Trauma-informed Pedagogy: What It Is and How It Can Help Now
We’re nearing the end of the fall semester and this has been a term like no other. When the university announced that the majority of courses would be offered online, many faculty took the recommendations for eLearning “best practices” to heart and created great, robust online courses in the middle of an emergency. We now recognize that some of the typical evidence-informed eLearning techniques aren’t the most effective for quickly shifting a traditional face-to-face university online. After speaking with a few departments, it’s clear that everyone’s doing better than they think they are! However, there’s still an anxiety-inducing tension between managing a typical in-person course load in an online environment. I think the principles of trauma-informed pedagogy can help provide perspective on the current situation.
As we all moved online during winter 2020, I offered two short reflections for consideration to get up and running online quickly: “Curriculum Tips for Modifying a Course” and “Student Support for Unexpected Anxiety and Grief.” We’re still in the middle of a pandemic and never moved out of an emergency period. It’s important to recognize that grief can impact us for a long time. Many of us are still grieving the loss of in-person instruction, as well as all the social facets and ease of our lives prior to the pandemic. Additionally, the trauma associated with a major life upheaval can shift our motivation to surviving and limit the ability for our brains to process information the way it might when we’re free from threat.
When Mays Imad (2020), a professor of Genetics, Biotechnology, and Bioethics at Pima Community College, describes trauma she uses this definition, “an event, series of events, or set of circumstances that is experienced by an individual as physically or emotionally harmful or threatening and that has lasting adverse effects on the individual’s functioning and physical, social, emotional, or spiritual well-being.” Experiencing a global pandemic certainly qualifies as a “physically or emotionally harmful or threatening” event that effects how we exist in the world. For example, now we need to consider a myriad of extra factors when we go to the grocery store: Do I know what I’ll need for the next week? Do I know where to find the things I need? Do I have my mask? Do I have my bags? Will I remember to follow the arrows? How will I navigate any potential social interactions? How long will this trip take? I spent the entire month of October trying to figure out what to do about my child’s Hallowe’en experience! That’s a lot of mental real estate occupied by life beyond my job. Even when I’m working, I share an office space with my partner. We need to coordinate meetings and negotiate our child’s desire for our time. There are a lot of additional considerations that demand our attention and cognitive ability.
Trauma-informed pedagogy, rooted in the theory of trauma-informed practice, reminds us that stress can impede the ability to process information, make choices, and stay focussed. Ultimately, it’s more difficult to learn (and to teach) when your brain is already overwhelmed with survival, including daily tasks that used to be completely mundane. Trauma-informed practices often incorporate (Zacarian, Alvarez-Ortiz, and Haynes, 2020):
Predictability: Use consistent routines
Flexibility: Provide choices where it is possible
Connection and Warmth: Focus on compassion
Relationship: Get to know your students
Empowerment: Give students voice and choice
So, what can we do as we develop courses? On multiple occasions, Imad has provided guidance for instructors to apply a trauma-informed lens to their teaching right now. She advises (McMurtrie, 2020):
Don't go at it alone.
Re-examine your course.
Be organized but flexible.
Re-emphasize concepts and scaffold.
Involve students.
Don’t take things personally.
Throughout the emergency, I’ve been focusing on three main factors for considering course design:
1) Ensure the integrity of your discipline/program
Plan to meet the goals of the program, the outcomes of the course, and avoid academic dishonesty.
Consider whether it’s an undergraduate or graduate course, a seminar or survey, and if it’s required or an elective.
2) Consider the student experience
A student might be enrolled in a full course load, which requires them to process information, make choices, and stay focussed for five courses.
Students have an easier time navigating online courses if instructors use consistent learning tools and methods. Consistency also reduces cognitive load.
The course size will most likely alter the student experience because they may not have the opportunity to meet their peers. Alternatively, students who move through the program as a cohort will most likely have multiple occasions to meet.
Not all students will have access to reliable internet or a quiet space to complete work.
Students are experiencing heightened anxiety and will need assistance to access proper supports.
3) Be mindful of your teaching experience
Become comfortable with the technology even if you’re not 100% confident.
Keep your course simple, it’s not necessary to use every feature or tool and it’s probably best if you don’t.
Consider your teaching load. Keep grading manageable with regards to class size and TA resources.
Create assignments that you’ll enjoy reviewing.
As I piece together my course for winter 2021, I’m using these three principles with a trauma-informed lens. In practice this means I’ve stripped down my assignments in order to meet the course outcomes and ensure integrity of the discipline. To keep the student workload manageable, I’m offering the course asynchronously, I’ve provided flexibility (but limit overwhelming choice) by allowing students to miss two of the smaller, regular assessments, and created opportunities for students to direct the course topics by asking them to submit visual responses and primary sources that I’ll incorporate throughout the course. I’ve appropriately weighted assignments by ensuring nothing in the course is worth less than 15% or more than 30%. Finally, I’ve determined a conceivable workload that will allow me to provide timely, meaningful feedback throughout the term, which is especially important for maintaining connection and relationship with the students. I’ve scheduled a few, short optional synchronous meetings in addition to my office hours that students can sign-up for in advance to provide extra opportunities for community building.
By reflecting on the fall term and the feedback received by both students and instructors, I’m convinced that we can do more with less. That is, we can increase capacity for learning without overwhelming students, and ourselves, with too much during a period of grief and trauma.
References:
Colleen Flaherty, “Faculty Pandemic Stress is Now Chronic” Inside Higher Ed, 19 November 2020.
Mays Imad, “Leveraging the Neuroscience of Now” Inside Higher Ed, 3 June 2020.
Beth McMurtrie, “An Explainer on Trauma-Informed Teaching” The Chronicle of Higher Education, 4 June 2020.
Debbie Zacarian, Lourdes Alvarez-Ortiz, and Judie Haynes, “5 essential trauma-informed priorities for remote learning” ASCD, 7 April 2020.