We have been reading Critical Digital Pedagogy: A Collection by Morris, Stommel, and Friend out loud and to the kids for extra impact. I had honestly never realized what those three words, in combination, meant until reading a couple of essays in the collection. I nod often, agree, and stop to mention: why didn’t we read/know about this before? The Open incubator and Open Pedagogy groups have made me think about how we interact with students, our assumptions as instructors, and the goals and responsibilities as co creators of knowledge. I am trying to be more transparent in rationale for course design and in the ways we use technology. This should include, but truthfully I haven’t gotten this far, discussions about information privacy, data management, data equity, and accessibility. We use social annotation tools, web based portals, and have students produce resources that hopefully benefit others beyond the course as assignments. This semester I recorded my electronic elements disclosure and let students acknowledge and ask questions after hearing (and reading) me. I’m still not content with the approach. I somehow want to distance the grading element so that we can focus on feedback and creation of open resources. I want these assignments to educate and intrinsically motivate. Critical Digital Pedagogy also reminds us that we can’t neglect basic student needs. This requires instructors to be socially present and actively engaged in checking on and supporting students. Instead of a survey to see how many can’t attend synchronous or what barriers they have… this is my chance to get to know my students beyond ice breaker style introductions to reach out and support their learning. This may require restructuring, flexibility, and, above all, commitment to honoring our students as persons who believing in them. Discussions that begin with cheating students or lack of engagement during a pandemic, fail to meet one critical need: that of believing in our students and their ability to learn. How should we use digital and pedagogical tools and a more time- and context-appropriate view of the instructor’s obligations to learn, create, and share together? That’s the discussion I’m interested in having.
