Pedagogical Partnerships in the Arts First Classroom

Project Team

Stacy Denton, Arts First | English Language and Literature

Barb Bloemhof, Arts First | Economics

Project Summary

Student engagement and agency in higher education has the potential to enhance learning and foster leadership capabilities, a particularly valuable innovation in the first-year classroom because of its potential for durable change. This project proposes expanding the instructor/student relationship by adding a pedagogical partnership between students enrolled in first-year seminars and third-year students who have had an opportunity to integrate their first-year seminar experience into their subsequent coursework. This pilot case study aims to enhance enrolled and upper-year students’ identities within a specific classroom, discipline and university environment by leveraging three interlocking foci: novel student-centered pedagogic approaches in the first-year classroom; content co-creation’s effectiveness in fostering empowerment for first-year students; and reflective insights of upper-level students whose developing academic capabilities were first honed in the first-year seminar environment of Arts First.

References

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