Christie Kleinmann is a Professor of Public Relations at Belmont University and presented at ITLC Lilly Conference Online last month. The session was entitled ” Capitalizing on What Matters: Understanding the Culture Code of the College Classroom.” Kleinmann did a “which is better” slide annotation activity on Zoom with two images of a sunrise and a sunset. Participants voted by annotating the slide. There were slides for city/country and movie/book voting. This was a nice adaptation of the Zoom annotation tool I had not seen before. Kleinmann introduced The Culture Code book by Clotaire Rapaille. The author asked “why am I doing this?” as a central question. Kleinmann was inspired to ask two guiding questions: “Does a classroom have a culture code? If so, what is the culture code that creates a successful classroom experience?” Rapaille thought smell was the imprint and association with coffee. Kleinmann played a Folgers commercial and then explained all the components that were part of the culture code. Kleinmann then did a Padlet (board) with the prompt: “Describe your earliest memory of the classroom.” The responses varied and were numerous within a minute! Kleinmann pointed out that they were not really about learning. The Principles of Public Relations course Kleinmann taught in the spring of 2021 was asynchronous. Kleinmann asked students to think about their memory of the classroom and then share them with peers. The codes that emerged were community, freedom, and professional experience. Students mentioned community and a sense of belonging with their teachers and the classroom. Respondents saw community as very important and that “without community, the classroom loses a ton of its purpose.” Community was also critical for students to develop and increase their knowledge. For freedom, students talked a lot about the playground, Kleinmann mentioned. Freedom translated into the classroom as a space to express themselves in the classroom and community without judgment. Students defined professional experience differently: they defined it as empowerment and the opportunity to pursue their dreams. Importantly, the teacher was described as a guide and not a driver for professional experience. Kleinmann explained that community was the dominant code and freedom was the next step. Professional experience began with community. Kleinmann noted that the students were generation Z, and that learning and academics were absent from responses. To implement culture code in the college classroom, Kleinmann implemented peer partners to work together and advise each other. As unpopular as they are, Kleinmann noted that group projects force interactions and with that create community. To implement freedom, Kleinmann implemented learning centers. Each center had a video, group activity, and activities. Students could self-select into groups and would rotate every fifteen minutes. While at first it seemed like it wasn’t working, Kleinmann mentioned that the reflections emphasized community. Now, Kleinmann wants to intentionally integrate community into learning outcomes for courses. This session and the experience Kleinmann shared helped emphasize the power of community and providing space for those interactions and exploration!
