In our first two weeks together, we read, reflected on, and discussed asset-based pedagogies, including trauma-informed pedagogy, open pedagogy, Universal Design for Learning (UDL), and culturally sustaining pedagogy. Because of how we tend to think of STEM disciplines—fact-based, methodical, impersonal—it can be challenging to conceive of how these pedagogies might work in STEM courses. Karen Cangialosi, a professor of biology at Keene State College in New Hampshire, explains her thinking about what can be done in a STEM Course in an article at Hybrid Pedagogy. Her approach is grounded in these two core values:
- Student agency—“how we share power in our classrooms and work collaboratively with students”
- A “commons-oriented approach to education”
If you would like to learn more, check out these resources.
- Using Practices of Open Pedagogy in My Biology Courses at Open Pedagogy Notebook—notice how the practices of UDL are at play in much of what Cangialosi describes here
- Practicing Open Science, which shows what “a commons-oriented approach to education” looks like in science
