Visiting Speaker Series

Dr. Joy Robinson Visits BGSU
Dr. Joy Robinson visited our campus on Monday, October 14, to deliver a workshop and a presentation. In the workshop, "Making Your Digital Pedagogy Plan," Robinson discussed the habits of mind in relation to usability and UX (user experience). Then attendees considered what habits of mind they would most want to focus on in their courses and brainstormed how to include those habits in pedagogy plans in the digital age. The process was structured by a UX framework of Discover (a problem), Decide (a method), Make (a testable solution), and Validate (by testing the solution). Below are images of the work participants created on large sheets of notepad paper.






In the afternoon workshop, "Digital Pedagogy in the Digital Age," Robinson reviewed the UX framework and habits of mind before sharing some of the results of a recent three-question research study—with findings for one of the questions forthcoming in Computers and Composition. Robinson shared the results of this question: "How are digital resources used by teachers in the writing and communication classroom?" The researchers found that teachers often go for "low-hanging fruit" in choosing which digital resources to use and that too much familiarity stifles creativity, with encouragements to create digital pedagogy plans and leverage our agency in these plans.
Dr. Robinson is an Assistant Professor of Technical Writing and New Media in the English Department of the University of Alabama in Huntsville. She has more than 10 years of experience researching user experience and more than 15 years of experience in teaching and course and program development. Her courses emphasis designing thinking strategies, and she runs the VUE (eValuation and User Experience) lab at UAH.