AASP Newsletter - November 2018

John Coumbe-Lilley

John E. Coumbe-Lilley, PhD, CMPC, CSCS, University of Illinois at Chicago

Recently Dr. Amber Shipherd, Dr. Pete Kadushin and I presented a webinar for AASP called “Becoming the Instructor You Wish You Had: A Graduate Student and Young Professional's Guide to College Teaching.” My segment of the presentation focused on the delivery of PRICELESS teaching and learning, set against the Spectrum of Teaching Styles (SoTS) proposed by Mosston & Ashworth (2002). Let me share what PRICELESS principles are and show you examples of how to apply each one.

The purpose of PRICELESS delivery is to engage learners through high impact teaching and learning practices so that they can master content and develop competencies in their area of study. PRICELESS stands for:

Participation
Relevance
Inclusion
Climate
Enjoyment
Learner centered
Esteem
Success
Self-reflection

Participation 
Participation means the degree to which an individual takes an active part in the class. For example, if an opening exercise in class requires a short written response or a vote using an electronic polling system, this is seen as active learning. Intentional design of participatory activities achieves active learning in the classroom through carefully applied methods to ensure ideas and voice are expressed by all students. By engaging students within a few minutes of the start of class, the tone is set and the instructor has signaled the intent of the class. 

Relevance 
Relevance encourages the course content and activities to have meaning to the students in their lives and to the field. An example of relevance is shown when content focuses on team cohesion and dynamics, the instructor shares a case concerning a team that is in the news and the instructor elicits the students’ own lived experiences in teams. By integrating these sources of experience, the course experience becomes more relevant and promotes critical thinking and appraisal. A way to add even greater relevance is to work on issues that have high stakes and high impact on the learner. 

Inclusion 
Inclusion refers to classes where the instructor reduces student marginalization by approaching content from multiple viewpoints and groups. Instructors work with students to help them understand their experiences, values and viewpoints in the context of their course of study. Instructors consider course content, multicultural aspects, student grouping, developing their own knowledge of diversity and how their own class behavior creates an inclusive climate (Saunders & Karyn, 1997). For example, in an exercise psychology class examining the social determinants of health, the instructor might invite students, in random groups of three, to share with one another the zip code from where they group up. Then students are asked to compare and contrast their zip codes against the criteria of the social determinants of health. Once the results of the analysis are shared in the small groups, a larger discussion including all groups can take place. The instructor can foster discussion and expression being carefully to assure the focus is on critical understanding and respect for difference. 

Climate 
Climate is explained by the physical set up of the place where learning takes place. Many college instructors do not have control over the way a location is designed or how it fosters learning. Learning spaces that are well-lit, have moderate temperatures, space to move, chairs with wheels and easy to use tablet arms, electricity mains supply and wall space to project, post and write on are helpful to create comfortable physical conditions. Course rituals are effective ways of creating warmth, examples of this might be a check-in at the beginning of every class review the previous class, or it might be town hall discussions at the beginning and ending of each content section. Other options include offering students a choice of activities or projects to promote autonomy and modeling the desired classroom behaviors of active listening, nonverbal behaviors showing interest and respect with appropriate challenges to ideas shared. 

Enjoyment 
Enjoyment in a college class can be a tricky thing, because on one hand it might seem like “edutainment” in the classroom is the desired goal, but it is not that at all. What we mean by enjoyment is where the intellectual challenge set for the students meets their capabilities and is facilitated in a way that applies motivational learning approaches to help students achieve the learning outcomes of the course of study. These approaches are well known to many in our field and provide established ways of helping students enjoy their learning. An example of this happened in a psychology of injury course where students in an online course self-selected a peer to work with. They were provided a series of three case progressions that required completion of increasingly complex critical thinking tasks. The final progression had a pre-work task to consider possible options before the task was set to promote discussion, interest and planning for the final case. The final case offered a summative learning experience promoting the application of the students learning from the course. Feedback from students indicated high voluntary engagement in extra learning activities, increased peer interaction compared to face to face and other online classes they had taken, and a desire to show their knowledge and critical thinking abilities.

Learner-Centered 
Learner-centered teaching is often demonstrated by teachers displaying a range of the following characteristics on a consistent basis: (a) Learning is set up so that students work harder than their teachers; (b) essential skills such as how to think, problem solving, analysis and hypothesis testing are taught concurrently with content; (c) balance ownership of decision making in the classroom by identifying the things that students might decide for themselves about how the course unfolds for them; and (d) the teacher fulfils their obligations to teach and promotes peer learning between students. An example of this kind of teaching is when an instructor has assigned pre-work before a class. When students arrive to the class the instructor provides them enough information to set expectations and outcomes and then randomly assigned groups of three. Groups are given a problem to solve with requirements for presenting the solution to their peers. The instructor facilitates groups themselves or uses a peer group leader-to-leader model. For example, for large classes with greater than 35 students each triad has a leader who discusses their group’s process and findings with another leader or two; these leaders share with one another and then return to their groups with further feedback. The goal is to have students discover knowledge, grapple with the problem, and find a solution with the guidance of the teacher and context expert in the class. 

Esteem 
Esteem in the context of PRICELESS delivery describes the global sense of self-worth and value the student experiences during the course. Sources of esteem in this delivery approach are often helped when teachers praise effort, persistence and use feedback to improve performance based on the strengths present in the student’s initial work or contribution. For example, during a discussion about an important concept a student contributes an incorrect response to a problem posed. The instructor acknowledges the contribution, probes a bit to check understanding and provides the correct counterpoint being mindful not to squelch the enthusiasm and risk the student took by speaking up.

Success 
Success in the PRICELESS delivery model means that students can visualize their accomplishment in the course, set goals for academic achievement and experience accomplishment at their level of learning. Success for students means achieving good grades and achieving academic milestones, it also includes making friends, well-being and maintaining a desire to learn (Jennings, Lovett, Cuba, Swingle & Lindkvist, 2013). An example of how to foster these experiences of success in a college classroom is a well-designed assignment with clear learning objectives where a student’s effort will take them to the edge of their current abilities. The teacher provides a scaffold through their own content expertise and support with peer engagement. A way of doing this is by using an objective rubric to guide learning, setting a problem related to the assignment, having each student work on it alone, and then having them work on it together before returning to their own work. Following this kind of approach helps develop intellectual capabilities to achieve good grades, deepen engagement and build relationships. 

Self-Reflection 
Self-reflection is the final element in a PRICELESS delivery model. Its purpose is to close the learning process through evaluation of the difference between the beginning and end of the learning cycle. Its goal is to help students identify their accomplishments and recognize gaps in their knowledge, skills and abilities. They are encouraged to consider how they might do things differently if they could go back in time and do things over again. This kind of learning is particularly salient in clinical training situations or hands-on supervisory situations, where the examination of situational performance can be debriefed and discussed for the purposes of raising self-awareness and developing insight in the learner. 

Using the PRICELESS delivery model principles can help any college teacher develop high impact teaching practices to achieve desired learning outcomes, engage students and create a course experience with lasting positive impact on their students. The key to integrating the principles is to marry the course learning outcomes with the goals and abilities of students and the teacher’s own strengths. Through the triangulation of these complementary influences, a PRICELESS delivery model can come alive in any college course.

References

Jennings, N., Lovett, S., Cuba, L., Swingle, J. & Lindkvist, H. (2013). "What would make this a successful year for you?" How students define success in college. Liberal Education, 99, 2. 

Mosston, M., & Ashworth, S. (2002). Teaching physical education. 5th Ed. Boston, MA: Benjamin Cummings.

Saunders, S., & Kardia, D. (1997). Creating an Inclusive Classroom. Retrieved from http://www.crlt.umich.edu/gsis/p3_1

Weimer, M. (2012). Learner-centered teaching and transformative learning. The handbook of transformative learning: Theory, research, and practice, 439-454.