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Critical Pedagogy

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What is critical pedagogy, why is critical pedagogy important.

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This guide gives an overview to critical pedagogy and its vitalness to teaching and education. It is not comprehensive, but is meant to give an introduction to the complex topic of critical pedagogy and impart an understanding of its deeper connection to critical theory and education.

One working definition of critical pedagogy is that it “is an educational theory based on the idea that schools typically serve the interests of those who have power in a society by, usually unintentionally, perpetually unquestioned norms for relationships, expectations, and behaviors” (Billings, 2019). Based on critical theory, it was first theorized in the US in the 70s by the widely-known Brazilian educator Paolo Freire in his canonical book Pedagogy of the Oppressed (2018), but has since taken on a life of its own in its application to all facets of teaching and learning. The "pedagogy of the oppressed," or what what we know today to be the basis of critical pedagogy, is described by Freire as:

"...a pedagogy which must be forged with, not for, the oppressed (whether individuals or peoples) in the incessant struggle to regain their humanity. This pedagogy makes oppression and its causes objects of reflection by the oppressed, and from that reflection will come their necessary engagement in the struggle for liberation. And in the struggle this pedagogy will be made and remade...[It] sis an instrument for their critical discovery that both they and their oppressors are manifestations of dehumanization." (p. 48)

Perhaps a more straightforward definition of critical pedagogy is "a radical approach to education that seeks to transform oppressive structures in society using democratic and activist approaches to teaching and learn" (Braa & Callero, 2006).

There are many applications of theory-based pedagogy that privilege minoritarian thought such as antiracist pedagogy, feminist pedagogy, engaged pedagogy, culturally sustaining pedagogy, and social justice, to name a few.

Billings, S. (2019). Critical pedagogy. Salem press encyclopedia. New York: Salem Press.

Braa, D., & Callero, P. (2006, October). Critical pedagogy and classroom praxis. Teaching Sociology, 34 , 357-369.

Freire, P. Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York: Bloomsbury Academic.

Critical Pedagogy is an important framework and tool for teaching and learning because it:

• recognizes systems and patterns of oppression within society at-large and education more specifically, and in doing so, decrease oppression and increase freedom
• empowers students through enabling them to recognize the ways in which "dominant power operates in numerous and often hidden ways
• offers a critique of education that acknowledges its political nature while spotlighting the fact that it is not neutral
• encourages students and instructors to challenge commonly accepted assumptions that reveal hidden power structures, inequities, and injustice

Kincheloe, J. L. (2004). Critical pedagogy primer. P. Lang.

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• Digital Tools and Critical Pedagogy: Compassionate Pedagogy as a Classroom Practice

by Thomas Keith | Mar 13, 2024 | Instructional design , Pedagogy , Services , Universal Design for Learning

This post is the third installment in a series on how to implement the principles of critical pedagogy with digital tools. For more information, please see previous installments in this series . The author wishes to thank ATS instructional designers Joe Olivier and Cheryl Walker for valuable suggestions that improved this piece.

A key tenet of critical pedagogy as it is currently practiced is compassionate pedagogy . In this post, we shall examine what compassionate pedagogy does (and does not) entail, as well as simple and easily implemented methods by which you can integrate the principles of compassionate pedagogy into your classroom praxis.

What Is Compassionate Pedagogy?

At its heart, compassionate pedagogy is an educational praxis that takes into consideration the physical and emotional well-being of both students and instructors . It entails a fundamentally cooperative, rather than adversarial, relationship between instructors and students, with each group extending understanding and care to the other.

As a faculty member or instructor, you may be wondering how you can best apply this approach to your students. Some broad considerations to keep in mind are:

• Students have different backgrounds and needs. A “one size fits all” approach to pedagogy runs the risk of ignoring the individuality of students and even leaving some of them behind.
• Circumstances outside the classroom matter. Difficulties such as food insecurity, housing insecurity, or lack of reliable internet access can impede students’ success in your course.
• Flexibility is important. A rigid approach to pedagogy leaves little room to adjust your approach when students are overwhelmed or otherwise in need of help.

What Is Compassionate Pedagogy Not?

It should be stressed at the outset that compassionate pedagogy does not mean either of the following:

• Reducing academic rigor. A compassionate course is not the same as an easy course. It means, instead, that students are not kept from success in the subject matter of your course by circumstances beyond their control.
• Making you a counselor or therapist. It is not your responsibility to take on a mental health professional’s role. Instead, you should know how to lend a sympathetic ear and how to direct students toward personnel and resources who can best help them.

Simple Steps You Can Take Now

Fundamentally rethinking your course to incorporate compassionate pedagogy can be time-consuming. Fortunately, there are a number of simple steps you can take to help make your course more flexible and welcoming. These are discussed below.

Syllabus Steps

Your syllabus is the charter document of your course. Consider incorporating the following suggestions to help ease your students’ anxieties.

• Set out your approach on Day One. Make sure that your students know you are aware of the issues they may be facing. Stress that they should reach out to you without delay when they find themselves in difficulties.
• Make clear how to reach you. How should your students get in touch with you? Email? Phone? How quickly will you respond by each method? (You might give a typical response time, such as two business days.) What are your office hours? (Note that the term “office hours” may be confusing or opaque to some students , so you might consider using a different term such as “drop-in hours”.) All of this should be clearly communicated by your syllabus.
• List resources for students. These may include counseling resources, writing centers, tutors, and so on. Give as much information for each resource as you can, such as phone numbers, hours of operation, email or website addresses, etc. In a digital Canvas syllabus , these can be clickable links. You might also consider building a Canvas page with an ample list of resources. When you copy your Canvas site for reuse in future quarters, you can copy this page to avoid reinventing the wheel.

Assessment Design

When setting up assessments with Canvas, there are ways for you to maximize flexibility so that students have multiple avenues for submitting their work and need not feel overwhelming pressure over grades.

• Allow multiple submission types on Canvas Assignments. When a Canvas Assignment is of type Online Submission, you can allow multiple methods of submission : Text Entry, Website URL, Media Recordings, Student Annotation , and File Uploads . The more options you allow, the more flexibility your students will have, and the more fully you can achieve the principles of universal design for learning (UDL) . You can also increase the ease of submitting your assignment by not limiting the file extensions permissible for File Uploads (e.g. not restricting uploads to .docx or .pdf).
• Use Canvas to give extensions when appropriate. You can use the Assign To functionality supplied with each Canvas Assignment to give particular students or groups of students later due dates, if need be. You can also manually adjust submission status in the Gradebook ; for example, if a student submitted an assignment late but there are extenuating circumstances, you can change their submission status to On Time .
• Give additional attempts on Quizzes. There are a number of reasons why you might wish to give students additional quiz attempts. Students with unreliable internet access may experience difficulties while completing Canvas Quizzes. Alternatively, you may wish to use multiple quiz attempts as a learning opportunity . Whatever the case may be, you can manually unlock extra attempts to allow your students to retake the quiz as necessary.
• Use Assignment Groups to drop low grades. Canvas Assignment Groups allow you to set rules such that a given number of low (or high) scores are not counted in grade calculations . You can use these rules to give students breathing room. For example, you might create an Assignment Group of nine weekly writing assignments and set a rule that only the seven highest will be counted, so that students need not panic if they are unable to complete all nine.
• Leverage Poll Everywhere for classroom “temperature checks”. In difficult times, students may find it hard to concentrate on coursework. They (and you) are likely to experience heightened levels of anxiety in the wake of local, national, or global crises. You might consider using Poll Everywhere , the University’s instant polling system, for quick “temperature checks,” asking students how they are doing and what concerns are uppermost in their minds. You can then adjust your pedagogical approach accordingly.

Announcements and Communication

Few strategies are as vital to successful pedagogy as keeping the lines of communication open between you and your students. Canvas and other tools make it straightforward to communicate clearly and effectively.

• Leverage Canvas Announcements. Canvas Announcements are a robust system for reaching all students in your Canvas course site, or specific sections. You can attach files, schedule announcements for later posting, and even record video announcements. Canvas Announcements are also pinned at the top of your Canvas syllabus page, so that they are readily available for students to view. Using Announcements, you can ensure that your students are kept informed about upcoming events, changes to course policies, opportunities for extra credit or make-up work, and so on.
• Use Ed Discussion to supplement office hours. Ed Discussion is a powerful tool for Q&A and other forms of course discussion. Faculty at the University of Chicago have leveraged it with success as a homework help tool, allowing students to ask questions and get assistance from instructors, TAs, and peers at times when traditional office hours may not be available. Ed Discussion is integrated with Canvas, and ATS personnel can help you to get started if you wish to employ it in your course.

Compassionate pedagogy need not be difficult to implement, nor does it need to be a barrier to academic rigor. Through the judicious use of Canvas and other digital tools, you can help to build a sense of community among your students, alleviate the pressure they may feel due to the many stressors of student life, and point them toward help when they need it, thereby contributing to a healthier and more successful course.

Further Resources and Getting Help

For more tips on inclusive and compassionate pedagogy, check out UChicago’s Inclusive Pedagogy site .

If you would like to learn more about compassionate pedagogy and how to implement it, we encourage you to reach out to us. You can drop by our office hours (both virtual and in-person during academic quarters), come to one of our online workshops , or book a consultation with an instructional designer .

(Cover Photo by Dave Lowe on Unsplash )

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Critical pedagogy is a teaching philosophy that invites educators to encourage students to critique structures of power and oppression. It is rooted in critical theory , which involves becoming aware of and questioning the societal status quo. In critical pedagogy, a teacher uses his or her own enlightenment to encourage students to question and challenge inequalities that exist in families, schools, and societies.

This educational philosophy is considered progressive and even radical by some because of the way it critiques structures that are often taken for granted. If this is an approach that sounds like it is right for you and your students, keep reading. The following five steps can help you concretely implement critical pedagogy into your classroom.

• Challenge yourself. If you are not thinking critically and challenging social structures, you cannot expect your students to do it! Educate yourself using materials that question the common social narrative. For example, if you are a history teacher, immerse yourself in scholars who note the character flaws or problematic structures that allowed many well-known historical figures to be successful. Or, perhaps, read about why their “successes” were not really all that successful when considered in a different light. Critical theory is all about challenging the dominant social structures and the narratives that society has made most familiar. The more you learn, the better equipped you will be to help enlighten your students. Here are some good resources to get you started.
• Change the classroom dynamic. Critical pedagogy is all about challenging power structures, but one of the most common power dynamics in a student’s life is that of the teacher-student relationship. Challenge that! One concrete way to do this is by changing your classroom layout . Rather than having students sit in rows facing you, set up the desks so that they are facing each other in a semicircle or circle. This allows for better conversation in the classroom. You can also try sitting while leading discussions instead of standing. This posture puts you in the same position as the students and levels the student-teacher power dynamic. It is also a good idea, in general, to move from a lecture-based class where an all-wise teacher generously gives knowledge to humble students to a discussion-based class that allows students to think critically and draw their own conclusions.
• Present alternative views. In step 1, you, the teacher had to encounter views that were contrary to the dominant narrative. Now, present these views to your class alongside the traditional ones. Have them discuss both and encourage them to draw their own conclusions. If a student presents a viewpoint, encourage him or her to dig further. Asking questions like “why do you believe that?” or “why is that a good thing” will encourage students to challenge their own beliefs, break free of damaging social narratives, and think independently.
• Change your assessments. Traditional assessment structures, like traditional power structures, can be confining. You don’t have to use them ! Make sure that your assessments are not about finding the right answer, but are instead about critical thinking skills. Make sure students are not just doing what they think they need to do to get a particular grade. You can do this by encouraging students to discuss and write and by focusing on the ideas presented above presentation style.
• Encourage activism. There is a somewhat cyclic nature to critical pedagogy. After educating yourself, you encourage students to think critically, and they, in turn, take their newfound enlightenment into their families and communities.  You can do this by telling your students about opportunities in their community where they can combat oppression, like marches, demonstrations, and organizations. You can help students to start clubs that focus on bringing a voice to the marginalized. You can even encourage students to talk about patterns of power and oppression with their family and peers.

Concluding thoughts

Obviously, implementing critical pedagogy will look different in different subjects, and what works for one class may not work for another. For example, a history teacher may challenge an event that is traditionally seen as progressive, while a literature teacher may question a common cultural stereotype found in a book. A science teacher, on the other hand, may encourage students to look at the impact of scientific discoveries on marginalized groups. Often, this will involve finding common bonds between subjects as the critical approach is not confined to only one area of education and culture.

How have you implemented critical pedagogy in your classroom? What strategies have you found effective? Let us know by commenting below!

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Encyclopedia of Educational Philosophy and Theory pp 258–263 Cite as

Critical and Social Justice Pedagogies in Practice

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Critical pedagogy ; Educational practice ; Social justice pedagogy

Introduction

While pedagogy is most simply conceived of as the study of teaching and learning, the term critical pedagogy embodies notions of how one teaches, what is being taught, and how one learns. Critical pedagogy is a way of thinking about, negotiating, and transforming the relationship among classroom teachings, the production of knowledge, the institutional structures of the school, and the social and material relation of the wider community and society. Critical pedagogy is historically rooted in the critical theory of the Frankfurt School and was greatly influenced by the work of Karl Marx, particularly his views about labor. According to Marx, the essential societal problem was one of socioeconomic inequality, believing that social justice is essentially dependent upon economic conditions. The “New Left scholars” in North America, including Henry Giroux, Roger Simon, Michael Apple, and Peter McLaren...

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Ayers, W., Quinn, T., & Stovall, D. (Eds.). (2009). Handbook of social justice education . New York: Routledge.

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Breunig, M. (2011). Problematizing critical pedagogy. International Journal of Critical Pedagogy, 3 (3), 2–23.

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It is easy for those of us invested in critical pedagogy to see need for major change in education in the U.S. It is also easy for us to write highly ideological manifesti that make sweeping philosophical statements about how things should be. One question I often hear from those getting their feet wet in critical pedagogy is where do I start? Many agree with the ideology and the goals of critical pedagogy and other movements seeking major change, but we cannot simply drop those changes into our current institutional structures. Never mind the fact that we have colleagues and students to win over before we can implement these changes with a chance at success.

But some of the issues raised by critical pedagogy are major ethical issues. It’s not that we can do something more efficiently or effectively, it’s that we see what we’re doing on the whole as being actually wrong . As a critical pedagogue, I can go along with something less effective much more easily than with something that goes against my newly pricked conscience. So when I disagree fundamentally with the direction something is headed, but am powerless to change it singlehandedly, what do I do? Do I forget about it and wash my hands of the situation? Do I leave in disgust? Do I bide my time until I can really do something? (And hope it doesn’t get worse in the mean time!) Do I try to make incremental changes, appeasing my conscience with the knowledge that I am improving things, albeit slowly?

As I’ve thought about various issues in various contexts, I’ve come to believe that I should work on at least three different planes — or resisting along three different fronts. Sometimes, only one is an option; sometimes all three. But by framing my thoughts and work this way, it helps me to identify what I can and can’t do, and to not feel like every class I teach needs to be a major revolution. I hope these three lines of resistance can help other people seeking to make changes where they are.

The first and highest line of resistance is pushing for major institutional change in policies and practices, like I did at Charleston Southern University with the social media policy. This is where we should push for large, sweeping changes — where our full ideology, even our manifestos, should come to the fore.

The second line of resistance is changing our own day-to-day practices. Major institutional change comes slowly, if at all. And we are unlikely to get everything we want on the highest level. But we can effect significant change on the local level. These changes are often incremental because of the lack of major institutional change, but they are no less important.

Often, I find myself working on both of these levels simultaneously. For example, I may speak against the use of letter grades or standardized tests (first line of resistance). But until there are major university-wide changes, I cannot operate entirely outside of the world of grades and SAT/ACT/GRE scores. However, I can ignore, or at least heavily de-emphasize, GPA and GRE scores in favor of writing samples and unique elements on the C.V. when considering graduate school applications to my department (second line of resistance).

Likewise, I can employ assessment practices in class that focus on formative assessment and verbal feedback over summative assessment and final grades. I can also use a standards-based, or criterion-referenced, grading system where I assign grades of P, B, A, or N (passing, borderline, attempted, not attempted) — encouraging students to think less about ABCDF grades, and to think more about the meaning of an assessment. (The fact that the letter grades stand for a word, and that B is better than A, both contribute to that.) Since these grades are assigned in reference to concepts or skills, rather than assignments, it also invites students to focus on the content we are exploring together and their intellectual development in light of it, rather than just a series of scores. This is by no means ideal, but it is an improvement that still fits inside university policies and draws student attention to the problems with those policies. It also allows me to demonstrate the value of other systems, and have data and student feedback to point to if and when the university actually considers changing its policies.

Not every change we would like to make can be accomplished within the policies set forth by our university, though. That’s where the third line of resistance comes in: teaching underground . Academic instructors can influence the intellectual and social development of our students outside the boundaries of the course. We can also influence the way our colleagues think about things. Further, our role as critical pedagogues need not be limited to the professional relationships we have with students and colleagues. We have an educational role to play outside the university, as well.

For example, while what we do during class, prep, and grading time is important, what happens during office hours often has a greater impact on our students. Even better can be meetings over coffee or the throwing of a frisbee. And education need not be limited to our tuition-paying university students. As a parent and the member of a vibrant faith community, I have two very important educational charges outside my professional life, in which I seek to put my critical-pedagogy ideals to work. Social media is another locus of pedagogy, if we use it as such. Many of us teachers use social media for pedagogical development, seeking the ideas of others that we can can appropriate for our own teaching. But we can also use it as an others-oriented place to teach other educators, especially given the large population of educators seeking to learn from others on those platforms.

These are not the only ways in which we can seek change and resist harmful practices in education. But I have found it helpful to frame my educational work in these three ways. For instance, I used to try and do everything that I found important in every class. When institutional policies or student preferences got in the way, I became frustrated — either with the policies, or the students, or with my own inability to make it all work. However, recognizing the difference between the first and second lines of resistance helps me see the value in making incremental local changes while pursuing big change outside the immediate context of my classes. Likewise, taking opportunities to “teach underground” helps me accomplish aims outside of class that I cannot (yet) accomplish in class. (Don’t underestimate the value of having coffee with education majors, for example, especially if they just read Paulo Freire in one of their education classes!)

Among the Hybrid Pedagogy community, we often focus on the ideology, and thus the first line of resistance. Of course, most of us live in a world where we can have our biggest influence on the second and third lines of resistance. (And communities like Hybrid Pedagogy are examples of that third line of resistance.) We do not live in Luther’s Wittenburg or Calvin’s Geneva; most of us live in Cranmer’s England. Reformation, if it comes at all, will come slowly and incrementally, and we may risk our livelihood if we push too hard on the first line of resistance too soon. But we all have things we can do on the second and third lines of resistance. The more we push there, and the more people we can bring along with us, the greater chance we’ll have of success when we do make that assault on the first line.

As a community that teaches each other underground, let’s keep our eyes fixed on the broad goals and help each other to make significant, incremental gains on the local level, both in class and off the books.

The following is a letter to my first- and second-year music theory and aural skills students at The University of Colorado–Boulder. This is my second semester at CU, and the music students and I are still getting to know each other. For some, this will be their first semester with me; others are still getting used to my pedagogical quirks. To help frame the semester, I will have them read and discuss this open letter.

My most profound educational experience was not a lecture, or a test, and certainly not a homework assignment from a workbook. My most profound educational experience was playing second horn for a brass sectional for our conservatory orchestra. We were playing Richard Strauss’s Ein Heldenleben , a piece full of difficult passages for the brass players. Our principal horn was away for an audition on that day, and our horn professor, Dale Clevenger (principal horn of the Chicago Symphony), played in his place. I sat right next to him, seeing and hearing what he was doing first-hand, and trying to match or complement him as I played. Even though he only talked to me for a fraction of the time, that single two-hour rehearsal was easily worth a year of lessons, or dozens of concerts. And no amount of lectures or readings could have accomplished what was accomplished by playing a hard piece alongside the greatest horn player in the world, trying to match his sound as I heard it.

Now I’m not the world’s greatest music theorist. But I am an expert in the things we will be studying, and I care deeply about fostering the best opportunities I can for you to learn them for yourselves. With that in mind, I’d like to set the tone for this semester by offering a few things to keep in mind as we work together. Though these are not part of the course content, do not appear on the syllabus, and will not be assessed, they are more important than the course content. These things will help us lay the groundwork to be successful in our engagement with the course material, and, even more importantly, they have broad applicability to learning processes in general — in this course, in other courses, and outside the classroom. We will occasionally reflect on these in class, as they apply to specific situations in which we find ourselves.

First, education is more than the transfer of information . Education involves the transfer of information, of course. However, there are things more important, and more difficult, than simply memorizing information. In our class, those things include the assimilation of concepts and the application of those concepts in musical activities. Assimilating concepts often requires engaging multiple perspectives on the same information — multiple theories about the same musical concept, multiple ways to perform the same kind of passage, etc. It also requires attempts at applying the material, such as composing, analyzing, or performing. These things are harder than taking notes and regurgitating them on a test, and often take longer than a single class meeting or homework assignment to figure out. For those of you who are used to courses that “test early and test often,” this may be uncomfortable and may feel, initially, ineffective. However, doing hard things and working to apply concepts leads to deeper, longer-lasting learning than lecture, baby-step homework, and a test you can cram for. That’s a big reason that I rarely lecture and don’t use workbooks: we need to do hard things and engage multiple routes through the material in order to truly understand and master it.

Education is training for life, not just a career, and certainly not just a job upon graduation . You are paying too much money and putting too much time into your education for it to be valuable for a few years of work only. Your education should help you develop skills that will last your entire career (which could be upwards of 50 years). We don’t have all the information that will be required of musicians working in 2060. However, what we do in these classes can help you develop the skills of inquiry and analysis you’ll need to figure out how to work in those new settings. We will also take multiple approaches to a single topic so that you can 1) see that there are always a diversity of ways to understand a single topic, and 2) have more tools at your disposal to choose from when facing something new that was not anticipated by your textbook’s authors or your professors.

Ask your private studio teachers, ensemble conductors, or other seasoned professionals you respect (in any field) what their most valuable educational experience was that has prepared them for their life and career. Was it a series of lectures? Was it a textbook reading? A workbook assignment? Or a hard project — maybe even one they created themselves — for which there was no textbook or how-to guide, but which pushed them to develop new ways of thinking about their work, and led them to create something they didn’t think they were capable of? You will get plenty of lectures and readings in your college education. I want you to find the tools and experiences that will help you develop the ability to do good, hard work when there are no lectures and readings.

In other words, I want you to learn how to learn . That means that at times you will be teaching yourself. This is an intentional choice. One of my chief goals is for you to take charge of your own education. Though I will help set a frame in which this will take place, many of you will feel uncomfortable, even overwhelmed, at this. That’s normal. It’s what independent learning feels like quite often. (Because it’s what teaching feels like.) However, if at any time you feel lost, please talk to me. I have gone through the same process many times before, both as a student and as a teacher. I may not remove the discomfort immediately, or at all, but I will help you learn to manage it and harness it to a positive outcome.

Education is about far more than grades . I understand that grades feel incredibly important. The university puts stock in them, your scholarships depend on them, and many of you are only able to be here because of those scholarships. You’re working hard to make sure you can stay here. Other students are, admittedly, minimizing their workload while maximizing their GPA, so they can spend time doing other things, often very good things. However, in both cases, focusing on grades leads us to miss the best things an education has to offer. Some of the most important things in a class are things that are hard to assess, so they’re not part of the grade. You have the opportunity to work with world-class scholars and creative professionals here, some of whom are your fellow students. Take advantage of that! Don’t think about your education as work for a boss who tells you what to do. You are making an investment. Do what you can to reap the greatest return on your investment (which is not only, or even chiefly, financial). Education is not a commodity that can be purchased; it is a process, and your tuition does not buy learning; it buys an opportunity to learn. That means figuring out what else a professor, or a book, or a piece of music, or a campus, or a city, or a group of fellow students has to offer you besides what is on the syllabus or in the course catalog. Yes, grades can be important, but they are not the goal: the goal is an intellectual, musical, professional, and social maturity that will allow you to get the most out of, and contribute the most to, your life.

A class is a negotiated space . Every class is full of students — and an instructor — whose backgrounds, goals, and attitudes differ. Even when students’ goals are congruent, the “best” route for each student towards those goals is different. Thus, a class activity is always a compromise that seeks to enable as many students as possible to make as much progress as possible towards those goals. And even though this means more freedom for all of you, there will be times when I have to make decisions for the group. But they will be made with this need for compromise in mind.

Teaching is not performance . My goal is not to dazzle you with my intellect or to blow your mind with the course content. Nor is it to entertain you or to charm you with my personality (though I may). Instead, my goal is to create an environment that is conducive to your musical and intellectual growth. While I do have some tricks up my sleeve that will help you “get it” quickly, and I do have some class activities that may be entertaining or inspiring, much of our work will look like your daily work in the practice room. Mastering something new is like that, as you know from the hours you’ve spent composing or practicing. However, I will make sure that everything we do, whether mind-blowing or mundane, will have value.

Finally, I am not perfect . Nor are any of your other professors. We are experts in the fields we teach, and some of us are experts in the art of teaching. However, we make mistakes. We also have an imperfect university structure to work within (semesters, grades, class schedules, etc.), and each pass through the material brings new students with different experiences, backgrounds, skills, sensitivities, prejudices, loves, career goals, life goals, financial situations, etc. There is no one way — often not even a best way — to teach a topic to a student, let alone one best way to teach a topic to 15 or 40 (or 400) students simultaneously. So even when we do our jobs well, it won’t fit everyone. And even if it did, you will have bad days, too. This is why I will provide you a variety of resources and tasks to help you learn. If you take charge of your own education, make full use of the resources most helpful to you, and make full use of the people around you (myself and your fellow students), you will make significant strides in your musical growth.

Most of you did not come to music school so that you can make lots of money. And I doubt any of you came here just to get good grades. In fact, I bet all of you are here because you love music. And most of you enjoy making and talking about music together with others. That’s exactly what these classes are about. If you focus on making and exploring music collaboratively in this class, deep learning will happen. (And, yes, good grades will follow.) You will also grow as musicians who can continue to educate yourselves when you leave CU. So let’s make the most of our time together not by seeing how much information we can get from my notebook into yours, but instead by learning how to make music, and to make insights about music, in new ways.

Critical Digital Pedagogy Copyright © 2020 by Kris Shaffer is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Radical Pedagogy (2007)

Issn: 1524-6345, teaching resistance: an exercise in critical pedagogy.

Jennifer Stewart, Ph.D. Department of Sociology Grand Valley State University 1 Campus Drive Allendale, MI 49401 (616) 331-2168 [email protected] College of San Mateo [email protected]

Jennifer Stewart is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Grand Valley State University.  Her teaching and reseach interests include Race & Ethnicity, Social Problems, and Pedagogy.  Dr. Stewart is currently working with a student anti-racism theater group (Act on Racism) who perform skits based on the incidents gathered from the homework assignment described in this paper. 

In this paper I describe a critical pedagogy assignment used in an upper-division Race and Ethnicity course. This is the last assignment in the semester and challenges students to engage in acts of resistance against racism and racial inequality encountered in everyday interactions. I developed this project as a response to students' frustrations regarding the eternal and immutable nature of racism in America. Included are examples of student actions as well as suggestions for how to orient discussions to build up to this activity.

INTRODUCTION

The objective of critical pedagogy is to generate in students the desire and ability to ask questions about relationships observed in society (Freire, 1970). Further, critical pedagogy embraces the perspective that education should be a liberating experience, designed to spur students on to seek social and economic justice (Berling, 1999; Freire, 1970). Modern educational contexts, however, are often not conducive to critical pedagogy. Large class sizes, limited class time, and the demanding work and school schedules of contemporary college students all function to hamper learning beyond the “banking model” in which students receive and then regurgitate information without the application of critical thinking skills, or the ability to learn on their own (Freire, 1970; Nieto, 2002).

Traditionally, sociology is viewed as a science of objective observers of social facts such as inequality (i.e., is “value free”). That sociology does not intend to create activists is unpalatable to many sociology students and teacher/scholars. In fact, learning about social problems without developing concrete solutions to those problems risks rendering sociology obsolete.

As not all students of sociology will enter academic workplaces, they need to be given the tools to interpret the world through a sociological lens and to apply critical thinking skills in devising solutions to social problems (Basirico, 1990). The creation and application of sociological solutions implies a deeper understanding of sociological concepts and theories (Basirico, 1990). Students who passionately wish to change conditions discussed in courses need to acquire those skills. I have found ways to help students develop strategies of resistance in the context of a Race and Ethnicity course.

White students have been socialized to believe that we live in a color-blind society or that the denial of the existence of race is the only workable solution with regard to structured racial inequality. Students of color, on the other hand, are all too aware that we do not live in a color-blind society, nor is that the goal of all Americans. In fact, appeals to a color-blind society threaten to negate some of the individuality students of color have cultivated based on race (Dalton, 1995). A big part of the challenge of teaching about racial and ethnic inequality is to get students to understand that while some of the more “obvious” or overt forms of racism have been collectively deemed unacceptable, many more insidious forms of racism and racial inequality remain deeply entrenched in American social interactions and institutions. Once that understanding is achieved, however, it is imperative that students be given tools to deal with their newly acquired awareness of racism and the mechanisms through which modern racism operates.

Increasingly, colleges and universities (following the lead of long-standing sociology programs) are requiring their students to complete “diversity” and/or race and ethnicity courses. Learning about racial oppression can be disheartening to say the least, producing in students a sense of futility with regard to addressing social problems that appear to be such an entrenched part of American history. In fact, students often comment that systems of racial inequality are immutable and somehow inevitable.

Given that racism and racial inequality have persisted for centuries in the United States, a semester is surely not enough time to change such systems of oppression…or is it? In this paper, I describe an assignment that allows students the opportunity to actively confront some aspect of racism and inequality. I developed this assignment specifically to address the frustration voiced by students: they feel powerless to alter what they find to be a reprehensible component of American life. This assignment also provides wide latitude of avenues of action for individual student engagement. Finally, this exercise could be extended to other dimensions of inequality such as gender, sexuality, and social class.

Although, when I initially assigned this activity I worried that the “acts of resistance” would be fairly trivial (e.g., limited to enforcing “political correctness” in speech), the response and range of actions taken by students suggests the potential power and appeal of this assignment. I now instruct students that there is no such thing as a “trivial” act of resistance.

In addition to Richard Schaefer’s (2003) Racial and Ethnic Groups , students are assigned Paula Rothenberg’s (2001) White Privilege: Essential Readings on the Other Side of Racism, as well as Doane and Bonilla-Silva’s (2003) White Out: The Continuing Significance of Racism. Over the course of the semester, we have several discussions oriented around the pieces in these texts. Their acts of resistance often reflect or draw on the concepts, theories, and suggestions for change provided by the authors included in this collection.

The Context

Lake State University is located in the Midwest. The student body, as well as the surrounding community, is fairly homogenous with respect to race : 88.5 percent of the student body is identified as white, 4.7 percent African American, 2.4 percent Hispanic, 2.1 percent Asian/Pacific Islander, and .6 percent American Indian. Although segregation in the surrounding region has declined somewhat in recent years, many of the communities from which Lake State University’s students are drawn are “hyper-segregated” (Glaeser and Vigdor, 2001). In fact, many white students relate that there were no students of color in any of the primary and secondary schools they attended.

I use this assignment in an upper-division course titled “Race and Ethnicity”. This course is required for Sociology, Criminal Justice, and Social Work majors. It is also a course that fulfills a general education requirement. Therefore students’ fields of study range from art and business, to nursing and physical therapy.

Description of Assignment

The assignment is the last in a series of five assignments. Students have 3 options. The first option is open to those who are privileged on the basis of race. Students who consider themselves racially privileged discuss 2 or 3 privileges they were unaware accrued to their racial category/status before taking the class (i.e., not having to think about their racial status in a variety of situations, finding barbers and hairdressers). The second option is open to those who are disadvantaged on the basis of race. Students who choose this option discuss experiences that they believe reflect or were shaped by racial disadvantage (i.e., driving while black or brown, being denied housing, being followed or ignored in stores). I provide these first two options for those who are uncomfortable with the third option that is the focus of this piece.

The third option is a challenge for students to engage in an act of resistance. I try not to restrict the range of responses available to students but some rules are necessary to ensure personal safety and/or liberty. The rules for the act of resistance are as follows: 1) students may not use violence; 2) students should attempt to refrain from using insults and inflammatory language; and 3) students may not violate any laws in the course of completing this assignment. In contemporary society, students tend to perceive racism and/or racial inequality as social problems solved through grand measures and/or policies. The purpose of this assignment is to make students aware that racism and racial inequality can be addressed, in part, through everyday interactions and individual decision-making.

Because confronting racism often invokes fears of acts violence and rejection (Kivel 1996; Tatum 2003), I am very explicit about giving examples of unacceptable and acceptable acts of resistance for the purposes of this assignment. For instance, we have deemed face-to-face confrontation of hate groups such as KKK, white supremacy movements, or Christian Identity as off-limits for this assignment. We do discuss ways that we can safely confront these groups such as writing letters to the editor or to elected officials. These rules are intended to steer students away from endangering themselves or others and often challenge them to think more critically about the everyday places that racism lives.

Similarly, we try to steer ourselves away from insulting language that could escalate a confrontation. As Wildman and Davis (1997) argue, calling someone a “racist” generally results in defensive posturing and a focus on the individual, attitudinal nature of racism rather than on the institutional and social components of racism. For this assignment, emphasis is placed on trying to question the rationale behind prejudicial notions and actions. Students are challenged to focus on the myths and stereotypes prevalent about minority groups in American society and to deconstruct those factors in the formation of prejudicial beliefs and behaviors.

We discuss this assignment about midway through the semester even though it is not due until the last day of class. It is important to give students time to think about the nature of their acts of resistance so some of the fears attached to this option can be allayed and so they are prepared to engage in resistance. Many students respond in their assignments that the first time they had an opportunity to resist, they were caught off guard and failed to act. It is also important to provide ample time for students to complete the assignment as many acts of resistance occur spontaneously (e.g., while waiting in line at a grocery store).

I have used this assignment for two courses per semester, three semesters per year for three years. The percentage of students electing to engage in the third option (the act of resistance) rather than the discussions of privilege and disadvantage have ranged from a low of 60% to a high of 90%. On average 75% of students choose this option.

Challenging “White” As Normal

Critical studies of whiteness have generated a wealth of research on the meaning of whiteness. Whiteness has been defined as “normal”, invisible, unspoken, and the standard by which all other groups are measured (Dyer, 1997; Frankenberg, 1993; Lipsitz, 1995). Tied to the perception that whiteness is the normative state of being, is the idea that racism and racial inequality are phenomena disconnected from whites. In other words, the burden of finding solutions to racism and discrimination is a burden not for whites but for people of color (Lipsitz, 1995; Kivel, 1996; Morrison 1992). In setting the scene for her act of resistance, one white student wrote,

“In white people, talking about discrimination, prejudices, or racism is frowned upon…I think white people can choose whether they want to believe that discrimination exists or not.”

Some white students, therefore, choose as their act of resistance to start and maintain a discussion about racism and racial inequality with their family members or within other network contexts. Though at first I deemed this a relatively “easy” act of resistance, I soon understood my perceptions about the ease of talking about racism with family members were flawed, especially given power relationships between parents and children. For example, one student whose son was in the hospital recounted an event in which her mother refused to buy a magazine requested by her son.

“After we left his room, my mother let me know she had found The Source , but refused to buy it for him. Sounding totally disgusted, she went on to say how she thought the magazine was inappropriate for him to be reading. When I asked her why, she said it was because it was all about black people and their “hip hop” music….I decided this was a great opportunity to confront my mother about her prejudice and discrimination…my mother’s prejudices were not only limiting her, but in this circumstance were also limiting to my son. I took this opportunity to explain that when I was growing up, her beliefs of prejudice and actions of discrimination impacted my view as well, adding that I have chosen to raise my children with a much different view towards minority group members. I want my children to experience a more balanced life; I also want for them to understand the effects prejudice and discrimination have on individuals and on society.” (white female)

Parents and family members are often shocked, angered, and, conversely, sometimes even relieved to hear their children discuss the topic of racism. In general, students are quite anxious about their family’s responses but report a sense of accomplishment and independence in expressing their views about the validity of societal (and parental) beliefs about race and racial inequality.

Additionally, some students have used this assignment to challenge their own comfort boundaries. For example, white students have attended events sponsored by minority student groups on campus that white students have historically avoided. They relate their experiences as the “other” to the experiences of minority students attending a predominately white institution. Additionally, students have attended multi-cultural events taking place in the larger community. These events have included potlatches, a Juneteenth celebration, and a local “Summit on Racism”.

Attacking “Racial Codes”

Tatum (2003) and Sleeter (1994) argue that whites employ racial codes to delineate racial boundaries. Incorporated in this code are race - based and biased jokes, behaviors and actions that establish group boundaries, and the direction of conversation to whites only. Another trend in students’ acts of resistance is the dismantling of this racial code. The opportunities to do so often present themselves spontaneously in a variety of “real world” settings. Students have confronted family members, roommates, strangers, and, professors and challenged their use of racial slurs. For example, one student who works as a bank teller addressed the emerging stereotyping of persons of Arab descent (or those mistakenly assumed to be of Arab descent), increasingly prevalent since the events of 2001. A white male customer made the following comment regarding an Indian customer of the bank to the student: “Doesn’t it make you scared to have towel heads coming in here?” The student attempted to confront the in-group boundary establishment by pointing out the erroneous assumption of the white male customer:

“I asked him if he knew that the Indian customer wasn’t Middle Eastern, if that was what he was implying, and that he was from India. I also told him that even if he were Middle Eastern, I still would have no reason to be scared of him...Our Indian customer had overheard this entire conversation and came over to me. He laughed and said ‘I need you to come with me everyplace. No one believes I’m not Middle Eastern and I get treated badly.” (white female)

Another student with a penchant for on-line games described his efforts at rejecting racial codes and racist language even in an “anonymous” setting:

“One player called another player a “nigger” because he thought the other guy was cheating. I typed in that he better stop using racial slurs or I would begin a vote to have him kicked out. He...ignored me. I left that particular game server and went to another server to play.”

After a short period of time, the player who had used the racial slur caught up to the student and demanded an explanation.

“I typed in that yes, he was being racist in the last match I played and that I left because I have a no-racial-insults policy while I am playing on-line. Another player typed in “Right On!” Maybe this was not a life changing act of resistance but it showed about eighty-five on-line players that there are some people out there who find racial slurs and bigotry intolerable.” (white male)

Yet another student chose a more public setting, the student union, for his act of resistance:

“My friend and I shoot a lot of pool. We are there probably 3 or 4 days a week so we know the crowd that hangs out there a lot. There is this one kid, that me and my friends frequently play with…one particular day there happened to be a very large group of African American girls who seemed to be possibly celebrating a birthday party. At several points in time the girls got rather loud and it became very obvious that it was very annoying to our fellow pool-playing partner. After about five or six games, the kid made an extremely racist and offensive remark. After my shot I stopped and informed him that they were doing nothing wrong, they didn’t have to be quiet, and that if he was celebrating a friend’s birthday with all his buddies they would probably be twice as loud as these girls. I then put my cue away and told my friend and the kid who made the remark that I was leaving.” (white male)

Not long after the beginning of the war between the U.S. and Iraq, while riding the campus bus, a student observed an interaction between a white male and an Arab American male. The white male demanded to know whether the Arab American student was a supporter of the Iraqi regime. In her assignment, the student wrote:

“I was shocked that he had asked such a question. My mind started to fill up with some thoughts of anger. Before I even knew it I had turned to the man who had asked the question and asked him why he didn’t ask me that question also. He got very quiet then he said that he didn’t ask me that question because I was an American. So I told him just because someone is Arab it doesn’t...mean that they are either supporter of terrorism or supporters of the Iraqi government. I went on to say that he didn’t know where the student was born so he didn’t know if he was an American or not. I tried to point out to him that it didn’t matter where he was from; the only thing that matters is he is here now.” (African American female)

The student reported that a conversation about ethnic profiling and the war, lasting twenty minutes, occurred after this incident between the students traveling to campus on the bus.

Institutional Contexts

Some students attempt to address an institutional aspect of discrimination. This

trend is much less common than others discussed as students rarely have positions from which to influence institutional components of discrimination. When they do resist institutional discrimination they do so by either drawing attention to an issue or attempting to change that institutional component. For example, one minority student, who held a position of relative influence on campus, tried to point out that the University had neglected the interests of minority students in programming entertainment.

“One student even told me he thought it was really ‘shady the way the African American community was disregarded’. I decided that I had better tell the others that some of the students that we are elected to represent are angry, for racial reasons. I let them know that we had been, in a quiet fashion, accused of racial discrimination. Later some… would say that contrary to my report, they heard nothing but positive reactions…They made no mention of race. I just hope that no one ever asks why Lake State University can only retain seventy percent of its minority freshman yearly. They might not like the answer.” (African American male)

Another student chose to use her responsibility for hiring and firing new employees at her work site as a way to challenge institutional contexts of inequality. She worked at a health and fitness club whose members were exclusively white. We had discussed in class how the tendency to hire family members and friends can, when combined with residential and school segregation, create homogenous work settings as well. During the semester, a position for a new lifeguard opened up. Though in the past she might have selected a lifeguard recommended by a member, this time she selected the most qualified person for the job. The most qualified person was a woman of Asian American descent. Immediately upon being hired, members began to lodge complaints with the student regarding the abilities and competency of the new lifeguard. The student patiently addressed each complaint, defending the right of the woman to work at the club. After two months, the lifeguard had become a very popular and well-liked member of the club staff. In her written assignment, the student reflected on the isolation and sense of “otherness” potentially experienced by the lifeguard and vowed to increase the diversity of the staff at her club.

Because many students work in retail establishments, discussions of racial profiling in retail settings is a prominent topic in classes. White students state that they are often pressured to be hyper-vigilant when minority group members enter. They are often instructed that they must do this to limit theft. One student observed, and reacted to the following incident which she believed to be racial profiling in a retail context:

I watched as a white man walked towards the exit with three little boys trailing behind him, each was pushing a brand new bike out the door. The white woman who is the store greeter just kept doing her business of straightening her flyers, and work area. The man and kids left with no need to display proof of purchase to the greeter, and I went back to watching my kids. A black man soon came to the door pushing a bike as well. I then witnessed the greeter step from behind her little desk and ask the man for proof of purchase. He searched for his receipt, showed it to the greeter, and was on his way. I approached her and began to speak stating that I had noticed that she asked a black man who was pushing a bike for a receipt while not questioning the white man with three bikes for a receipt. ...I went on trying to explain to her that it is common for people not to even notice their racist behavior because of the fact that the society in which we live condones the behavior.” (white female)

Students who address the issue of profiling in retail settings often point out that their own experience contradicts the validity of profiling as a strategy to reduce inventory losses. They have found shoplifting to be equally distributed among all racial and ethnic groups.

Discrimination Tests

During the semester, we examine many components of discrimination. For example, the students watch media reports on instances of racial discrimination in

housing, lending, and sales. They also watch pieces on “linguistic profiling”. These media reports are often based on the results of discrimination tests in which two testers are matched along all dimensions (e.g., gender, age, ability) except race. A final example of the outcome of this assignment can be shown in the form of tests devised by students to detect discriminatory behavior.

“On Saturday nights my friends and I usually go to the same bar around the same time. ...The dress code at this particular establishment is relatively relaxed and in the 6 months or so that I have been going there I have only seen one person get asked to leave because they were wearing something inappropriate. It just so happens that that one person was a black male.” (white male)

The student went on to describe the details of this incident. The black male described was a co-worker of a friend of the student. The man who was denied entry due to his clothing was wearing a “Nike fleece sweat suit”. The students were discussing what had happened on the way back to the car and debated whether they had ever seen a patron at this establishment wearing a sweat suit. The general consensus was that they had. So, the black male and the student writing this assignment traded clothes in the parking lot. The white student, wearing the same sweat suit for which the black male had been denied entry, was allowed into the club fifteen minutes later. He pointed out this discrepancy in race and treatment to the bouncer making the decision and left the club. He and his friends have not returned since. As a class we discussed how this student’s experience illustrates the use of supposedly “neutral” rules to enforce racial discrimination.

Finally, a Mexican American student enlisted the help of a friend to determine whether his suspicions were correct regarding his own experience of discrimination. The student described how he feels he must carry his I.D. at all times. Part of this need, he argues, is due to his age and the fact that he is in a college town where store and bar owners must, by law, be very vigilant about checking I.D. for age tested purchases (i.e., cigarettes and alcohol). His white friends, he states, are subject to the same rule so he is confident that it is being applied fairly. That was not the case, however, when he went to the bank. He decided to test his suspicions.

“We went to our bank in a different neighborhood so the tellers would not know us, and we both went without ID’s and attempted to cash our checks. It was busy inside so we did not get the same teller as I had hoped...I was denied the ability to cash my check and my friend walked out with his money. I vocally pointed out how I was not allowed to cash my check without ID and my friend who was white was allowed to cash his check without ID.” (Mexican American male)

The students went back to their car, picked up their IDs and closed their accounts at that bank.

I would include one final step in this assignment: allow students to share their experiences and acts of resistance with each other. As previously mentioned, I introduce this assignment midway through the semester. I have found that the more we discuss our actions as a class, the greater the likelihood that students will choose the act of resistance for their final homework. Every week I ask if anyone has encountered an opportunity to engage in an act of resistance. Sometimes students are unsure if their acts “count” or were done according to the rules of the assignment. I allow the class to vote on whether certain acts qualify or not as long as they can defend their decision. I also encourage students to essentially ignore me and ask questions of each other. They query fellow students about the level of anxiety they felt before, during, and after their actions.

On the day that the assignment is due, we devote the entire class period to discussing students’ actions. We debate about the types of discrimination or inequality addressed by each act of resistance. We critique our own behavior and discuss whether there are other ways to address the specific instance of racism being examined. We even talk about how nervous we were or what types of responses we anticipated. It is helpful for students to know that many were scared to act; but they were happy with their actions and often the responses to their actions afterwards.

There is one difficulty that teachers may have in instituting this assignment: assessment. Educational institutions demand that students’ work be assessed based on some “objective” criteria. Students are also demanding of the need to be assessed through the assignment of grades. Unfortunately, assessment, particularly in this case, assigns “value” and differentiates among acts of resistance , demanding that some criterion be developed which ranks various student acts (Spademan, 1999). I find this

practice contrary to the goals of critical pedagogy. Therefore, I use this assignment almost as an extra credit assignment. When students are informed that their actions will not be ranked, they are able to act without the constant worry of assessment.

There are long-range implications of this assignment. Resistance can be addictive. After their semester was over, several members of one class protested a billboard campaign sponsored by a local developer. They wrote letters to the advertiser and developer explaining their objections to the advertising campaign. Students also report that they hope for, and have observed occasionally, a “pay it forward” effect. In other words, the students often state that they think their actions can serve as the basis for action for friends, roommates, and siblings, among others. Whites hesitate to act against racism for fear of backlash and loss of privilege (Kivel 1996). Many students counter that they can serve as role models for acts of resistance.

This assignment fulfills the goals of critical pedagogy. It causes students to ask questions regarding observed inequalities: What is the basis for the differential outcomes we observe? Is race a determinant of inequality in specific situations? What can I do to change the inequalities I observe? Furthermore, by maintaining relationships with students after the semesters end, I would argue that the ability and tendency to ask questions about race and racism and to formulate solutions does not end with the assignment of final grades but extends into the future.

In this paper, I have given examples of an assignment that calls on students to resist racism and racial discrimination. This assignment is meant to empower students and address an often-voiced frustration on the part of students who learn about American systems of racial inequality. Clearly acts of resistance could also occur along multiple lines of difference.For example, students could be challenged to address systems of gender-based privileges. The same methods described in this paper could be applied to developing a critical and liberating approach to dismantling gender inequality (as well as inequality based on social class and heterosexist privilege).

It is also a hope that this assignment, when students graduate, will be a reminder of the agency possessed by individuals to create, maintain, alter, and dismantle social inequalities. By providing an initial insight into that agency, graduates may learn to question institutional rules and effects in order to eradicate structures of inequality from positions of relative power.

Basirico, L.  1990.  “Integrating Sociological Practice into Traditional Sociology Courses,”  Teaching Sociology, 18: 57-62.

Berling, J.  1999.  “Student-Centered Collaborative Learning as a “Liberating”             Model of Learning and Teaching,” Journal of Women and Religion, 17: 43-55.

Dalton, H. 1995.  Racial Healing.   Doubleday. 

Doane, A. and E. Bonilla-Silva (eds.).  2003.  White Out:  The Continuing Significance of Racism.”   New York:  Routledge. 

Dyer, R.  1997.  White.   New York:  Routledge. 

Frankenberg, R.  1993.  The Social Construction of Whiteness: White Women, Race              Matters.   University of Minnesota Press.

Freire, P.  1970.   Pedagogy of the Oppressed.   New York:  Herder and Herder.

Kivel, P.  1996.  Uprooting Racism:  How White People Can Work for Racial Justice.  British Columbia:  New Society.

Lipsitz, G.  1998.  The Possessive Investment in Whiteness: How White People Profit from Identity Politics.   Philadelphia, PA:  Temple University Press.

Morrison, T.  1992.  Playing in the Dark: Whiteness in the Literary Imagination. Vintage.

Nieto, S.  2002.  Language, Culture, and Teaching: Critical Perspectives for a New Century.  Mahwah, N.J.: L. Erlbaum.

Rothenberg, P. (ed.). 2002.  White Privilege:  Essential Readings on the Other Side of Racism.  Worth Publishers.

Schaefer, R. 2003.  Racial and Ethnic Groups:  Ninth Edition .  Prentice Hall. 

Sleeter, C.  1994.  “White Racism,” Multicultural Education, 5-8;39.   

Spademan, T.  1999.  “Radical Pedagogy and the Logic of Assessment,” Radical  Teacher, 56:  26-31.

Tatum, B.  2003.  Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? And Other Conversations About Race.   New York: Basic Books. 

© Radical Pedagogy

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Critical Pedagogy in the ESL Classroom.pdf

Critical pedagogy is most commonly associated with the problemposing model of education espoused by Freire (1970/2005), who was predominantly concerned with challenging the politics of education and, by extension, society, in the classroom (Aliakbari & Faraji, 2011). Freire was responding to the unjust social politics that propagates the banking model of education, which characterises the students’ minds as tabula rasa and empowers the teacher with the power to introduce and prescribe ideas that are marketed as ‘truth’ and ‘reality’. However, such depositing of unquestioned information is what critical pedagogy aims to challenge, since Freire’s (1970/2005) problem-posing approach believes that “[k]nowledge emerges only through invention and reinvention, through the restless, impatient, continuing, hopeful inquiry human beings pursue in the world, with the world, and with each other” (p. 72). By privileging the teacher’s position as that of the revolutionary leader, his or her position of power in the classroom can be used not to disempower students but to empower them with tools needed to discover invisible codes that determine power relations on their own, challenging the question of silence (Freire, 1970/2005), and reconstructing these codes (Aliakbari & Faraji, 2011; Crookes, 2010). Freire’s theory of critical pedagogy thus demands that the teacher trusts and invests in the learner’s ability to reason and engage in independent thought, instead of assuming that it is the student whose trust is to be gained. This is a more democratic approach to the power dynamics in the classroom between the teacher and the student, because the main aim of Freirean critical pedagogy is to liberate the oppressed (in this case, the students) from the ideological control of the oppressors (in this case, society) by working together: “Teachers and students (leadership and people), content on reality, are both Subjects, not only in the task of unveiling that reality, and thereby coming to know it critically, but in the task of recreating that knowledge” (p. 69). Thus, critical pedagogy helps to nurture “an uncolonized imagination” (Crookes, 2010, p. 334) that can better read and negotiate the world (Van Duzer & Florez, 1999; Wilson, 2014); Freire calls this ‘critical consciousness’, and EFL/ESL teachers may recognise this as the foundation for critical literacy. The teacher implements the tenets of critical pedagogy within his or her own specific social, cultural, and political contexts, and according to the profile of learners he or she is facilitating.

Related Papers

E. Wayne Ross

Critical pedagogy is understood (and misunderstood) in myriad ways. Most often associated with Paulo Freire’s (1970) problem-posing approach in opposition to the traditional banking method of education, it is also closely connected with neo-Marxist, critical theory–based analyses of education, schooling, and society. Despite popular perception, and the conceptualizations of critical pedagogy by some of its most well-known proponents, there is no single ideological perspective or particular social movement that defines critical pedagogy. The dominant conceptualizations of critical pedagogy are unnecessarily narrow, both politically and philosophically. As a result, a pedagogical approach that is undeniably powerful has been undermined and its impact blunted. Critical pedagogy has become less a process of students investigating the world and constructing personally meaningful understandings that aid them in the struggle to overcome oppression and achieve freedom and more akin to an a priori set of beliefs about the world presented as maps to be followed. In other words, critical pedagogy has met the enemy and he is us, or at least includes us. If critical pedagogy, as process of education, is to achieve its aims, it cannot exempt itself from the same uprooting and examination of its own underlying assumptions, pronouncements, clichés, and received wisdom.

Loukia K . Sarroub , sabrina quadros

Encyclopedia of Teacher Education

Victor Manuel Yugar Vega

Handbuch Bildungs- und Erziehungssoziologie

Henry Giroux

Elham Faraji

Getahun Yacob Abraham

Abstract Critical pedagogy is a transformation-based approach to education. The aim of this article is to introduce the origin, vision, action and consequences of critical pedagogy. It also aims on finding out about educators’ possibility of actualising it in their practice. As a source materials articles, book chapters and books are used. The literature shows that critical pedagogy has its origin in the tradition of critical theory of the Frankfurt School and the work of the Brazilian pedagog Paulo Freire. According to the literature, its major theses is that education should go beyond transfer of knowledge and training the future labour force; to help developing critical consciousness, which leads to transformation of the individual, learning environment and society at large. Critical pedagogy is criticised for a focus on macro level system, for not having a model for classroom implementation and for being abstract. Despite some critics, I argue that critical pedagogy has still the potential to empower those in the field of education to increase their consciousness about the injustice in their society and to involve in transforming it. Keywords: Critical pedagogy, critical thinking, critical theory, dialogue, Frankfurt School, transformation.

Journal of Transformative Praxis

Binod Prasad Pant , Niroj Dahal

Critical pedagogy is a pedagogical philosophy and social movement founded on the notion of critical social theories and paradigms. Critical pedagogy encompasses a wide range of topics, including future and hope. Whilst developing educational programs, implementing pedagogies, and responding to humanitarian crises, critical pedagogy becomes a basis for examining deep-seated values, beliefs and assumptions that might otherwise challenge empowering, equitable and socially just educational and social systems (Luitel & Dahal, 2020). Such a process is, without doubt, an important component of renewing education and culture. Politics is at the heart of critical pedagogy (McLaren & Leonard, 1993). Hence, in this editorial, we attempt to highlight critical pedagogy: future and hope of the Freirean concepts of critical pedagogy (1921-1997). Education as “Banking”, liberatory pedagogy, education is political, critical pedagogy is not Eidos, pedagogy of hope, critical reflection as/for conscien...

Review of Education, Pedagogy and Cultural Studies

Critical pedagogy is understood in myriad ways. Most often associated with Freire’s problem-posing approach, in opposition to the traditional banking method of education, it is also closely connected with neo-Marxist, critical theory-based analyses of education, schooling, and society. Despite popular perception, there is no single ideological perspective or particular social movement that defines critical pedagogy. The dominant conceptualizations of critical pedagogy are unnecessarily narrow, both politically and philosophically. Critical pedagogy has become less a process of students investigating the world and constructing personally meaningful understandings that aid them in the struggle to overcome oppression and achieve freedom and more akin to an a priori set of beliefs about the world presented as maps to be followed. The aim of this paper is to broaden the conception of critical pedagogy and thereby increase its uptake by teachers and its effects on individuals, schools, and society by adopting a less orthodox conception of what it means to practice critical pedagogy.

Facta Universitatis, Series: Teaching, Learning and Teacher Education

Aleksandra Andjelkovic

Educational Theory

patti lather

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Critical Theory Pedagogies Guide

• Welcome to the Guide
• Critical Pedagogy
• Anti-Racist Pedagogy

Feminist Pedagogy

• Inclusive Pedagogy

Feminist pedagogy is grounded in feminist theory, and it stems from critical pedagogy .

Power & Empowerment

Feminist pedagogy is concerned with existing and historical power systems and relations while also incorporating the concept of intersectionality (Vanderbilt). Feminist pedagogy adopts a classroom model in which teachers become students and students become teachers. Power is shared within the classroom (Vanderbilt). Feminist pedagogy seeks to connect social justice with learning, and acknowledges a connection between power and knowledge in the learning environment (Vanderbilt).  

Knowledge is socially produced rather than individually produced. According to Freire, when knowledge is treated as individually produced, this leads to a view of knowledge as "a gift bestowed by those who consider themselves knowledgeable upon those whom they consider to know nothing" (Freire, p.72). Freire terms this the "banking" model of education. In this view, students become repositories of information and are inactive, passive learners. 

• Feminist pedagogues approach knowledge as being socially produced through "interaction, collaboration, and negotiation" (Vanderbilt).
• Instructors on this view consider themselves as part of the learning community rather than being positioned above students. According to Vanderbilt, the ideal is that "students and teachers ideally learn with and from one another, co-constructing knowledge" (Vanderbilt).
• The classroom is "a space historically rooted within systems of power" (Vanderbilt).
• One aspect of feminist pedagogy involves ensuring that students can become aware of power through "empowering students to reflect upon their positions in the classroom, to consider themselves as holders of knowledge, and to consider their implicit authority" (Vanderbilt)

Identity & Intersectionality

Feminist pedagogy affirms that identity is intersectional.  Intersectionality is the concept that "different aspects of identity and systems of oppression" are interconnected and inextricable (Vanderbilt). Intersectionality is accounted for in feminist pedagogy. Because of this, the following are components of feminist pedagogy:

• Instructors develop an understanding of identity that acknowledges difference.
• The acknowledgement of difference allows for "equity-mindedness, a desire for justice and fairness that's attentive to the specific identities, histories, and needs of students within a specific context, rather than assuming that everyone in the classroom is the same" (Vanderbilt). 
• Instructors also address "those identities and voices that are erased, silenced, absent, or otherwise excluded" (Vanderbilt).
• By being aware of the multiple identities of both instructor, students, and texts, this can create "a deeper sense of community and solidarity" as well as allowing students to "achieve a better sense of the world around them and the contingent nature of its truths" (Vanderbilt). 

Knowledge & Personal Experience

Feminist pedagogy affirms that personal experience (including emotion) is a valid form of knowledge. 

• Feminist pedagogy incorporates "the whole of one's identity - student and instructor - in learning" (Vanderbilt).
• Feminist pedagogy moves away from the emphasis on rationalism that Freire acknowledged. Rather, feminist pedagogy acknowledges emotion as valid, particularly in response to the historical positioning of rationalism opposed to the "irrational Other," which included women and "other exotic Others" (Vanderbilt). 
• Feminist pedagogy helps identify the "relationship between experience, emotion, and action" to "help students bridge the classroom and the 'real world,' the personal and the political, theory and practice" (Vanderbilt).
• The incorporation of emotion into the classroom is about "analyzing how they inform perspectives and actions" (Vanderbilt). Therefore, emotion in the classroom is about allowing greater knowledge.

Community is "the understanding that members of a group have of themselves as a collective and how they relate to each other based on that understanding" (Vanderbilt).

• Feminist pedagogy addresses "notions of listening, speaking, risk-taking, respect, reconciliation, and mutuality" to address the historical oppressions brought about to influence community (Vanderbilt).
• The classroom allows "interactions that can embody the values of solidarity and shared power, and facilitate the goals of unveiling and dismantling oppressive structures and organizing for action" (Vanderbilt).
• Emphasis on community, therefore, is a way of rejecting the patriarchal oppressions that have led "women and other historically marginalized groups to fear one another, and to believe they are 'valueless and obtain value only by relating to or bonding with men' (hooks 34)" (Vanderbilt).

Feminist Pedagogy Influences

Because feminist pedagogy stems from critical pedagogy, a key figure in feminist pedagogy is Paulo Freire, whose work Pedagogies of the Oppressed heavily influenced critical pedagogy. Another major figure in feminist pedagogy is bell hooks, whose work Feminist Theory: from Margin to Center was highly influential. 

A major figure in feminist pedagogy is bell hooks, whose work  Feminist Theory: from Margin to Center  was highly influential. 

Putting it into Practice

Empowering Students:

Empower students through activities that allow each student and instructor to share power or control over the course.

Assign students activities that allow for students to take turns leading the class and invite collaboration. An example of this would be to have a student present on a topic, then lead a discussion in which a variety of perspectives are desired. These perspectives may be heard in silence while the student takes notes on their answers and considers their own initial reactions to their peers’ answers. (Chick)

Facilitate a discussion in which students get into small groups to develop 1-2 of their own goals for the course. As groups report back, students see how the goals relate to one another and collectively incorporate them into the syllabus. (Chick)

Consciousness raising - group activities which emphasize dialogue and allow for students to share their experiences around a topic and locate shared experiences.

Connect students' classroom experiences with the "real world," allowing them to find practical applications of instruction they can apply elsewhere.

Community-Building:

• Discussion-based learning
• Collaborative assignments
• Consciousness-raising activities
• Activities and resources that connect the classroom to activism in the community

Instruction Design:

• Backward design model  - Design an assignment or lesson starting with the lesson goal (i.e. what the students will be learning), rather than the activities or assessment methods (i.e. how they will learn it). Once the learning goals have been established, then move on to designing the activities and ways of assessing student understanding and learning.

Classroom Environment:

• This may include setting expectations for discussions and preparing to handle conflicts and disagreements.
• Create a classroom where students and instructors and utilize silence and self-reflection as ways of active learning.
• Classroom environments also emphasize community and allow for personal experience and emotion to be expressed, with each student's experiences viewed as valid forms of knowing and learning about the world. 

Key Theorists

bell hooks - A scholar, feminist, and activist whose work focuses on intersectionality, feminism, and critical pedagogy.

Paulo Freire - Paulo Freire (1921-1997) was a philosopher of education whose work became the foundation of critical pedagogy. Read more about Freire .

• Peter McLaren  - A leading scholar in critical pedagogy whose work relates to Marxist theory, critical literacy, and cultural studies. Read more about McLaren at his Chapman University faculty profile.
• Patricia Lather   - A scholar and educator whose work focuses on feminist methodology and gender and education. Read more about Lather at her faculty page at Ohio State University. 
• Kimberlé Crenshaw - Philosopher, scholar, and lawyer, Crenshaw's work focuses on critical race theory, intersectionality, and feminism. Read more about Crenshaw.
• Ileana Jiminez  - A feminist and social justice scholar and educator. Learn more about Jiminez. 
• Audre Lorde - Audre Lorde (1934 - 1992) was a civil rights activist, writer, and feminist. 

Key Readings

• Crenshaw, K. (1991). Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color. Stanford Law Review, 43(6), 1241–1299. "Focusing on two dimensions of male violence against women - battering and rape - I consider how the experiences of women of color are frequently the product of intersecting patterns of racism and sexism, and how these experiences tend not to be represented within the discourses of either feminism or antiracism" (Crenshaw 1244).
• Ellsworth, E. (1989). Why Doesn't this Feel Empowering? Working through the Repressive Myths of Critical Pedagogy. Harvard Educational Review 59(3), 297–324. Critical pedagogy has developed along a highly abstract and utopian line which does not necessarily sustain the daily workings of education. Such concepts as empowerment, student voice, dialogue, and critical reflection are critiqued.
• Jaggar, A. M. (1989). Love and knowledge: Emotion in feminist epistemology. Inquiry (Oslo), 32(2), 151–176. This paper argues that, by construing emotion as epistemologically subversive, the Western tradition has tended to obscure the vital role of emotion in the construction of knowledge.
• Lal, S. (2000). Dangerous Silences: Lessons in Daring. Radical Teacher (Cambridge), 58(58), 12–15. Examines the power dynamics of university instruction from the perspective of a graduate teaching assistant, questioning her own response when white students resisted a text that included works by women of color which were critical of white, middle class feminism. Describes how to promote ongoing discussion, noting the importance of analyzing one's own identity in order to move forward.
• Lee, M., & Johnson-Bailey, J. (2004). Challenges to the classroom authority of women of color. New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, 2004(102), 55–64. Two women of color professors use the themes of authority, mastery, voice, and positionality to examine the theoretical and practical underpinnings of feminist pedagogy.
• Shulman, L. (2005). Signature Pedagogies in the Professions. Daedalus (Cambridge, Mass.), 134(3), 52–59. Shulman talks about signature pedagogies, the types of teaching that organize the fundamental ways in which future practitioners are educated for their new professions. In these signature pedagogies, the novices are instructed in critical aspects of the three fundamental dimensions of professional work--to think, to perform, and to act with integrity. But these three dimensions do not receive equal attention across the professions

Additional Readings & Resources

• A Guide to Feminist Pedagogy (Vanderbilt) An in-depth guide to feminist pedagogy from Vanderbilt University providing the theoretical framework and core principles of feminist pedagogy.
• Diversity & Inclusion Syllabus Statements (Brown University) A guide to creating a diversity & inclusion statement for your syllabus with sample statements from Brown University instructors. Also included are samples of curriculum, wellness, and land acknowledgement statements.

Referenced Guides & Sources

• A Guide to Feminist Pedagogy (Vanderbilt)
• Freire, P., Ramos, M. B., & Macedo, D. (2014). Pedagogy of the oppressed (Thirtieth anniversary edition.). Bloomsbury.
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Pedagogy - Diversifying Your Teaching Methods, Learning Activities, and Assignments

Definition of Pedagogy 

In the most general sense, pedagogy is all the ways that instructors and students work with the course content. The fundamental learning goal for students is to be able to do “something meaningful” with the course content. Meaningful learning typically results in students working in the middle to upper levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy . We sometimes find that novice instructors conflate course content with pedagogy. This often results in “teaching as talking” where the presentation of content by the instructor is confused with the learning of content by the students. Think of your course content as clay and pedagogy as the ways you ask students to make “something meaningful” from that clay. Pedagogy is the combination of teaching methods (what instructors do), learning activities (what instructors ask their students to do), and learning assessments (the assignments, projects, or tasks that measure student learning).

Key Idea for Pedagogy

Diversify your pedagogy by varying your teaching methods, learning activities, and assignments. Critically assess your pedagogy through the lens of BIPOC students’ experiences at a PWI . We visualize these two related practices as a cycle because they are iterative and ongoing. Diversifying your pedagogy likely means shedding some typical ways of teaching in your discipline, or the teaching practices you inherited. It likely means doing more active learning and less traditional lecturing. Transforming good pedagogy into equitable pedagogy means rethinking your pedagogy in light of the PWI context and considering the ways your pedagogy may help or hinder learning for BIPOC students. 

PWI Assumptions for Pedagogy

Understanding where students are on the spectrum of novice to expert learning in your discipline or course is a key challenge to implementing effective and inclusive pedagogy (National Research Council 2000). Instructors are typically so far removed from being a novice learner in their disciplines that they struggle to understand where students are on that spectrum. A key PWI assumption is that students understand how your disciplinary knowledge is organized and constructed . Students typically do not understand your discipline or the many other disciplines they are working in during their undergraduate years. Even graduate students may find it puzzling to explain the origins, methodologies, theories, logics, and assumptions of their disciplines. A second PWI assumption is that students are (or should be) academically prepared to learn your discipline . Students may be academically prepared for learning in some disciplines, but unless their high school experience was college preparatory and well supported, students (especially first-generation college students) are likely finding their way through a mysterious journey of different disciplinary conventions and modes of working and thinking (Nelson 1996).

A third PWI assumption is that instructors may confuse students’ academic underpreparation with their intelligence or capacity to learn . Academic preparation is typically a function of one’s high school experience including whether that high school was well resourced or under funded. Whether or not a student receives a quality high school education is usually a structural matter reflecting inequities in our K12 educational systems, not a reflection of an individual student’s ability to learn. A final PWI assumption is that students will learn well in the ways that the instructor learned well . Actually most instructors in higher education self-selected into disciplines that align with their interests, skills, academic preparation, and possibly family and community support. Our students have broader and different goals for seeking a college education and bring a range of skills to their coursework, which may or may not align with instructors’ expectations of how students learn. Inclusive teaching at a PWI means supporting the learning and career goals of our students.

Pedagogical Content Knowledge as a Core Concept

Kind and Chan (2019) propose that Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) is the synthesis of Content Knowledge (expertise about a subject area) and Pedagogical Knowledge (expertise about teaching methods, assessment, classroom management, and how students learn). Content Knowledge (CK) without Pedagogical Knowledge (PK) limits instructors’ ability to teach effectively or inclusively. Novice instructors that rely on traditional lectures likely have limited Pedagogical Knowledge and may also be replicating their own inherited teaching practices. While Kind and Chan (2019) are writing from the perspective of science education, their concepts apply across disciplines. Moreover, Kind and Chan (2019) support van Driel et al.’s assertion that:

high-quality PCK is not characterized by knowing as many strategies as possible to teach a certain topic plus all the misconceptions students may have about it but by knowing when to apply a certain strategy in recognition of students’ actual learning needs and understanding why a certain teaching approach may be useful in one situation (quoted in Kind and Chan 2019, 975). 

As we’ve stressed throughout this guide, the teaching context matters, and for inclusive pedagogy, special attention should be paid to the learning goals, instructor preparation, and students’ point of entry into course content. We also argue that the PWI context shapes what instructors might practice as CK, PK, and PCK. We recommend instructors become familiar with evidence-based pedagogy (or the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning , SoTL) in their fields. Moreover, we advise instructors to find and follow those instructors and scholars that specifically focus on inclusive teaching in their fields in order to develop an inclusive, flexible, and discipline-specific Pedagogical Content Knowledge.

Suggested Practices for Diversifying + Assessing Pedagogy

Although diversifying and critically assessing teaching methods, learning activities, and assignments will vary across disciplines, we offer a few key starting points. Diversifying your pedagogy is easier than critically assessing it through a PWI lens, but both steps are essential. In general, you can diversify your pedagogy by learning about active learning, peer learning, team-based learning, experiential learning, problem-based learning, and case-based learning, among others . There is extensive evidence-based pedagogical literature and practical guides readily available for these methods. And you can also find and follow scholars in your discipline that use these and other teaching methods.

Diversifying Your Pedagogy

Convert traditional lectures into interactive (or active) lectures.

For in-person or synchronous online courses, break a traditional lecture into “mini-lectures” of 10-15 minutes in length. After each mini-lecture, ask your students to process their learning using a discussion or problem prompt, a Classroom Assessment Technique (CAT), a Think-Pair-Share, or another brief learning activity. Read Lecturing from Center for Teaching , Vanderbilt University.

Structure small group discussions

Provide both a process and concrete questions or tasks to guide student learning (for example, provide a scenario with 3 focused tasks such as identify the problem, brainstorm possible solutions, and list the pros/cons for each solution). Read How to Hold a Better Class Discussion , The Chronicle of Higher Education .

Integrate active learning

Integrate active learning, especially into courses that are conceptual, theoretical, or otherwise historically challenging (for example, calculus, organic chemistry, statistics, philosophy). For gateway courses, draw upon the research of STEM and other education specialists on how active learning and peer learning improves student learning and reduces disparities. Read the Association of American Universities STEM Network Scholarship .  

Include authentic learning

Include authentic learning, learning activities and assignments that mirror how students will work after graduation. What does it mean to think and work like an engineer? How do project teams work together? How does one present research in an educational social media campaign? Since most students seeking a college education will not become academic researchers or faculty, what kinds of things will they do in the “real world?” Help students practice and hone those skills as they learn the course content. Read Edutopia’s PBL: What Does It Take for a Project to Be Authentic?

Vary assignments and provide options

Graded assignments should range from low to high stakes. Low stakes assignments allow students to learn from their mistakes and receive timely feedback on their learning. Options for assignments allow students to demonstrate their learning, rather than demonstrate their skill at a particular type of assessment (such as a multiple choice exam or an academic research paper). Read our guide, Create Assessments That Promote Learning for All Students .

Critically Assess Your Pedagogy

Critically assessing your pedagogy through the PWI lens with attention to how your pedagogy may affect the learning of BIPOC students is more challenging and highly contextual. Instructors will want to review and apply the concepts and principles discussed in the earlier sections of this guide on Predominantly White Institutions (PWIs), PWI Assumptions, and Class Climate. 

Reflect on patterns

Reflect on patterns of participation, progress in learning (grade distributions), and other course-related evidence. Look at your class sessions and assignments as experimental data. Who participated? What kinds of participation did you observe? Who didn’t participate? Why might that be? Are there a variety of ways for students to participate in the learning activities (individually, in groups, via discussion, via writing, synchronously/in-person, asynchronously/online)?

Respond to feedback on climate

Respond to feedback on climate from on-going check-ins and Critical Incident Questionnaires (CIQs) as discussed in the Climate Section (Ongoing Practices). Students will likely disengage from your requests for feedback if you do not respond to their feedback. Use this feedback to re-calibrate and re-think your pedagogy. 

Seek feedback on student learning

Seek feedback on student learning in the form of Classroom Assessment Techniques (CATs), in-class polls, asynchronous forums, exam wrappers, and other methods.  Demonstrate that you care about your students’ learning by responding to this feedback as well. Here’s how students in previous semesters learned this material … I’m scheduling a problem-solving review session in the next class in response to the results of the exam …

Be diplomatic but clear when correcting mistakes and misconceptions

First-generation college students, many of whom may also identify as BIPOC, have typically achieved a great deal with few resources and significant barriers (Yosso 2005). However, they may be more likely to internalize their learning mistakes as signs that they don’t belong at the university. When correcting, be sure to normalize mistakes as part of the learning process. The correct answer is X, but I can see why you thought it was Y. Many students think it is Y because … But the correct answer is X because … Thank you for helping us understand that misconception.

Allow time for students to think and prepare for participation in a non-stressful setting

This was already suggested in the Climate Section (Race Stressors), but it is worth repeating. BIPOC students and multilingual students may need more time to prepare, not because of their intellectual abilities, but because of the effects of race stressors and other stressors increasing their cognitive load. Providing discussion or problem prompts in advance will reduce this stress and make space for learning. Additionally both student populations may experience stereotype threat, so participation in the “public” aspects of the class session may be stressful in ways that are not true for the majority white and domestic students. If you cannot provide prompts in advance, be sure to allow ample individual “think time” during a synchronous class session.

Avoid consensus models or majority rules processes

This was stated in the Climate Section (Teaching Practices to Avoid), but it’s such an entrenched PWI practice that it needs to be spotlighted and challenged. If I am a numerical “minority” and I am asked to come to consensus or agreement with a numerical “majority,” it is highly likely that my perspective will be minimized or dismissed. Or, I will have to expend a lot of energy to persuade my group of the value of my perspective, which is highly stressful. This is an unacceptable burden to put on BIPOC students and also may result in BIPOC students being placed in the position of teaching white students about a particular perspective or experience. The resulting tensions may also damage BIPOC students’ positive relationships with white students and instructors. When suitable for your content, create a learning experience that promotes seeking multiple solutions to problems, cases, or prompts. Rather than asking students to converge on one best recommendation, why not ask students to log all possible solutions (without evaluation) and then to recommend at least two solutions that include a rationale? Moreover, for course content dealing with policies, the recommended solutions could be explained in terms of their possible effects on different communities. If we value diverse perspectives, we need to structure the consideration of those perspectives into our learning activities and assignments. 

We recognize the challenges of assessing your pedagogy through the PWI lens and doing your best to assess the effects on BIPOC student learning. This is a complex undertaking. But we encourage you to invite feedback from your students as well as to seek the guidance of colleagues, including advisors and other student affairs professionals, to inform your ongoing practices of teaching inclusively at a PWI. In the next section, we complete our exploration of the Inclusive Teaching at a PWI Framework by exploring the importance of auditing, diversifying, and critically assessing course content.

Pedagogy References

Kind, Vanessa and Kennedy K.H. Chan. 2019. “Resolving the Amalgam: Connecting Pedagogical Content Knowledge, Content Knowledge and Pedagogical Knowledge.” International Journal of Science Education . 41(7): 964-978.

Howard, Jay. N.D. “How to Hold a Better Class Discussion: Advice Guide.” The Chronicle of Higher Education . https://www.chronicle.com/article/how-to-hold-a-better-class-discussion/#2 

National Research Council. 2000. “How Experts Differ from Novices.” Chap 2 in How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School: Expanded Edition . Washington D.C.: The National Academies Press. https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/9853/how-people-learn-brain-mind-experience-and-school-expanded-edition

Nelson, Craig E. 1996. “Student Diversity Requires Different Approaches to College Teaching, Even in Math and Science.” The American Behavioral Scientist . 40 (2): 165-175.

Sathy, Viji and Kelly A. Hogan. N.D.  “How to Make Your Teaching More Inclusive: Advice Guide.” The Chronicle of Higher Education . https://www.chronicle.com/article/how-to-make-your-teaching-more-inclusive/?cid=gen_sign_in

Yosso, Tara J. 2005. “Whose Culture Has Capital? A Critical Race Theory Discussion of Community Cultural Wealth.” Race, Ethnicity and Education . 8 (1): 69-91.

• Research and Resources
• Why Use Active Learning?
• Successful Active Learning Implementation
• Addressing Active Learning Challenges
• Why Use Team Projects?
• Project Description Examples
• Project Description for Students
• Team Projects and Student Development Outcomes
• Forming Teams
• Team Output
• Individual Contributions to the Team
• Individual Student Understanding
• Supporting Students
• Wrapping up the Project
• Addressing Challenges
• Course Planning
• Working memory
• Retrieval of information
• Spaced practice
• Active learning
• Metacognition
• Definitions and PWI Focus
• A Flexible Framework
• Class Climate
• Course Content
• An Ongoing Endeavor
• Align Assessments
• Multiple Low Stakes Assessments
• Authentic Assessments
• Formative and Summative Assessments
• Varied Forms of Assessments
• Cumulative Assessments
• Equitable Assessments
• Essay Exams
• Multiple Choice Exams and Quizzes
• Academic Paper
• Skill Observation
• Alternative Assessments
• Assessment Plan
• Grade Assessments
• Prepare Students
• Reduce Student Anxiety
• SRT Scores: Interpreting & Responding
• Student Feedback Question Prompts
• Research Questions and Design
• Gathering data
• Publication
• GRAD 8101: Teaching in Higher Education
• Finding a Practicum Mentor
• GRAD 8200: Teaching for Learning
• Proficiency Rating & TA Eligibility
• Schedule a SETTA
• TAPD Webinars

Creative and critical engagement with AI in education

A collection of assignments and materials for educators curious about how AI affects their students and their syllabi

Focused on the essentials and written to be accessible to a newcomer, this interactive guide will give you the background you need to feel more confident with engaging in conversations about AI in your classroom.

Part 1: AI Starter

For educators who are new to using AI tools, Part 1 introduces AI concepts, suggests classroom AI policies, and more.

Part 2: LLM Tutorial

A guided demonstration of ChatGPT, recommended even for those who have used it before. You’ll learn essential dos and don’ts, debunk common myths, and be prepared to use large language models responsibly.

Part 3: Resources

There’s always more to learn! In Part 3 we include additional trusted resources to continue expanding your knowledge about AI.

Assignments

These assignments are designed to spark informed conversation about the risks, benefits, and potential impacts of AI tools. They are sourced from educators around the world, often revised or expanded for the purposes of this collection (the original source links are included).

This is an evolving collection. Sign up for our newsletter to get a heads-up when we add more, or submit your own assignments here .

Thank you to the educators who are credited in this collection. Please cite the source when using or adapting one of these assignments.

A Tale of Two Critiques

Compare and reflect on a primary source, a ChatGPT-generated critique of that source, and a human-generated critique. The goal is for students to build skill and confidence with critical reading.

Illustrate a Hoax

Explore the potential for AI image-generation tools (e.g., DALL-E, Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, etc.) to corroborate false narratives, or provide “evidence” that would be characterized as misinformation.

Close Reading the Terms of Service

Students will become more familiar with the data and privacy impacts of creating an account with OpenAI, and gain experience with legal and technical texts along the way.

Critical Analysis Across AI Tools & Stereotypes

An update of the "pre-digital" exercise in which students compare multiple accounts of a particular theory from different authors. With AI tools, students engage in similar critical analysis and debate, while developing an understanding of what this software can (and cannot) do.

Submit an Assignment

We are seeking contributions from educators who are responsibly incorporating AI tools into their pedagogy. We invite you to share an assignment with us to help foster a global community of critical AI literacy.

We want to hear from you!

If you are interested in learning more, offering feedback, or just saying hi, please reach out to [email protected] .

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