Student Engagement Challenge 2

Welcome back to Week 2 of the 4-week FDEV Student Engagement Challenge!

So, how did the first challenge go? Did using names more granularly feel a bit weird or out of your comfort zone? If so, good. Keep doing it! It will feel more natural, and your students will feel connected, which leads to engagement.

This week we are doubling-down on that first pillar of engagement – because it is just that important. Below you will find two planned activities designed to help you and your students connect even more. 

We encourage you to choose one to implement this week and see how it goes. Take 5-10 minutes to plan these out to ensure they go well. However, we need to encourage students to engage by letting them do it safely. This means no points attached and anonymity. 

Challenge 2: Pillar 1 (care about students as people)

OPTION 1 – The Two Word Check-In 

Synchronous – Ask your students: “I would like everyone to describe how they are feeling today in just two words.”

  • I encourage this to be an anonymous response and not have any point value attached.
  • Remember, we are playing the long game here. These strategies and tactics may boost engagement a bit at first, but HOW YOU RESPOND is critical to promoting FUTURE engagement. Students see you respond to others with kindness, care, and value, and then they will decide to engage as well. 
  • Students need to know engaging is SAFE and VALUABLE – Your actions prove this.
  • Share your own, too – Be sure the class response is visible to everyone. You can do this by using: 
  • A Poll-Everywhere Word Cloud: https://www.polleverywhere.com/word-cloud
  • Google Doc / Jamboard
  • Your Response: Respond & Empathize – Let students know you hear them, and recognize their feelings. Empathize and encourage or affirm.

Asynchronous: Two Word Check-In & Response Use this Google Slides Template.

  • Create a copy and add enough slides so that each student has their own.
  • Be sure to change the “Share” settings to “Anyone with link can edit”
  • To ensure anonymity, encourage students to log out of Google before they edit
  • Each student will put their two words in the title box
  • Each student will then spend a few minutes anonymously offering encouragement and thoughtful responses to classmates’ two words in the text box on the slide.
  • If you notice any slides not getting responses, give some encouragement there yourself.

Challenge 2: Pillar 1 (care about students as people)

OPTION 2 – The  Entry Ticket 

Works for synchronous or asynchronous classes – Entry Ticket Template

  • Create a copy of the Entry Ticket Google Form above. Edit as you see fit.
  • At the start of class, share the link to the form and ask students to fill it out, letting them know you hope to quickly get a sense of where everyone is today, both personally and academically. 

The key to the entry ticket is to view class results as a whole and discuss them afterward. You can screen share the results as you discuss (just be sure to skip the section where they put their names). 

One of Entry Tickets’ great things is that it allows students to ask CONTENT and ADMINISTRATIVE questions safely. You can devote some time in the class to answer them, as they are directly relevant to the course. I encourage you to try it out more than once.  

Asynchronous Version: Do a weekly check-in ticket. Use the template above, but make some edits to apply to a week rather than asynchronous classes. 

Take it up a notch: Add a specific question you want to ask your students before sharing the form with them. Making it personal to you and what you care about improves authenticity.

I can’t wait to hear how it goes!

Cheers,

Dustin Bakkie
FDEV Faculty Fellow
Lecturer, Kinesiology

Student Engagement Challenge

The FDEV team is excited to announce the launch of a 4-week student engagement challenge

Beginning this week, and continuing up to Spring Break, we will be issuing a small weekly challenge that you can do in your next class to help improve connection and engagement with your students. Each challenge will take just a few minutes to prepare for and about five minutes of class time to implement. Don’t feel locked into our instructions or time frames. Making each task your own will only improve your results. We will also give you a short explanation of why this strategy enhances engagement. 

In the next three weeks, keep an eye out for the Tuesday Tip to access the easy-to-implement task or activity for each week. FDEV Faculty Fellow Dustin Bakkie, from the Kinesiology Department, is going to be our guide and facilitator throughout this challenge. 
We will wrap this all up in Episode 4 of the Rise, Teach, Learn Podcast (released on March 25th) and in a Friday Forum on March 26th from 10:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. so, stay tuned!

We are going to ask you to step out of your comfort zone a little bit. There will need to be some vulnerability on your part. Engagement is a two-way street. You will have your colleagues and the FDEV team with you the whole way to support you.

So are you in? Are you ready? 

Let’s just dive into Week 1 – The 3 Pillars of Engagement.

This week, we’re going to have you try the subtle Power of Names challenge in your class. It’s SUPER SIMPLE and involves building the personal foundation needed for high-quality engagement.

Framework: In 2014 the Gallup-Purdue Index Report surveyed 32,000 college-level students determined 3 Pillars of Engagement were necessary to foster a sense of engagement and wellbeing. 

·         Pillar 1 – Instructors need to care about students as people first * Most Important

·         Pillar 2 – Instructors need to make students excited about learning

·         Pillar 3 – Instructors need to encourage students to pursue their goals.

Challenge 1: Pillar 1 – The Power of Name

Synchronous Class: Use student’s names as often and granularly as possible. “Great question Tom”, “Good morning Halima”. 

·         Being as intentional as possible about acknowledging students and USING THEIR NAMES. You might be like, “DUH”, but I mean REALLY GRANULAR. Every student who says “hi” in the chat gets named, and I say good morning. Research shows that better social presence from instructors improves student learning and satisfaction. We can do that by using names more often and expressing gratitude. (Ladyshewsky, Richard K. (2013) “Instructor Presence in Online Courses and Student Satisfaction,” International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning: Vol. 7: No. 1, Article 13. Available at: https://doi.org/10.20429/ijsotl.2013.070113)

Asynchronous Class: You can use students’ names in feedback. If you are leaving video or audio feedback in the Blackboard or Turnitin Suite be sure to use their name. If you are responding to discussion posts or emails include their name. 

That’s it, you’ve now taken the first step to improve engagement in your course! Engagement comes with connections and using someone’s name is a powerful way to do that!

We look forward to hearing your experiences in the classroom, so let us know how it goes!

Dustin Bakkie
FDEV Faculty Fellow
Lecturer, Department of Kinesiology

Anti-Racist Approaches to Language and Literacy Education

How do we honor, validate, and sustain language identities? How do we decenter whiteness in our classrooms? As educators, how can we expand what counts as literacies and whose literacies count?  If you are interested in anti-racist approaches to language and literacy education, please consider joining the next Book in Common event tomorrow, February 10, from 4:00 – 5:00 p.m.: The Every Day Work of (Re) Claiming our Languages. The webinar features Dr. April Baker-Bell an Associate Professor in the Departments of African American and African Studies and English at Michigan State University, and author of Linguistic Justice: Black Language, Literacy, Identity, and Pedagogy (2020). Dr. Baker-Bell will be in conversation with Chico State’s Dr. Sara Trechter, Professor of English, who studies the Lakhota, as well as language revitalization with the Nu’eta, and Dr. Aydé Enríquez-Loya, Associate Professor of English, who studies cultural rhetorics and femicides of Mexican/Mestiza women on the US/Mexican border. Together, they will discuss the contention of language, the violence of language, and the work needed for language recovery, reclamations, and celebration of language and language identities. Hosted by Dr. Kim Jaxon and co-sponsored by the Book in Common and the Northern California Writing Project.

Register for Zoom link here: https://www.csuchico.edu/bic/events/stories/linguistic-diversity.shtml

We encourage you to explore these resources:

  • Book trailer for Linguistic Justice: Black Language, Literacy, Identity, and Pedagogy 

Open Access (Friday Forum)

Do you have questions about Open Access and how it impacts your scholarly work and publication?

Open Access encompasses a variety of issues but includes literature that is digital, free for users, and that offers authors a variety of licensing options. The relatively new process of publishing in Open Access venues raises questions, however, regarding the process, authors’ rights, and the implications of Open Access publishing for the RTP process.

The film Paywall: The Business of Scholarship highlights some of the pressing issues driving the Open Access movement. 

In March of 2019 the Academic Senate of the California State University passed a Resolution in Support of Faculty Publication Rights with a Green Open Access Policy for the California State University but what does that mean to the academic community at Chico State?

Please join us in a discussion about the status of Open Access on Friday, February 12th (11:00 a.m. – 12:30 p.m., via Zoom). Chico State librarians will discuss research and resources at CSU, Chico. 

We seek to learn about your interests and concerns regarding Open Access publication and want to hear from individuals across campus to engage in a learning community about this topic. This Friday Forum is designed to share information about the process and policies in place, while understanding how we might best direct efforts to support Open Access publication on campus. We hope you will share your experiences and insights.

A few things we will cover in this forum:

  • Explore what Open Access means for our academic community.
  • The Elsevier APC Waiver Agreement with the CSU system, and how you can take advantage of an opportunity to expand access and visibility to your published articles for no additional fees. 
  • Details of Chico’s Open Access Institutional Repository, ScholarWorks.
  • Resources from the library to aid additional exploration.
  • Feedback and stories from you on Open Access relating to your scholarship and discipline.

Our desired outcomes include:

  •         Invite a conversation with OA leaders on campus – listening session
  •          Learn about OA needs for campus
  •          Determine future needs around OA on this campus
  •          Let folks share their existing efforts around campus on OA     

Have questions? Feel free to contact us!

Chrissy Hursh cmhursh@csuchico.edu

George Thompson ghthompson@csuchico.edu

Pam Kruger pkruger@csuchico.edu

William Cuthbertson wcuthbertson@csuchico.edu