How to challenge students to apply classroom learning and theories from course readings in practical ways off campus? How to bring what’s learned elsewhere back into the classroom? This perennial dilemma can be addressed by constantly moving back and forth between praxis and practice. This can be further intensified by asking students to learn from…
Author: Leo Garofalo
Shortening Distances through Technology
Employing technology in the classroom can shorten distances; this semester student researchers into topics of sustainability and social justice enrolled in SRS/HIS/CRE299 History and Cases of Equality interacted through Skype with counterparts in California, Illinois, Washington, D.C., Peru, and Mexico. Alumni in each location described how they came to engage in social justice research while…
Making Global Connections and the Digital Divide
Classroom technology can widen the digital divide and strengthen language barriers and socio-economic inequality. This can happen if we expect all students to have smartphones to complete an assignment, if we expect the classrooms and students that we connect with abroad to speak English, if we assume everyone has internet access, and if we do…
How to Best Access and Work with Documentary Footage & Testimonials
One of the advantages of teaching at a small liberal arts college is that you enjoy more freedom to offer a wide range of courses on topics outside your area of research expertise. Over the years, I have been able to develop and offer courses on Mexico and Cuba, environmental history and social movements, the…