As an educator, I believe in encouraging the interests of individual students as a means to improve engagement between the student and both the instructor and classmates. However, the pedagogy of individualism seems to be in conflict with the nature of geodesign.
Students in online courses typically look for an individual approach to learning. For a wide variety of legitimate reasons, they are unable or unwilling to commit to the rigid schedule and pace of traditional "face-to-face" classrooms. Online courses offer flexibility that allows students to balance their academic and non-academic priorities. Geodesign is, by contrast, an inherently collaborative method. It is based on a process that improves with the increased participation of relevant perspectives. The process of feedback and iteration is critical to the geodesign process. It can be challenging to replicate the critical aspects of collaboration while supporting individual interests.
Feedback and response is a continuing theme that will be part of all of PennStates’s geodesign courses. For example, in GeoDesign: History, Theory, and Principles (GeoDZ 511) I ask the students to review each other's work, provide feedback, and respond to their peers' suggestions. This process is intended to mimic a team-based approach. I also ask students to engage in a dialogue about the lesson's key topics. What I observed in the first offering of the course was very different from the collaboration I had imagined. Students would often wait until the last day to comment on classmate’s work, leaving little time for their peers to respond. This was largely a result of the conflicting need for students to manage their own workload and interests first. Students placed a much higher value on their own work than on their collaborative contributions.
My colleagues and I have suggested several strategies to bridge the gap between individualism and collaboration:
1. Shorten the feedback cycle - break the lesson down into smaller, manageable pieces within the week. Students are expected to post initial comments by mid-lesson and responses by the end of the lesson.
2. Separate feedback and response - dedicate one lesson to quality feedback and the following lesson to responses.
3. Scale down the process - break the class into small groups. Group-work focuses the student's efforts and introduces a higher degree of personal responsibility.
It is important to consistently emphasize the value of an individual’s perspective to the geodesign team. Each student's unique background, knowledge, skills, and ideas are the energy that drives the team's engine. By engaging in feedback, group-work, or discussions, the student is actually developing and testing their individual interests.
This article was written by Stephen Mainzer (@smainzer), our instructor for GEODZ 511, Geodesign History, Theory and Principles. Stephen will also be developing GEODZ 826, Geodesign Models III: Representation and change.