#ImaginationWork(ing) with What We've Got: Practicing an Engaged Pedagogy in the Virtual Classroom

Here we are — Week 11! Last week, I discussed heterotopias, the disorienting and transformative in-between spaces that are discursively "other" and offer possibilities for transformation even as they often exist with/in the context of trauma/traumatic events. For example, navigating COVID-19 as students, teachers, and citizens — individually and in community with one another. 

on being somewhere in between by Lily McNeil

Extending this idea, I submit that Week 11 in heterotopia feels more than anything like turning a corner: from the midpoint to the end of the semester, from the past toward the future in the context of election week, with COVID numbers once again rising, and the leaves and temperature finally falling. To me, the personal and political are rubbing against one another to create friction both exciting and uncertain, hopeful and, frankly, horrifying. Too, I'm thinking about how this context that informs the conditions of the heterotopian virtual classroom, the need for an engaged pedagogy, and the potential of #ImaginationWork to marry the two. 

In my last #ImaginationWork blog post, I took time to identify the virtual classroom — which we both create and participate in as graduate students and/or TAs — as a heterotopian space and how the shifting in-between/hybridization of virtual education invites us to (re)imagine what an online engaged pedagogy might look like in practice, specifically if we let go of expectations that the IRL classroom could simply be (re)created online. I signed off with the intent to reflect on some "concrete" ideas for implementation. 

inside and outside, inseparable by Lily McNeil

#ImaginationWork(ing) with What Is Going Well

In full transparency, I'm having trouble thinking beyond the pedagogical strategies already put in place. So, rather than "reinventing the wheel," so to speak, I've outlined some engaged online pedagogical strategies that I submit as particularly successful as well as possible #ImaginationWork extensions to consider by asking a few choice what if questions:

• Video lectures/announcements and voice memos: these save time and offer a sense of presence to the otherwise impersonal experience of (specifically asynchronous) online learning. This aligns with hooks' (1994) insight that "As a classroom community, our capacity to generate excitement is deeply affected by our interest in one another, in hearing one another’s voices, in recognizing one another’s presence" (p. 8). While class members are working at different paces, I've tried to post video announcements throughout the semester offering a visual and aural element to announcements with the hope to offer some sense of immediacy with the benefit that they can be viewed/played at any time. Karen models this so well via virtual lectures in COMM 1010 as well. 

• Extension: What if,  students were asked to post short, informal video responses to the discussion prompt(s) instead of requiring students to provide written responses where they experience one another's presence only via written communication? How might this impact group cohesion and increase social presence online? 

• Optional/drop-by hours dedicated to a specific topic/purpose: In addition to office hours by appointment, Dr. Megan Morrissey has scheduled the first hour of Rhetoric and Mediated Culture as a time to meet informally to ask questions about the course content and assignments. I've attended this drop-by hour frequently and feel it has helped me connect with my peers in ways that are deeper/less curated within the context of class. In this, I think this informal hour demonstrates Fassett and Warren's (2007) assertion that "We don't find communities; we forge them" (p. vii) through creatively and intentionally cultivating connection.

• Extension: What if, short slots of our office hours each week were dedicated to meeting with each group (in courses that involve group work/projects)? Would students be more apt to show up if they knew they had time specifically reserved at the same time each week for their team/success? 

• Peer mentoring groups: As communication studies graduate students, we have been placed in peer mentoring groups to create the opportunity for intentional community and connection within our program. In my experience, this has been life-giving. We are assigned a prompt each month about organizing a particular event (coffee hour, writing workshop, etc.) and asked to provide a "round up" detailing our experience.

• Extension: What if, undergraduate students were required to schedule and engage in a "Get to Know You" meeting online, on their own time, at the beginning of the semester? Much like our graduate peer mentoring groups, students could be provided a prompt and asked to send a "round-up" describing how their session went. Would this help them to forge community/connection within their groups early on in the semester?

Inter- Intra- by Lily McNeil 

In the wise words of Fassett and Warren (2007), "Critical communication pedagogy offers no magical spells to ward off moments of frustration or hurt" (p. 128). Heterotopias — in the classroom and outside of education — are messy and hard. Digging deep into ourselves and into our communities in the context of primarily virtual education requires investments of time and energy that could not be anticipated in advance. It's easy (at least in my experience) to feel bogged down and isolated. However, I as the authors also observe:

It's tempting to dwell in the seeming absence of community — feeling out of place, ignored, excluded. But community is what you make of it. In it's finest moments, community feels like home, like celebration and sunshine and understanding. . . But community is so much more . . . It's the messy home, the argument on the stairs, the scrabble for attention. . . We don't find communities; we forge them (Fassett & Warren, 2007, vii). 

So, amid the mess, the scramble for our attention being pulled in different directions as we attempt to be good teachers, students, and friends, there is hope still to forge community. And engaging in #ImaginationWork to imagine how these connections come to be is crucial. 

This semester, as it creeps toward a close, may not be the time to try all of the engaged pedagogical strategies above, imagined to enhance the virtual classroom/online learning experience. However, I think I will try to implement the second strategy and schedule individual time slots each week during my office hours dedicated to meet with groups in my Comm 1010 classes as they shift into focusing full-time on their Advocacy in Action team projects. This feels like a least one actionable step to putting the theories we've been learning about in Pedagogy into practice. 

in between days by Lily McNeil

As the #ImaginationWork journey continues, I look forward to sharing more experiences and ideas and would love to hear from my fellow peers and pedagogues, what do you think is going well? What practices can we extend or implement to forge community during this time? How are your face-to-face sessions hetertopian spaces, if that idea lands with you?

References:

Fassett, D. L., & Warren, J. T.  (2007). Critical communication pedagogy.  Thousand Oaks, CA:  Sage.

Foucault, M. translated Miskowiec, J. (1986) Of other spaces. Diacritics, 16(1), p.22-27.

hooks, b.  (1994). Teaching to transgress:  Education as the practice of freedom.  New York:  Routledge.

All images retrevieved from the Instagram account @lilynilly.art