2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

This project describes a current work in progress beta testing of an interactive classroom space for an Architectural Technology course focused on Wood Framed Construction. In an effort to enhance the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL), we will be utilizing a newly constructed lab on the XXXXX campus called the Active Learning Classroom of Valuable Experiences (ALCOVE) that looks to create a stronger working partnership between students, faculty, and classroom designers. Understanding the difference between Scholarly Teaching and SoTL Research, is critical in assessing a project like this. In their article Using Assessment and SoTL to Enhance Student Learning, K. Laurie Dickson, Melinda M. Treml expand on the intrinsic difference between the two strategies. They explain Scholarly Teaching as one’s observation of student learning and behavior while implementing new teaching strategies, while SoTL Research collects, analyzes, and interprets data, as explained in the graphic below.

Effective scholarly teaching is difficult to assess, particularly so in design studio-based courses because outcomes may not always be based on project success, but instead feasibility of design approach. This even more emphasizes the importance of content delivery and early by-in by students to be active participants in the classroom environment. This project looks at ways that technology can help create rigorous forms of discussion and inquiry, as well as creative ways to disseminate information from faculty to student and student to student.

From the classroom design perspective, the design process traditionally seeks out the best technologies to build advanced active learning classrooms that meet the needs of all students and instructors. Post occupancy surveys are given to learn what works for, and what hinders, learning in the space. With the ALCOVE, we are flipping the process around and building one room that will continually serve as a proving ground for future classroom technologies. Rather than a one-time test or scheduling a demonstration, we continually build our relationship with instructors and students throughout an entire semester to truly understand the aspects of the room we want to continue to build out in other spaces across all our campuses. This paper will describe year one of the two-year project research.

References:
K. Laurie Dickson,Melinda M. Treml. 2013. Using Assessment and SoTL to Enhance Student Learning

Bass, R. 1999. “The Scholarship of Teaching: What's the Problem?” Inventio: Creative Thinking About Learning and Teaching