Goal 1: Intersectional and Interdisciplinary Learning

In my courses, I center race, class, gender and the intersection between them. Students have different understandings of the histories, implications, oppressions, and privileges of social identities. By taking a multidimensional approach, I want students with from varying backgrounds, learning styles, and knowledge to learn the theoretical and empirical concepts of the discipline. In my community college courses, students have a vast range of language and educational proficiencies. It is in these classes I learned to become more adaptable to the different learning capabilities, in addition to the varying cultural perspectives inherent within a classroom. Many students within my introductory courses come from a variety of disciplines, therefore group work and interpersonal connections are elements within the course. Living in an increasingly global and interdisciplinary society, gaining skills of working with others is essential. 

How I Accomplish My Goal

I begin each class by asking students if they have current news or topics they wish to discuss. I use this opportunity relate recent societal issues to the topics we are learning. Due to hot topic issues which arise, I have had to use different techniques when tensions surface. To have students dialogue across racial, gender, and class lines, I found ways to turn arising debates into constructive learning opportunities. Some methods, such as using a privilege walk, did not work well within one classroom, and other techniques, such as fishbowls, worked better. I adjust based on the students. My favorite moment at the end of the semester is when students say, “I have never thought about that before” or “you made me look at that differently.” This shows me that they learned a new approach and it broadened their minds to other perspectives. I continue to reflect, modify, and experiment with new activities and approaches to better align my goal with outcomes.

Within my Introduction to Sociology course, my final assignment is sociological biography. Students identify two social identities (e.g. race, gender, sexual orientation) that they are interested in exploring. Student interview family members, mentors, or family friends that are at least 50 years old. They utilize research and critical thinking skills to conduct the interviews and analyze the role social identities have on one’s life. The insights gained by students give them the ability to connect history, social identities, how people navigate their identities within society, and how identities affect life opportunities.

Goal 2: Community Engagement & Engagement with Everyday Life

“How will you use this knowledge to help your community?” No matter the teacher or subject, this is the common theme within each of my graduate classes. This also has been the thread through my courses and research, and it has deeply influenced the way in which I teach. Attending a university tends to silo students from the outside world, therefore I want students to remember that they are a part of a larger community. Many students do not interact with those that have different social identities as themselves, therefore I want student to engage outside their comfort zone and become global citizens. 

How I Accomplish My Goal

Through community projects and assignments, students are able to connect with people outside of the bubble of academia. Each of my courses has a community engagement component. Two assignments which I have given are attending community events and conducting a social experiment. The community events are related to social issues or problem. Student are to critical analyze the event and relate their experience to what they are learning within the classroom. When conducting a social experiment, they are to challenge a norm within society (e.g. men holding hands, wearing clothing backwards, etc.) and write about their experience doing it. Students analyze how others treated them and begin to challenge the norms and values of society.

Reaching My Goals

To evaluate my own teaching, I ask students at the end of the semester to let me know what worked and did not. If I have a co-facilitator within the class, we debrief and give critical feedback to each other in order to learn about areas of improvement. I reach out to other professors and colleagues to find new and different pedagogical techniques. I alter my classes to the interests of the students, in order to engage them in the material. Assessing my skills and learning new techniques as a teacher and educator is important to me. By using the feedback from my students, colleagues, and through personal reflection, I am able to find new ways to engage with students and ensure that they are gaining the skills and knowledge of critical thinking and community engagement.