry
Chris
Round 1 (3, 5, 7) Round 2 (4, 6)

51. Used in a variety of courses
General Education + Major
• Scientific Revolution
and the Enlightenment
• Ethics of Privacy
Major + Interested Others
• Theory of Knowledge
• Visions of Technology
• Philosophy of Mind

53. Deepens learning
• Meaningful and authentic assignment => Students
work harder
• Connections with others => students work harder
• High rate of completion (accountability to peers)

54. Develop agency and voice
• Students write about themselves, to peers
• Less formal
• decreases anxiety
• encourages authentic voice
• Unprompted integrative learning:
• Connections across class texts
• Connections with other academic work
• Connections with life experience
• Connections with partners' experiences
• Reflection, metacognition, self-direction

55. Community, care, healing
• Personal sharing
• Seeing others and feeling seen
• Expressions of care, empathy, and support

56. Personal sharing
Ideas about course
Letter 1

57. Processing
course ideas
Letter 2

58. Course content
Connection to
other content
Letter 3

59. Letter 4
Care, personal
Connecting
thinking about
course with self
reflection

60. Student comments

61. References
Kuh, George, High-Impact Educational Practices: What They Are, Who Has Access
to Them, and Why They Matter, AAC&U (2008).
Pascarella, Ernest T., and Charles Blaich, "Lessons From the Wabash National Study
of Liberal Education," Change: The Magazine of Higher Learning, v. 45, n. 2 (2013),
pp. 6-15.
Reder, Michael, "What Makes Students Want to Work Hard?" In New Research on
Student Experiences with High-Impact Practices: Effective and Efficient Ways to
Implement, Connect, and Scale, AAC&U Annual Meeting, Washington, D.C.,
January 2014.
Tronto, Joan, "Creating Caring Institutions: Politics, Plurality, and Purpose," Ethics
and Social Welfare, v. 10, no. 2 (2010), pp. 158-171.
Umbaugh, Bruce, “A Pedagogy of Autonomy and Care: A manifesto for equity in
education and engaged citizenship,” Association for General and Liberal Studies,
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, September 2018.
Umbaugh, Bruce “The Imperative of Care Over Contract,” Association of American
Colleges and Universities Annual Meeting “HEDsUp” session, Washington, D.C.,
January 2020.
Zepke, Nick, and Linda Leach, "Improving Student Engagement: Ten proposals for
action," Active Learning in Higher Education, v. 11, no. 3 (2010), pp. 167-177.

62. Questions?
Thoughts?
Room you see for
other nudges?