Teaching &Learning
2.0 My Teaching And Learning Activities (TLAs)
In addition to continuously re-examining my onto-epistemological premises, reflectivity as advanced by Larrivee (2000) enables me to my teaching approaches in line with the context. For example, when I joined Mangosuthu University of Technology, I was coming from an Open and Distance Learning environment (Zimbabwe Open University) where all the students come into higher education as mature, hence well-prepared to pace their own learning. At MUT, it is completely the opposite; the majority of the students enter into higher education and are underprepared for the rigour at this level due to a weak basic education system (Jaffer, Ng'ambi and Czerniewicz, 2007). Also, most of the students come from impoverished backgrounds, with have limited or no access to resources. Such a contextual paradigm shift meant that I had to adjust my teaching approach - from more of a facilitation approach to mainstream teaching. The other contextual factors that I also take into consideration when choosing teaching approaches include the mission and vision of the institution, its institutional culture and its resource base.
2.1 Teaching Approaches
Among a panoply of approaches to teaching, Paulo Freire, one of the principal representatives of critical pedagogy and an advocate of libertarian ideas in the field of education, suggested that there are two approaches to teaching and learning. That is, the banking model of education and the problem-posing (dialogical) model of education (Freire, 1970). His work was also expanded by other proponents of critical pedagogy such as bell hooks (1994), Salazar (2013), Fraser (2009) and Ihejirika (2017) just to name a few. According to Freire (1970, 2011), the banking model is oppressive and dehumanising to students. Durakoğlu (2013) defines the banking model as a system where students are viewed as learning objects or empty vessels to be filled with knowledge, hence knowledge is deemed to be transmitted from the teacher to the student through a pre-determined set of curriculum (Saleh, 2013).
The Banking Model of Education
In this transmission model, the teacher is the knower with absolute knowledge, students are the depositories while teachers are the depositors rendering it teacher-centred. Salazar (2013) lambasts the banking approach for stripping students of their linguistic, cultural, and familial resources to flourish, something which Mayo (2011) refer to as cultural imperialism.
On the other hand, Freire (1970) argued for the embracement of the dialogical approach as an instrument of liberation. Freire insisted that when people engage in dialogical encounters with others, they are able to "become conscious of his or her own perception of that reality, and deal critically with it" (p. 32). Brunstein, Woolvard and Cunliff (2021) confirm Freire's arguments in that using a problem-posing (dialogical) approach to education gives students "a richer opportunity for students to transform their perspectives, and positively impact society" (p. 478). What is more important about the dialogical approach to education is that it challenges the traditional and paternalistic relationship between the teacher and the student in favour of a dialogical relationship in co-constructing knowledge. The problem-posing approach preserves students’ epistemological curiosity to obtain knowledge (Durakoğlu, 2013). It concedes that knowledge and meaning are created through symbolic interaction amongst human beings, and with the world (Freire, 2011).
2.1.1 My Teaching Approach
As indicated earlier on, my conception of the purposes of education is underpinned to a large extent by the interpretivist worldview. At the methodological level, I am a disciple of Freire's libertarian approach to teaching and learning (dialogic pedagogy). Through my teaching and learning activities, I aim to allow my students to be able to think and act in a manner so as to contribute towards changing their world. My teaching approach seeks to avoid being oppressive to students, hence I try by all means to let the students own their learning. This is achieved through translanguaging to allow students to comfortably interact and participate in learning activities without having to struggle with the English language barrier. Such is done to avert what Salazar (2013) bemoans as stripping students of their linguistic and cultural capital. When students are comfortable with the medium of meaning-making, they are able to easily assimilate the marketing curriculum into their life experiences, which is crucial for authentic learning (Cenoz and Gorter, 2011; Lewis, Jones and Baker, 2012). This is my way of embracing diversity and availing of social justice.
Being a disciple of critical and transformative pedagogies, I open myself to scrutiny by both peers as suggested by Palmer (1993) and constantly examine my personal values and beliefs, and the expectations I have for students (Larrivee, 2000). This has helped me to understand the impact of my teaching methods on my students both from a learning point of view and philosophical view and within our context. In as much as I cannot claim to be the epitome of teaching excellence (for now), I have gradually started to discard most of my teaching strategies and tactics which are attributable to the banking model. However, I would not stand here and pretend to have completely left the banking model (nor is it possible), but I am certainly aware of tactics that according to Freire (1970) stifle humanity and as such bring about or perpetuate social injustices in education. Thus, as part of my learning curve, I locate my teaching methods on the banking model – problem-posing model continuum, albeit significantly skewed towards the problem-posing model. Of essence, in all my teaching and learning activities (TLAs), I strive to avoid misframing (Bozalek and Boughey, 2012) my students by ensuring that my TLAs are as inclusive as possible to avail social justice (Fraser, 2009).
The details of how my teaching practice manifests would not be complete if I do not illustrate how it draws from Biggs' (1996, 2012) concept of Constructive Alignment. In the spirit of constructivism, Biggs (2012) defines constructive alignment from a dual perspective, that is, the constructive aspect and alignment aspect. The constructive aspect draws from the concept of symbolic interactionism which states that humans create meaning from interaction amongst themselves and their world. Thus, with students, the constructive aspect means they create meaning through learning activities that enable social interaction and dialogue than the transmission of knowledge (Biggs, 2003). In concurrence, Joseph and Juwah (2012) assert that constructive education uses a construction metaphor, in this case by the teacher and students co-constructing knowledge. Then the alignment aspect refers to what the teacher does, which is to facilitate a learning environment that supports learning activities that entrap students to use higher-order thinking skills (HOTs) to achieve the intended learning outcomes (Biggs, 2003). The specifics of how I do this constructive alignment are detailed under Section 2.1.2 - 3 (Teaching and Learning) and in the Curriculum (learning outcomes and materials) page and Assessments page.
Constructive alignment (Biggs, 2003)
2.1.2 Approaches To Teaching That Influence, Motivate And Inspire Students To Learn
As indicated above, that my teaching methods propagate the concept of Constructive Alignment (Biggs, 1996, 2012), this section outline how I strive to entrap students into using their higher-order thinking skills to achieve the Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs) including the Critical Cross-Field Outcomes (CCFOs). Also, as indicated on my Home Page that I am inspired by Mishra and Koehler (2006) TPACK model, I will in the following subsections of this page (Teaching and Learning) and in the Curriculum (learning outcomes and materials) and Assessments pages, illustrate how I draw from my technological, pedagogical and content knowledge repertoires in setting up a learning environment and teaching and learning activities that entrap students to ILOs.
Teachers in the higher education sector are under pressure to provide the best possible assured experiences to students (Smith, Nerantzi & Middleton, 2013; Biggs & Tang, 2011; Gibbs, 2010). To provide such experiences, teachers must initiate creative teaching and learning activities (TLAs) that foster creative thinking and stimulate curiosity and independent learning in their students. It is for this reason that I ensure that my teaching methods embrace creativity and curiosity as part of learning (see my critical cross-field outcomes presented in one of my Student Guides). I also use strategies such as BYOD (bring your own device) sessions as part of integrating various educational technologies into TLAs in line with the imperatives of the 21st Century. In addition to creativity, the BYOD sessions are also used to stimulate students' curiosity about various marketing concepts, especially in relation to their own contexts.
Amabili (1996) extends creativity beyond individual teacher traits to learning environments. In concurrence, Sawyer (2015) suggests that creativity in teaching must encompass improvisation in the classroom to create opportunities for students to construct knowledge. Such creativity is key to stimulating curiosity, hence my classes (both physical and virtual) are unpredictable and disruptive through various activities such as small group discussions (SGDs), group presentations and various educational technologies such as Quizziz, Flipgrid, Screencasts and Edpuzzle. These educational technologies do not only enable me to introduce new exciting ways of learning, but also operationalise Freire's dialogical education which extends to individual learning. DeLong (2009) states, it is at the undergraduate level where we have to develop the students’ ability to learn and think independently.
To inculcate critical thinking and analytical skills, I often employ problem-based projects where students choose organisations to work with on specific marketing projects. In this hyperlinked video, this group was in a brainstorming session with managers from Durban International Conference Centre (DICC) where they were supposed to develop an Integrated Marketing Communications Plan. This allowed them to critically interface the theory they learnt in class and reality on the ground. Another disruptive teaching approach to foster student learning outside the brick and mortar class was (before the pandemic) the discussion walkabouts where students were given topics for discussions in small groups outside class in WIFI hotspots. This allowed students to loosen up and freshen at the same time engaging with learning material as they will have to come back for a report back session in class. I would, however, admit that such a strategy need a great maturity level of students. I also allow my students to evaluate each other through peer reviews to further embellish the student-to-student and student-to-content interactions as promoted by Garrison and Anderson (2003). attain maturity levels needed for meaningful learning.
Furthermore, to develop students' critical and analytical thinking, we use concept maps to tease out and analyse certain marketing concepts. MS Teams and Whatsapp discussion forums are used to engage one another on topics of interest and through the use of Google Docs, I encourage and foster collaboration skills and digital literacies. As a 21st Century teacher, I subscribe to the notion of play to learn. I use the gamification feature on Quizziz to stimulate enthusiasm for learning. I also encourage collaboration among my students and for them to be resourceful. I often download relevant books from various free books online websites for my students and challenge them to use the same sites to look for books which they share amongst themselves, thus saving a lot on buying textbooks. In summary, my approach is ultimately aimed at availing of social justice (Fraser, 2009).
Source: Dr Prem Network (2014)
Source: Kalantzis and Cope (2015)
2.2 Integration of Technology into Teaching and Learning
In line with my interpretivist/constructivist and connectivity perspectives highlighted in the Teaching philosophy page and spirit of the concept of constructive alignment, I view educational technology as enablers to effectively and efficiently facilitate learning and assessments that encourage students to be actively engaged and devolve the locus of control in constructing knowledge. I draw from the reflexive/ergative pedagogy (Kalantzis and Cope, 2015) to attain Freire’s (1970, 2011) humanising purpose of education. Unlike the didactic/mimetic pedagogy, e-pedagogy (reflexive/ergative) enables me to move learning out of the confinement of the four walls, bench and rows, one-to-many environment to a constructive aspect of Biggs' (2003) concept of constructive alignment approach to knowledge creation. It also enables me to create learning activities that transcend geographic and time restrictions.
With most of my students scattered over the out-of-campus rented and private residences, the chances are that they are constrained when it comes to group learning tasks. To circumvent such challenges, we use collaborative technologies (for example, Teams, Whatsapp and Google Docs) to work virtually. This effectively shifts the locus of control from me as the teacher to my students. It also activates their (students) social capital through symbolic interactions in making new meaning, thus creating knowledge. Even those students who are shy or are not confident to participate during traditional classes can do so in these virtual sessions.
Moreover, most of my students fall under Prensky’s (2001) digital natives’ age group, the one that was born and raised in the digital era and has a low appetite for traditional media and presentation of content, for example, text. To address this low appetite, I embrace the concept of multimodality in content creation and the content is no longer only created by me, but together with students. For example, using Flipgrid, Common Ground Scholar and Padlet for students to co-curate video, audio, images and text learning material. These technologies allow students to provide recursive feedback affordance where students are able to give feedback on their peers’ feedback (Kalantzis and Cope, 2015), thus creating a loop of learning. It also allows me to practise assessment as/for learning (formative assessment) rather than the assessment of learning (summative assessment). Lastly, I use technology to free up time in class through flipped class concept, I am left with some time to attend to individual student learning needs (differentiated learning) which is a misnomer under the banking model. All this said, I believe technology will continue to offer us new opportunities for improving teaching and learning, particularly as the ‘Big data wave’ and artificial intelligence seem to be disrupting industries and human life in general. It is only better that we prepare ourselves for new ways of learning.
Common Ground Scholar Multimodal Activity
2.3 My View of Good Teaching/Teacher
2.3.1 Conceptions of Good Teaching
There is extensive literature replete with the definitions and examples of good teaching (Samples and Copeland, 2013). One of the obvious definitions is that by Cochran-Smith and Fries (2001) who see good teaching as behaviours linked to successful students outcomes and test scores. Bullock (2015) summarises good teaching as a multifaceted phenomenon. The author says good teaching must be understood from students’ experiences, peer academics’ perceptions and dynamics in the classroom. In concurrence, Follman (1995) states that students’ perceptions of good teaching are central because they spend most of the time with teachers, hence experience both good and bad teaching. Beijaard, Verloop and Vermunt (2000) add that experienced teachers’ perceptions are equally important as they offer insights into the identity of good teachers.
Philosophically, good teaching can be attributed to reflective practice. Reflective practice, in its simplest form, entails the teachers' ability to self introspect on the impact of their practice, not on the end product as espoused by Cochran-Smith and Fries (2001), but as the entire process. Larrivee (2000) states that without critical reflection, teachers are “trapped in unexamined judgments, interpretations, assumptions, and expectations'' (p. 293). The reflexivity view is also supported by Finlay (2008) who uses Schon’s (1983) notions of reflection-on-action and reflection-in-action. In line with this, Larrivee (2000) advances that reflexivity enables teachers to fuse their personal beliefs and values (ideology) into professional identity.
Canbay and Beceren (2012) and Tilemma (2000), also concur with the ideological debate, they state that teachers’ conceptions are key in shaping their teaching practice. However, despite a growing interest in researching the conceptions of teaching, there seems to be a lack of consensus on the terminology to characterise good teaching, and terms such as conceptions, beliefs, orientations, approaches, attitudes, views, and intentions being used interchangeably (Canbay and Beceren, 2012). Amongst the scholars that have contributed to the corpus of such literature is Pratt (1992, 2002) and elsewhere (Pratt, Collins and Jarvis-Selinger, 2001; Pratt and Associates, 1998). Pratt (1992) defined the term conceptions as;
“Conceptions are specific meanings attached to phenomena that then mediate our response to situations involving those phenomena. We form conceptions of virtually every aspect of our perceived world, and in so doing, use those abstract representations to delimit something from, and relate it to, other aspects of our world. In effect, we view the world through the lenses of our conceptions, interpreting and acting in accordance with our understanding of the world” (p. 204).
Later on, Kember (1997) synthesised the research conceptions of teaching into two binary categories – teacher-centred and student-centred orientations. Other notable scholars who have also contributed to the discourse include; Degago and Kaino (2015), Di Biase (2019), Samples and Copeland (2013), Bullock (2015), Biesta (2015) and Alhija (2017). The discourse of conception of teaching is central to the concept of good teaching, which has become foregrounded in higher education. Alhija (2017) advances three reasons for this; the first being the need by universities to provide assurance to their various stakeholders with diverse expectations. Second, it is a means of responding to the calls for meaningful and relevant teaching. For example, in South Africa, the student movements are asking for curriculum renewal, which includes what and how they are taught. Third, Alhija (2017) points to the need to augment research performance (which is no longer sufficient to maintain the reputation of the higher education institutions) by improving teaching and learning performance and achievements.
The views and arguments about the conceptions of good teaching above underpin what I believe good teaching to be about, including Pratt’s (1992) Teaching Perspectives Inventory (TPI). Perspectives on teaching are described as interconnected sets “of beliefs, intentions, and actions linked to knowledge, learning, and the role of a teacher” (Pratt, 1992). Pratt (1992, 1998) used samples of adults and adult educators from Canada, China, Hong Kong, Singapore, and the United States to elicit the five conceptions of teaching, namely; Transmission, Apprenticeship, Development, Nurturing, and Social Reform (Pratt, Collins and Jarvis-Selinger, 2001). To evaluate my teaching practice, I took the TPI survey and the results are discussed in the following subsection.
2.3.2 My TPI Results and Discussion
It is important to note that despite the wide adoption of constructivism as the yardstick of effective teaching and learning, Pratt (2002) resists the rush to adopt any single, dominant view of learning or teaching. He cautions that as an argument to counter the positivist teacher-centred approach, over obsession with constructivism might lead us to “replace one orthodoxy with yet another and promote a ‘one size fits all’ notion of good teaching.” As such, Pratt (1992, 1998, 2002) and his associates (Pratt and Collins, 2000; Pratt, Collins and Jarvis-Selinger, 2001; Collins, Jarvis-Selinger and Pratt, 2003) hold the view that teachers, depending on the situation will move along the constructivist – positivist continuum. This means none of the perspectives can be the single, universal, best teaching perspective (Trigwell and Prosser, 2004), rather a perspective could be either dominant or recessive perspective in a certain teaching situation. Henceforth, looking at the graphical presentation of my TPI results, one can see that they (the perspectives) are not evenly distributed. Such is referred to as a flat profile.
From my TPI profile results, it is clear that the Development Perspective is my dominant teaching perspective. This augurs well with my philosophical grounding espoused under Teaching Philosophy. I did indicate that I am an interpretivist/constructivist who also believes in the humanist teaching of Friere’s libertarian education. Firstly, as an interpretivist, I believe in multiple realities and epistemologies. This is pertinent to my dominant orientation towards the developmental perspective. Pratt and Collins (2000) state that for developmental teachers, “effective teaching begins with the students’ already existing knowledge of the content and skills to be learned.” Secondly, interpretivist largely advances the notion of symbolic interactionism which states that knowledge and meaning are co-constructed (Smit and Fritz, 2008; Carter and Fuller, 2015). It is from this basis that I recognise students’ prior knowledge as part of their social capital which becomes the foundation for any new knowledge.
Then the backup perspectives as shown in the TPI results are Apprenticeship, Social Reform and Nurturing perspectives. According to Pratt (1992, 1998), Apprenticeship Perspective holds that effective teachers are subject matter experts who are not only committed to their disciplines but are also committed to having students observe them in action, modelling what it is that students must learn (Pratt and Collins, 2000). As such, this perspective shows my way of practicalising various marketing concepts to allow students to see that it is doable. Nurturing perspective on the other hand entails teachers who deeply care about students, hence working to support the effort as much as achievement. I do nurture my students to understand and believe they have the potential and that their achievement is solely their effort and ability rather than benevolence from me.
The social reform perspective stems from my interest beyond the student. I am a firm believer that education should not only benefit the few who get an opportunity to come to university, but how these students impact on the communities they come from. Lastly, the Transmission Perspective which is my recessive perspective indicates that I am not an ardent objectivist who believes in transmitting knowledge to students, an approach labelled as the banking model of education by Freire (1970). More importantly, are the three sub-scores that makeup what each perspective means. The sub scores are indicators of the level of agreement between what I do (Actions), what I want to accomplish (Intentions), and why I find it important or justified (Beliefs). The variation amongst these indicates internal consistency/discrepancy amongst the sub-scores in each perspective.
My TPI results show high internal consistency within the dominant perspective (Development), Nurturing and Social Reform perspectives. For example, my beliefs (12), intentions (13) and actions (11) are well aligned. Pratt (n.d.) explains that when sub-scores differ by one or two points indicate high internal consistency whilst a difference of three or more points indicate an internal discrepancy that has to be investigated. However, the results depict that there are inconsistencies in the Transmission and Apprenticeship perspectives. The reason for this is, insomuch as I do not believe in the teacher-centred transmission approach, I often find myself having to prolong cognitive feeding and modelling. This is necessitated by the fact that most of my students are underprepared; hence impedes my orientation towards working to assist them sync prior and new knowledge.
The TPI profile indicates that good teaching is a combination of the five perspectives in varying degrees. For a flat profile like mine, Pratt (n.d.) states that it might mean one is trying to be everything to everyone, and might be a bad thing if not well-managed. I concur with this view as I always find myself embroiled in contextual tensions. As indicated, we have underprepared students that need to be hand-held (transmission and apprenticeship) almost throughout the learning process. This conflicts with the dialogical problem-posing model (Friere, 1970) that I espouse in relation to knowledge and meaning co-construction and societal reforms.
2.4 Examples of My Teaching & Learning Materials
In my statement of teaching philosophy, I indicate that I am driven by the need to avail social justice to my students, the majority of whom are from poor backgrounds. Even though most are supported by NSFAS, they still have difficulties with procuring books. Thus, I avoid prescribing books and encourage them to use any relevant material. I also, curate digital copies of textbooks, journal articles, presentations that they can use to supplement our class discussions. I then share my Google Drive folders with them so they access the materials. The folders are hyperlinked below.