Students as agents in the creation of knowledge:
Incorporating voice and ownership through art-based projects
Author: Becky Beal, Professor of Kinesiology
Developed from many of my colleagues' work and feedback
As I reflect on my teaching and in what ways I can be more culturally inclusive, I have found that I need to be as in tune to my students as possible and to create spaces where I actively pay attention and respond to where they are coming from. For me, this means letting go of some of the faculty-driven structure of courses and allowing for (and expecting) the students to take ownership of the learning process. Incorporating art-based projects has been one successful means of facilitating this type of learning environment.
Below are my main goals for this type of assignment and a few examples from different courses.
Goals and upside:
- Encourages students to put their 'self' or voice into the project. They are the ones creating parameters of the art project and negotiating how they do the work.
- Enhances students' awareness that creating a position or an argument is a process grounded in thoughtful dialogue with each other but also with "academics" as represented by key concepts of course materials.
- Enhances the awareness that their positions are relational and, in turn, that knowledge is relational and political. In short, that knowledge has personal/political significance.
Downside:
- MESSY – process can be frustrating as there is no pre-determined "correct answers." Therefore, it's more "inefficient" and can be more challenging as it opposes the notion that being successful in class is simply "ticking off a box" or "jumping through a hoop."
- Also challenging as it requires consistent communication and negotiation with self and others about the logic and implications of one's position
- Not all students are comfortable in this environment, which is why in particular courses it is provided as an option to more traditional forms of research.