Benefits of teachers’ autoethnographies are well-documented in current research. This study adds to the research literature by directly analyzing how the insights gained through writing autoethnographic essays may impact second language (L2) teachers’ classrooms. To collect the data, the study incorporated autoethnographic essays into a graduate course for language teachers and asked the participating teachers to design lessons that reflected the insights they gained about themselves through this project. Adopting the transformative learning theory (Mezirow, 1978, 1997) that scaffolds teachers’ self-reflection, this paper explores the transformative potential of teachers’ autoethnographies through tracking qualitative changes in the teachers’ narratives and practice across one academic semester. The results show that as a learning tool, autoethnographies can facilitate teachers’ developing more empowering teaching identities and have a potential for enhancing their teaching practices. The paper adds empirical evidence and a new perspective in the investigation of teacher learning. It concludes with pedagogical and research implications for L2 teacher education.
Tag: Reflective Instructional Practices
Fostering Student Awareness of Team Skills: A Participative Team Formation Process for Class Projects
This essay outlines a participative team formation process for class projects with resources to support instructors in implementing this process. This hybrid process, integrating self-selection and teacher assigned methods, includes four touch points that foster students’ awareness of effective team behaviors and the presence (or absence) of these behaviors within themselves and in team members. The awareness can provide students the foundation for developing team skills—beneficial in both team projects and in organizational teams.
Collaborative Autoethnography: Best Practices for Developing Group Projects
Collaborative Autoethnography (CAE) is an emerging practice that combines group interaction with qualitative research. Group projects are often deployed in course design to maximize the value of collaborative learning environments. Using existing scholarship, we describe best practices for group projects that apply principles of CAE. To advance the premise of the paper beyond descriptive summaries of pedagogical inquiry, we utilize a best practices mechanism to present a coherent guide for project collaborators to use in various classroom settings. The best practices proposed are research validated by existing CAE and project management literature.
Teaching Rhetorical Praxis in a Post-Truth World: An Undergraduate Course on Detecting and Analyzing Bullshit, Fake News, and Alternative Facts
We are living in an era where reality, truth, and facts are being turned upside down and inside out. Fake news and falsehoods are being spewed out in increasing exponential rates. I was prompted to do something about the propensity of fake news through post-truth discourse and designed an undergraduate course that I titled: Bullshit, Fake News, and Alternative Facts. In this piece, I critically reflect on and share my theoretical frames for constructing the course, the design of it, my experience in teaching it, and report on a survey about the class—and I call all of you to work at least some material on post-truth into your classes or into a full course as I have.
Mindfulness and Gratitude: Does It Really Make a Difference for College Students?
Mindfulness is the intentional and nonjudgmental awareness of all thoughts, feelings, and sensations that occur in the present moment. Mindfulness has also been associated with higher levels of quality of life, sleep quality and duration, and life satisfaction and happiness (Chavan et al., 2017). Similarly, gratitude is a tendency toward appreciating the positive in life. It also has been associated with well-being, such as reducing anxiety, stress and depression, and increased life satisfaction (Lindor, 2019). This article takes these findings and explores them to determine whether consistent mindfulness activities and gratitude practices make a difference in the lives of college students, leading to a reduction in anxiety, stress, and uncertainty, as well as an increased ability to be present and to feel appreciation for their current lives.