Liberal Arts Classroom Research Articles

A Case Study of Using Problem-Based Learning in a University Liberal Arts Classroom : Focusing on a music appreciation-based class

The purpose of this study is to analyze the effectiveness of students' self-directed learning, creative problem solving, and critical thinking skills through the use of PBL in a university liberal arts music appreciation-based class to improve learning efficiency. The subjects of the study are 66 male and female undergraduate students participating in the course ‘Theory and Appreciation of Music’ at a four-year B university in Region A in Korea. The class was run as a PBL for 10 weeks with theoretical knowledge of each period and genre along with related music listening activities. The research method used the SPSS program to conduct pre-post t-tests, the analysis of individual and team evaluations, and qualitative data analysis using reflection journals. First, the results showed significant effects on self-directed learning, creative problem solving, and critical thinking skills through PBL-applied music appreciation-based liberal arts classes. Second, the analysis of the reflection journals revealed the expression of creative thinking and the positive meaning of empathetic communication, the benefits of developing self-directed learning and problem-solving skills, the effectiveness of team-based cooperative learning, and the expectations of future learning design and community activities. Therefore, this study demonstrates that PBL is an appropriate teaching and learning method for university students' liberal arts music classes. Thus, it is necessary for instructors to design and operate differentiated classes centered on learners to promote learning motivation and participation and to improve the students' overall level of satisfaction. In addition, the assignment of PBL topics and tasks that apply to real life is emphasized to encourage non-music majors to reflect deeply from the perspective of new thinking. Finally, as a result of this study, we suggest that instructors improve upon their learning assessment methods and that they conduct continuous research on innovative teaching methods using PBL.

기독교교양 강의실에서 기후변화 가르치기 ― 기후변화 담론과 신학적 대응의 지형

이 논문은 기독교교양학의 전망에서 기후변화 담론을 정리하고, 기독교교양학 강의실에서 활용하기 위한 연구다. 이 논문은 크게 두 가지 부분으로 구성된다. 하나는 현재 기후변화와 관련한 논의의 지형도를 그린다. 그것들은 기후변화 정의, 기후변화 부정론과 회의론의 전개와 주요 주장, 통념적 오해와 그에 대한 교정, 기후변화 종말론, 기후변화에 대응하는 주류 담론, 탈성장주의, 탈인간중심주의, 탈탐욕의 일상 등이다. 이후 기후변화에 대응하는 기독교 자원으로 생태학적 창조론, 비/인간 구원론, 희망을 향한 종말론을 제시한다. 기후변화는 긴박하고 중요한 교양교육의 주제이며, 기독교 전통을 활용하여 기후위기에 대응하고자 하는 기독교교양교육의 목표가 뚜렷하고 풍성하게 달성될 수 있음을 논증한다.

대학 교양 글쓰기와 문해력

This paper examins the reality of whether the literacy of the current liberal arts classroom is in a state where narrative and classical literature can be read or rewritten using it. To this end, various communication beyond traditional meanings such as text, oral, video, and digital, and the system in which these communication are combined are viewed as media in a broad sense, and these rules of media writing are defined as literacy. As a result of examining students’ literacy and media literacy in detail through the examples of liberal arts classes at each university, substitution (metaphor), which is the main axis of language, is suppressed in each university, and the principle of contiguity(metonymy) preceding substitution in Chinese literature classes is suppressed. In the SNS space mainly used by them, excessive metaphors and broken metonymy were seen, simplifying complex situations into abstract problems or reducing them to peripheral problems by fragmenting only a part of the whole. As such, the classroom is a place where various media coexist, imitate each other, negotiate, and collide. Existing analog literacy alone cannot describe the media literacy of classroom, and instructors cannot stay with analog literacy only. The instructor’s literacy should not be limited to transfer, interpretation, enlightenment, or prescription. We should think of learners as tribes and foreign language speakers, exchange new literacy with them, and translate, create, and produce. Clear information delivery and the pursuit of computable language, on the contrary, the phenomenon of failure to reach language and fragmentation of language is a new linguistic disease in an automated society. The practicality of liberal arts, education, and humanities lies in the ‘surplus’ of non-practical language, not practical language, and language, not clear and transparent. It is necessary to invent meta-language that connects instructors, students, and mouths, and restore the poetic function of language.

Growing interreligious and intercultural competence in the classroom

AbstractBuilding on various models for intercultural and interreligious competence (IC/IR competence), this essay argues that classroom learning about religious and cultural diversity will engage students' “sociological imaginations” and lead to increased IC/IR competence. The current strategy for increasing intercultural competence (attitude, skills and knowledge, to be developed in that order) does not reflect best practices for educating about social difference. Instead, knowledge acquisition about other cultures and religions is the “front line” task for increasing alterity competence, and the liberal arts classroom can represent a “safe space” for learning about cultural and religious differences in a depersonalized, sociological manner. Supporting this argument are self‐assessments of IC/IR competence collected from primarily European and white American students enrolled in “Religions of the World” or “Intercultural Communications,” allowing an analysis of IC/IR competence in light of the two distinct disciplines and contributing valuable data toward a broader theory of IC/IR pedagogy.

Using Student-Led Discussion and Reflection of a Public Health-Related Nonfiction Book as a Tool to Encourage Inclusive Pedagogy in an Undergraduate Classroom.

Educators realize the need to provide an inclusive, safe environment in a diverse classroom setting to encourage discussion of sensitive topics. However, descriptions of evidence-based approaches that may help us to meet inclusive pedagogy–related competencies are limited. Here, we describe a discussion format that followed chapter readings from a nonfiction biographical book called Mountains beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World (2003), by Tracy Kidder. This semester-long effort allowed sufficient time for students to develop an understanding of global public health affairs and to reflect on their own role in this world as responsible citizens. A discussion around several sensitive issues emerged, such as the extent of their belief in faith versus science, their opinion on providing financial aid to developing countries versus addressing public health issues in their home country, stereotypes and how that may spread panic during a public-health emergency. The student essays provided evidence that activities were successful in 1) drawing out students’ voices about world affairs, 2) teaching students to empathize with varied belief systems, 3) helping students develop a deeper appreciation of empirical and ethical factors that may affect such issues—all of which are key competencies for an inclusive classroom setting. We believe that the activities are flexible in structure and could be easily incorporated into a biology or liberal arts classroom setting to achieve inclusive pedagogy–related goals.

Trax on the Trail in the Interdisciplinary Liberal Arts Classroom

Research Article| December 01 2017 Trax on the Trail in the Interdisciplinary Liberal Arts Classroom Laura Moore Pruett; Laura Moore Pruett Laura Moore Pruett (associate professor of music and chair of the Department of Visual and Performing Arts at Merrimack College in North Andover, Massachusetts) teaches courses in music history, theory, and appreciation, as well as interdisciplinary offerings. Her research focuses on nineteenth-century American music and culture. Publications include articles on the works and career of Louis Moreau Gottschalk in 19th-Century Music and the Journal of the Society for American Music. Her current project is an edition of Gottschalk’s two symphonies for the series Music of the United States of America, after which a new project will focus on the life and writings of Bostonian music critic John Sullivan Dwight. Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Anne Boxberger Flaherty Anne Boxberger Flaherty Anne Boxberger Flaherty (associate professor of political science at Merrimack College in North Andover, Massachusetts) teaches graduate and undergraduate courses on American politics. Her primary area of research is on indigenous peoples and politics. Anne’s work has been published in a variety of edited volumes such as The Organic Globalizer: Hip Hop, Political Development, and Movement Culture and journals such as the American Indian Culture and Research Journal. She is currently working on a book manuscript about Native sovereignty and state enforcement of excise taxes on reservation sales. Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google American Music (2017) 35 (4): 531–536. https://doi.org/10.5406/americanmusic.35.4.0531 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Permissions Search Site Citation Laura Moore Pruett, Anne Boxberger Flaherty; Trax on the Trail in the Interdisciplinary Liberal Arts Classroom. American Music 1 January 2017; 35 (4): 531–536. doi: https://doi.org/10.5406/americanmusic.35.4.0531 Download citation file: Zotero Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All Scholarly Publishing CollectiveUniversity of Illinois PressAmerican Music Search Advanced Search The text of this article is only available as a PDF. Copyright 2018 by the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois2018 Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.

Orthodoxy revisited: the postsecular classroom

As is the case with many new intellectual concepts, the definitional parameters of the term ‘postsecular’ are in flux and ultimately will shape its critical usefulness. This article represents an effort to participate in this discussion with a particular emphasis on the pedagogical importance of the tenets of religious orthodoxy when discussing spiritual matters in the university-level liberal arts classroom. The analysis is contextualized by reflection on the place of religion in the public sphere by various scholars, including Jürgen Habermas and Rowan Williams. This analysis establishes that the study of traditional religious positions in the university classroom can enrich the discourse of the liberal arts; however, neither proselytization nor an emotion-based spiritual paradigm bereft of intellectual rigor will serve these ends. I argue that the re-introduction of religion into analytical discourse in the humanities classroom will be successful if the discussion of religion is complemented by the recognition of the serious study of religious thought and scholarship. The argument is then developed through a pedagogical case study of Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited that illustrates how the discussion of orthodox positions can enhance discussion of the novel in the postsecular classroom.

Teaching Tainted Lit: Popular American Fiction in Today's ClassroomJanet G.Casey, Editor. University of Iowa Press, 2015.

Teaching Tainted Lit: Popular American Fiction in Today’s Classroom Janet G. Casey, Editor. University of Iowa Press, 2015.The essays in Teaching Tainted Lit: Popular American Fiction in Today's Classroom suggest a shift in terms of the fundamental question in literary studies concerning literature: rather than ask if popular texts deserve a place in our classrooms, the more prevalent question is how these texts can incorporated in fruitful, appropriate ways. Janet Casey, in her introduction, states, Our collective sense of the literary has become much more capacious, and many would say more compelling, as a result of this enlarged version of what literature might be (3). Rather than permission, then, contemporary teachers of literature are instead looking for methodological examples; Teaching Tainted Lit contains ten. While the collection mentions a wide array of literary and cultural theorists, it is clearly focused on practical rather than on theoretical concerns.Even with this paradigmatic shift away from possibility and toward method, the essays contain ample contextual material about the history of pedagogical difficulties related popular, or tainted, literature. Many of the authors refer issues of canon-formation and and collectively assert that this history of debate is in fact one of the more rewarding attributes of popular literature. Incorporating tainted texts into the classroom provides opportunities for students engage with questions of canonicity and aesthetics. As Randi Lynn Tanglen offers, I hope organize my classes so that students can part of the debates about their education and make these judgments for themselves (33). For Tanglen, the incorporation of popular texts in her early American literature survey course allows students to become aware of the arbitrary nature of aesthetic values and assumptions (47). Melissa Gniadek says something similar about her inclusion of a nineteenthcentury serialized novel, of Prairie Eden (1848): 'Bel instructs students at least consider the possible politics of a particular aesthetics (29). Other authors in the collection echo the sentiments of Tanglen and Gniadek, stressing the idea that rather than revolting against the existence of a canon, the inclusion of popular texts instead affords fresh opportunity for students critically engage with questions about and implications of a canon.Discussions surrounding canon-formation are important-but expected-results of the inclusionary view toward popular literature espoused in this collection. More intriguing in Teaching Tainted Lit are the rather surprising approaches and outcomes many of the essays propose. For example, in Sneaking It In at the End: Teaching Popular Romance in the Liberal Arts Classroom, Antonia Losano suggests a unique home for romance literature: the undergraduate literary theory course. …

Empowering Students through Language & Critical Thinking: The Bard College Language & Thinking Program

In many parts of the world, and particularly in Eastern Europe and Asia, educators and institutions are turning to liberal arts education because they are recognizing the limitations of old didactic teaching methods—edagogies based primarily in lecture, rote memory, and disciplinary rigidity. At the heart of the liberal arts classroom is a student-centered pedagogy, but aside from hearing about the values of a “student-centered” edagogy by visiting scholars, few educators seeking change at the classroom level get to experience what a “student-centered” classroom actually is—teaching practices and methodologies that foster active inquiry, autonomous expression and agency among students who have traditionally been passive recipients of information. This paper presents one liberal arts college’s strategy for promoting a liberal arts pedagogy: the Bard College Language & Thinking Program developed to introduce educators and students alike to a classroom in which learning is interactive and where students are encouraged to raise questions, challenge assumptions, and to actively engage in intellectual inquiry and collaborative work through writing-to-learn practices. In the Language & Thinking Program, the teacher does not have monopoly on knowledge, but instead guides students through a variety of reading and writing strategies used to actively empower students through language and critical thinking.

Oulipo: Applying Mathematical Constraints to Literature and the Arts in a Mathematics for the Liberal Arts Classroom

Oulipo (Ouvroir de Littérature potentielle, or Workshop on potential literature), an over 50-year old movement that began in France, seeks to apply mathematical constraints to literature and the arts. In this article, I will give a brief survey of this movement and how I have built a learning module based on it for my mathematics for the liberal arts course. I will provide descriptions of student-created, mathematically constrained poetry, music compositions, and videos. These projects allow my students to apply mathematics (for example, modular arithmetic, combinatorics, and graph theory) to their interests in literature and the arts.

Active Learning in a Math for Liberal Arts Classroom

Inquiry-based learning is a topic of growing interest in the mathematical community. Much of the focus has been on using these methods in calculus and higher-level classes. This article describes the design and implementation of a set of inquiry-based learning activities in a Math for Liberal Arts course at a small, private, Catholic college. Activity design, student responses, class management, and student and instructor attitudes are discussed.

Musica speculativa for the twenty-first century: integrating mathematics and music in the liberal arts classroom

With its deep historical roots and its central position in the foundation of ancient knowledge, music, as a discipline, can claim an esteemed position in the modern liberal arts curriculum. Introductory music theory at the undergraduate level, however, still tends to focus on skill acquisition and fluency. This paper proposes a different model for such a course, one that integrates mathematics and music to provide a baseline knowledge of the language of music theory while exploring structural aspects of a system grounded in acoustics, algebra, and geometry. The Swarthmore College course “Mathematics and Music” aims to build on the musica speculativa tradition by adapting topics in the recent research literature in order to provide a classroom experience of collaborative exploration and discovery.

Conflations and Confrontations: Spirituality, Religion, and Values in the Liberal Arts Classroom

(2009). Conflations and Confrontations: Spirituality, Religion, and Values in the Liberal Arts Classroom. Religion & Education: Vol. 36, Spirituality in Higher Education: Problems, Practices, and Programs, pp. 40-53.

Teaching to Learn/Learning to Teach: Meditations on the Classroom

This book is a collection of stories about teaching and learning in the liberal arts classroom, written by a Quaker who is a part-time professor of American literature and gender studies at a small, historically Quaker, liberal arts college for women outside of Philadelphia. The author reflects on the point and purpose of education in such a space, with a particular concern for the religious and interactive dimensions of the process. This book includes multiple accounts by students and colleagues, reflecting on their own experiences of teaching and learning and acknowledges the powers and limits of storytelling as a means of making sense of what happens in the college classroom. « Anne French Dalke's courageous investigation of her own teaching practice provides those of us who can't help questioning ourselves as teachers with the solace of companionship, the wisdom of experience, and an unexpected sense of our own dignity as pilgrims on the path. (Jane Tompkins, Author of 'A Life in School: What the Teacher Learned') « I'm moved and excited by this remarkable book. It will surely help all readers to be much braver and wiser in the pursuit of teaching that is both intellectually sophisticated and resolutely honest. I recommend it with great enthusiasm. (Peter Elbow, Author of 'Writing with Power'; 'Embracing Contraries in Learning and Teaching'; and 'Everyone Can Write') « The meditation is an ancient and supple form which Anne French Dalke retrieves to reflect upon her teaching life. I don't know anyone who has gone as far as she has in soliciting, receiving, and pondering her students' own words, incorporated here as a substantial part of the text. The tendency ofwomen students to stand back particularly confounds us. Dalke ponders their withdrawal with recourse to current scholarship, to her own formidable experience as a Quaker teacher at a prestigious women's college, and to student texts that both challenge and honor the work we are trying to do together. One of the most important and original preoccupations of this book is Dalke's concern with a kind of hermeneutics of silence, a radical, generous, and scary move. 'Quaking we enter the classroom, ' Dalke begins. Quaking, I leave this book, for it calls into question the foundations of my teaching life. (Mary Rose O'Reilley, Author of 'The Peaceable Classroom'; 'Radical Presence: Teaching as Contemplative Practice'; and 'The Barn at the End of the World')

Teaching to Learn, Learning to Teach: Meditations on the Classroom

This book is a collection of stories about teaching and learning in the liberal arts classroom, written by a Quaker who is a part-time professor of American literature and gender studies at a small liberal arts college outside of Philadelphia. The author reflects on the point and purpose of education with a particular concern for the religious and interactive dimensions of the process. The book includes multiple accounts by students and colleagues, reflecting on their own experiences of teaching and learning, and acknowledges the powers and limits of storytelling as a means of making sense of what happens in the college classroom.

Wandering Thespians: Performance Across the Liberal Arts Curriculum

Wandering Thespians: Performance Across the Liberal Arts Curriculum Debra L. Freeberg (bio) Wandering Thespians was not born out of frustration or sublime artistic insight. It was simply a good solution to a practical problem. I needed to provide the students in Calvin Theatre Company (CTC)—the theatre production class at Calvin College—with more opportunities to perform over the course of the semester, and I wanted to encourage greater support for the theatre program across campus, making it more visible to the campus community. 1 For decades Calvin’s theatre program had enjoyed great success, usually selling out or nearly selling out most seasons’ shows. Our audience consisted primarily of segments of the campus community and local alumni who loyally followed the department’s acting company from Sophocles to Synge, Molière to Wilde, and Miller to Friel. However, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, we noticed, along with many in the American artistic community, that our loyal following was becoming grayer. We also perceived that many of our new, younger faculty and staff from across campus did not attend our performances, even with a generous complimentary ticket policy for faculty and staff members. Moreover, the college administration, while very supportive, began requesting that the program meet each year a specific box-office income figure. Theatre at Calvin, along with other arts programs across the country, was increasingly pressured to consider the bottom-line. If an aging constituency and funding pressures were not enough, student attendance increasingly wavered from show to show. Our concerns probably matched those of many other colleges. How could we get these newer faculty and staff excited about our program and lure a few more of them into the theatre each term? How could we transform these same faculty into active advocates of our program and supporters of our artistic season? How could we guarantee that the college administration would fund the program? How could we increase student interest in and awareness of the theatre? How could we show colleagues and students in different disciplines how valuable theatre is to their particular educational experience and to campus life more generally? Confronted with a seemingly hopeless set of problems and with the support of my colleagues, I decided to launch an advocacy program, a traveling troupe called “Wandering Thespians,” out of the Calvin Theatre Company [End Page 93] class. 2 Wandering Thespians did for us what theatre does best: it took theatre storytellers to the stage of real academic life—the campus classroom. As Director of Theatre, I wanted our campus community to recognize not only our artistic work in the theatre, but also the pedagogical potential that theatre can bring to the classroom. After all, our bread and butter as a liberal arts classroom was high-quality instruction with intensive faculty-student interaction. The appearance of young actors in various classrooms across campus made important friends and advocates of our program, served other departments, and underscored the theatre’s educational importance in the liberal arts tradition. Also, it gave meaningful theatrical work to students who might not have been able to participate as fully in the mainstage productions. My theatre colleagues fully supported the idea, volunteering to direct a portion of the offerings and to support student directors and performers. In the fall of 1993, our 85-student theatre production class, which was unusually large, staged Brian Friel’s Dancing at Lughnasa. The play requires a small cast and relatively easy tech; maximum standard crew and cast capacity for the production was sixty-six students. After establishing a concession crew and slots for students to create their own monologue notebooks, I needed to provide some meaningful occupation for twelve to fourteen students. Ordinarily, they would have sewn costumes, found properties, hung lights, or served on a running crew. Overloading the conventional crews wasn’t a viable option because there would not be enough time over the semester for students to fulfill their twenty-hour crew requirement. Wandering Thespians seemed the perfect opportunity to marry need with vision by involving people who either weren’t aware of our work or who were not yet interested in the theatre. A troupe of student actors and directors now...

Teaching theory and applications together: An exploratory teaching program, in the liberal arts

An exploratory approach to teaching and learning is described. The program incorporates real-world projects as class activities, which dramatically alters the traditional motivational structure of both students and professors. The approach is based on the principle that learning is most effective when the goals of instructors and students are congruent. The literature indicates that the traditional liberal arts classroom format makes such congruence unlikely. In this program, the key element to harmonizing student-teacher goals and objectives involves the inclusion of outside clients. They provide projects to be completed by student teams assisted by their professors and adjunct experts. In the process students gain opportunities to learn by doing and assume greater responsibility for course organization. Professors engage their undergraduate students in a manner more like graduate students and become more focused on educational outcomes than on lecture content. We conclude by discussing the major successes and problems incurred in attempting to integrate such a program into a standard liberal arts curriculum.

“I came to art school so I wouldn’t have to write...”: Creating New Contexts for Critical Writing in Post-Secondary Art and Design Education

This paper examines ideological and institutional contexts for liberal arts education at an art and design university as a means for understanding how critical writing is constructed by students and faculty as an interference to other creative practices students pursue as part of their art and design education. Observations of the form of assessment in art and design education known as critique, provides the basis for a reflection on how the pedagogy of critique, transposed to the liberal arts classroom, might serve to resist student resistance to learning to write critically.