College classrooms are spaces to build community, but community is more than a collection of students sharing in an experience. True classroom community engenders a shared sense of accountability which is best expressed through moments when we learn from and with each other. Being accountable to one another—as instructor to student or student to student—involves showing up.
Being present in the classroom, both physically (or digitally) and mentally, is a prerequisite for group discussions, critical thinking, problem solving, and the exchange of ideas. At many institutions, attaching value to these forms of engagement, for example through a point-based system, constitutes the “student participation” portion of the course grade. When academic policy forbids absences from impacting grades, the student participation grade can serve as an incentive for those students who might otherwise not show up (an issue for discussion at another time).
So, how does student participation engender a shared sense of accountability between students? It’s nuanced. On the one hand, assignments can be designed in ways that require students to be accountable to each for its completion. On the other hand, when we’re talking about “a sense of” and “feeling” accountable to a fellow student’s learning, it can get a bit fuzzy. Fortunately, this is a point where one’s teaching style and technique can be honed to set those “moments when we learn from and with each other” into high relief. Below I offer a couple of examples, but please refer to the Classroom Ethos section of my pedagogy statement for fuller articulation of these ideas.
How to foster a student’s sense of accountability for their classmate’s learning:
- Recognition of value: Class discussions are impossible without student discussants and while they are a commonly employed pedagogical activity, it is worth reminding our students that their purpose serves the entire class and not just the individual contributor. When students are actively engaged in class discussion it’s incumbent upon the educator/facilitator to articulate the value of their contributions (even ones that miss the mark by way of context) and connect across individual students by putting their contributions in conversation with each other.
- Students are knowledge-producers: Often it is the case that my students are living the very subject matters we are studying; either in their daily lives as New Yorkers (e.g., as members of sexually marginalized and/or rent burdened, and/or immigrant communities) or through their jobs (e.g., working in city agencies). Without solicitation, I have found students are open to sharing life experiences. It is in these contexts that I encourage my students to draw from what they already know (which may be more than they realize) and make educated inferences. When this is done early in the learning process, student contributions can act as a springboard from which we deepen our understanding. This act transparently demonstrates how integral student experiences can be underscoring how dependent we are on one another for our learning.
Building community in the college classroom isn’t always easy and despite our best efforts we can’t expect full participation 100% of the time. But what we can (hopefully) expect from our students is their appreciation for what accountability to one another can bring to the classroom experience.