Pathway 2: Disrupting Traditional Classroom Hierarchies
Pathway 2: Disrupting Traditional Classroom Hierarchies
Classrooms have traditionally been built on a number of hierarchies: Instructors hold more knowledge and power than students, the right answers count for more than the wrong ones, and students with more experience in and knowledge of the subject are “smarter” than their peers with less experience and subject knowledge. In this module, we’ll learn how to challenge these traditional hierarchies to create classrooms that center students as knowledge holders and creators, turn the “wrong” answer into a learning opportunity, and highlight the knowledge and strengths that all students bring to the classroom.
Pathway Steps
In equitable classrooms, everyone is both a teacher and a learner, even the instructor. Certainly instructors have expertise and experience, and it’s important to share that knowledge with students. However, even experts have areas for growth and questions they continue to puzzle over.
The physical setup of the classroom can signal that everyone in the room is both a teacher and a learner.
Instructors can easily take up too much space in the classroom as highly-educated experts. This dominance can be particularly pronounced if they also hold a lot of privileged identities.
To disrupt traditional hierarchies, instructors can step out of the way and allow students to take center stage. But positioning students as holders and creators of knowledge can be challenging. Not all students will be comfortable stepping into these roles immediately.
While Timothy Patrick McCarthy uses classroom discussion to position students as knowledge holders, Dan Levy uses technology. By giving his students an iPad to solve problems on the projection screen, he reduces barriers for students to share their thinking with the class.
In many classrooms, there’s a strict hierarchy for student responses: right answers are valuable while wrong answers are not. But mistakes are a critical part of learning, and even “wrong” answers can contain nuggets of brilliance.
In addition to the hierarchy that tends to discount the value in wrong answers, there’s often an epistemological hierarchy in disciplines, placing dominant narratives at the top and counternarratives at the bottom. By working to lift up counternarratives, instructors can create an inclusive and equitable environment where students from historically excluded groups see that their experiences and knowledge are valuable.
Conclusion
Postsecondary classrooms are often built on a number of traditional hierarchies, so ingrained in higher education that they may be difficult to notice at first. Change won’t happen overnight, but continually reflecting on the questions and issues raised in this pathway can help you create a more equitable classroom that centers learners, values all knowledge, and welcomes historically underrepresented voices.