Michael Bufano
Course
PSCI 3000: Peace, Security, and Development
Reflection on Using High-Impact Teaching Practices
In the summer of 2024, I participated in a one-week seminar at East Tennessee State University’s Center for Teaching Excellence to learn about relatively new pedagogical methods that can be applied in the classroom. These methods are useful in the classroom for helping students develop critical thinking skills, and they do so by having students become more actively engaged in the learning process. One of the methods that I learned about in this seminar that I have applied to my own classroom I know affectionately as the “Dolly Parton Game.” [Editor's note: This method was shared by Dr. Amy Johnson.]
In this game, students are given a series of questions, one at a time, that revolve around a central topic. In the seminar, for example, we started with the question, “Is Dolly Parton a national treasure?” Students have the freedom to agree with the question, to disagree with it, take a neutral stance, or state that they don’t know/have more questions. In response to each question, students must walk to a designated corner of the room based on their response to the question: agree, disagree, neutral, or don’t know. The students are then asked to justify why they walked to a particular corner of the room. In the process, students can change their minds and walk to different corners of the room as they listen to the answers of their fellow students.
I recently applied this game to my Peace, Security, and Development class on the topic of humanitarian intervention. I started the class by asking students, “Do you believe humanitarian intervention is a good thing for the world?” Once the students chose their sides of the room, it led to a great discussion on the positive and negative drawbacks of humanitarian intervention as well as a discussion on what humanitarian intervention precisely entails. I then followed up with specific questions on episodes of humanitarian intervention that have happened in the past and present such as in Bosnia from 1992 to 1995 and the Ukraine in the present. What was interesting was seeing students shift to different corners of the room and hearing their justifications for why they supported humanitarian intervention in some cases and not others.
Overall, the game was a great way to keep my students active, capture their attention, and share their knowledge with one another. It also is a great way to create more nuanced discussions on class topics.
Reflection on Gen Ed Scholars Institute
The Gen Ed Scholars Program a great way to not only learn about new teaching methods but interact with scholars from across the university to discuss common challenges we face in the classroom. Overall, it was a beneficial experience.