Maintaining Hope: Responding to Teaching Fails

Abstract

Teaching fails happen for a variety of reasons. How can post-secondary instructors respond constructively to situations where pedagogies fail to meet expectations, learning stalls, or classroom dynamics become stilted, among other things? This session looks to promote conversation on a subject that is often discussed between colleagues but far less frequently addressed on a broader scale amidst current discourses of student success, best practices, and award celebrations. This session aims to contribute to a more open discussion of responding to pedagogically difficult situations by highlighting an example of an exercise that provides both instructors and students with a constructive and collaborative but realistic basis for educational optimism in the midst of what can be trying and challenging situations. Our aim will be to share stories of successes and failures, to consider what gives us hope in difficult times, and to work through an illustrative example of an exercise that has worked in other instances of teaching fails, a modified version of the “flipped classroom.” From this exercise, this session will consider lessons that can be learnt by students (and ourselves as instructors) with regard to empathy, skills or competencies, interpersonal dynamics, habits of mind, empirical knowledge, and evaluative processes.