Journals.uncc.edu (North Carolina's Urban Research University)
Not a member yet
968 research outputs found
Sort by
Teaching Dance as a Multi-Spatial/Multimedia Practice: Reflections on De- vising Contemporary Dance Pedagogy in University Spaces
No full textThe last ten years have seen a remarkable rise in the number of art and dance degree programs in universities worldwide. This essay originates in my experience of having taught for three years (2019–2022) on an ad-hoc basis at one such program in a private Indian university. I describe some of my pedagogic methodologies and creative teaching experiments devised during my tenure and that were dedicated to questions of space and multimedia in dance and performance research. I examine how these methodologies and experiments were not just creative in nature but also triggered by: a. the output- driven approach of private-university systems, and b. the precarity of my own status as an adjunct teaching faculty and a “contemporary”—by which I mean non- classical, non-traditional—dancer in the Indian context. Dance scholar Janet O’Shea, in her essay Decolonising the Curriculum? Unsettling Possibilities for Performance Training, critiques the structure of the university as both “colonial and corporate” (750), and points at its links with the “precarity of neoliberalism” (750). I resonate with O’Shea’s position and acknowledge the neocolonial and neoliberal tendencies of private universities in India that idolize Euro-American university models in their approach to higher education. However, I also argue that these universities, with their advocacy for the interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary forms of research, mostly aimed at claiming the “cutting-edge” in the liberal art and education industry, inadvertently generate scope for upsetting the traditional hierarchies and trajectories of dance pedagogy and challenging the exclusive notion of dance itself
A Workshop Model of Strategies for Early Childhood Educators Who Work with Emergent Bilinguals
No full textThis series of workshops is based on a strengths-based perspective to emergent bilingual learning. It shows how a translanguaging approach can empower children, educators, and engage families by expanding learning opportunities, and making families a resource for educators. A blueprint of the professional development series is provided for teachers and administrators working with emergent bilinguals to consider
Engaging Bilingual Mathematics Learners With Principle-Based Instruction
No full textThis paper uses a framework of four key principles and considers the research question: “How did four middle school mathematics teachers’ instruction align with these principles to engage bilingual mathematics students in mathematical work in meaningful ways?” Findings from qualitative methods provide examples from teachers’ practice, demonstrating how they: (1) used bilingual learners’ funds of knowledge and resources; (2) provided bilingual learners with cognitively demanding work; (3) provided bilingual learners opportunities for rich language and literacy exposure and practice; and (4) identified academic language demands and supports for bilingual learners
Only Connect: The Growth of Relationship when Prisoners and College Students Study Together
No full textThis essay describes a class in a maximum-security prison that brought civilian college students and incarcerated learners together. The authors, one a professor of communication and one a sociologist, team-taught the class as a cross-disciplinary and cross-community partnership, designed to promote greater understanding between prisons and higher education communities. Students explored the two faces of education in the U.S.: on one hand, as a public good that spreads knowledge and opens doors to social mobility, and on the other, as an institution that reproduces social inequalities (such as the school-to-prison pipeline). The professors anticipated that these encounters would spark critical consciousness and a desire to work for social justice. However, the most salient part of the experience for both groups of learners turned out to be the affirmation their own humanity and the humanity of others through interactions that built a sense of community and caring
Exploring the Mathematical Agency of a Multilingual Child With an Identified Learning Disability
No full textIn this article, I illustrate how one student, Carlos, who is an emergent bilingual with a learning disability, expresses his mathematical agency dynamically and fluidly in multiple languages throughout 12 teaching sessions centered on mathematical discussions. The findings of this study show how Carlos made sense of fraction word problems, felt empowered to engage in conversations with peers about his thinking, and took ownership of his strategies. Implications areoffered for the math instruction of bilingual children identified with a learning disability
Authenticity of Assessment in Inclusive Spaces
No full textBarriers related to assessment may prevent high quality transition practices from occurring. Traditionally, assessment of young children involves table top testing where an assessor asks a child to perform standardized tasks that are often lacking developmental appropriateness with unfamiliar materials, in unfamiliar environments like a sterile clinical setting, and/or with people who are unfamiliar to the child. True skills may not be observed under such conditions as a traditional assessment. Alternatively, professionals today across multiple sectors use authentic assessment to measure child outcomes that can be used to better understand children’s development and learning during the transition from preschool to kindergarten process. Authentic “real-life” assessments measure skills that are functional rather than contrived, discrete tasks. This research-to-practice article shares practical application for authentic assessment leading to high quality transitions for children and families from preschool to kindergarten
Using Open Broadcaster Software (OBS) to Increase Professionalism in Online Teaching and Meetings
No full textVirtual work has become professional work. Meetings, classes, interviews, and entire conferences are held online. This change in mode for high-stakes interpersonal interactions requires that participants look more professional online. This session focuses in the free, open-source program known as Open Broadcaster Software (OBS) to enhance presenter professionalism and credibility. Participants will leave the session with a basic understanding of how OBS works and will receive a list of resources to assist with using the software. 
Let the Odyssey Begin: A Globally Networked Learning Project between Germany and the United States
No full textIn relation to the track theme of Innovative Technologies and Learning Spaces, our presentation reports on a Globally Networked Learning (GNL) project among students (n = 54) in Germany (n= 28) and the United States (n=26). The duration of the GNL project was 8 weeks in total and included 4 synchronous sessions as well as opportunities for students to collaborate over email, WhatsApp, and Zoom. One of the outcomes of this GNL project was that students collaborated on the creation of an interactive multimedia resource called a Global Competency Virtual Odyssey (GCVO). The students in Germany created their GCVOs on regions and indigenous people groups in the United States, whereas the students in the United States created their GCVOs on a region or people group in Germany. Student groups from each country were grouped together to provide consultations on their GCVO projects. Students presented the GCVOs at the final webinars of the GNL project. The duration of the GNL project was about 8 weeks in total. In this paper session, we describe how we planned, organized, and implemented the GNL project with the students. We also examine the impact of the GNL project and the GCVO assignment in relation to the development of the students\u27 global competencies and intercultural awareness, which was measured using a pre and post survey as well as artifact analysis. Finally, we showcase examples of the GCVOs the students created and collaborated on as part of this GNL experience
The Tale of a Choreographer, Her student, River and an endangered Heritage: Indu Mitha’s Qaseeda-i-Ilm of Jamal/ “An Ode to Wisdom and Beauty”
No full textChoreographing in Pakistan since the 50’s, the country’s senior most 90+ years young classical dance maestro Indu Mitha has made trailblazing contributions within the Kalakshtera Bharata Natyam using North Indian music, interesting and contemporary content, while also producing more tableau forms of dance.
In one of her recent solo pieces in the later style, titled “Qaseeda-i-Ilm of Jamal” or “An Ode to Wisdom and Beauty” Indu engages with symbolisms of a Hindu goddess of knowledge and Aesthetics_Saraswati and pays tribute to a forgotten dried up river of the same name. Indu Mitha allows the author, for whom and on whose body the dance is made, to bring in the forgotten river in her engagement with people’s histories of the land of present-day Pakistan and eventually facilitates her accessing of and embodying a pluralistic space of inter faith harmony which was occluded
