As is my habit, I’m already evaluating what worked and what didn’t in my spring term teaching, especially with undergraduates who I’ve discussed previously.
Banning smartphone use was a big success. Before class began, students struck up conversations with each other instead of silently staring at screens. They were also far more attentive during class.
Perusall didn’t work as well as it did in the past.1 I began using Perusall in September 2022 because (1) my prior experiments at collaborative student note-taking had failed, (2) several colleagues had raved about it, and (3) it enabled asynchronous online interaction between students, an essential element of course design given the lingering effects of the Covid pandemic. Two months later, it proved useful for a fourth reason: the release of ChatGPT. Toggling Perusall’s various background settings made the outsourcing of reading and writing to AI much less convenient, which definitely wasn’t possible with reading responses.
This term, the quality of students’ conversations on Perusall and in the classroom seemed lower than before. Since I haven’t dug deeply into any quantitative data, I might be wrong about this, but I don’t think so. In a last-minute attempt to get students to think more deeply and communicate more effectively, I resurrected my wicked problem activity, but with a few tweaks.
First, I tied each problem to the Perusall assignment students had just completed. For example, in relation to a reading assignment on industrial policy, I threw out this scenario:
- You are Senior Vice President of Operations at Apple.
- Apple needs a new iPhone manufacturing center.
- Options: Zhengzhou, China; Jundiaí, Brazil; and Dayton, USA.
- Which location should Apple choose and why?
Second, before putting students into groups to collaborate on solving the problem, I had them individually complete worksheets that contained these questions:
- What is the problem I am trying to solve?
- What solution am I choosing?
- Why is this the best solution to the problem?
- What assumptions am I making by choosing this solution?
- How do I learn whether my assumptions are reasonable?
- How does my problem-solving process apply to other problems I might encounter?
Although my questions need revision, I’m thinking of doing these wicked problem exercises on a weekly basis in my autumn term courses to see what happens. They are AI resistant, encourage social interaction, and maybe even help students learn how to apply knowledge learned in one context to new ones.
1My series of posts on Perusall is here. Scroll to the bottom for all the links.