This post was first published on SCHOLE: A Journal of Leisure and Recreation Studies. It is posted here with the permission of the authors.
Listening, Learning, and Leaning into Pandemic Pedagogy
by Brian E. Kumm-Schaley, Ph.D., Associate Professor & Internship Coordinator and Laurie K. Harmon, Professor & Department Chair from the University of Wisconsin – La Crosse
During the ongoing COVID-19 global pandemic, we often joked we were performing “meatball pedagogy” (Hooker, 1968/2001). We were in “triage mode,” sacrificing nuance and finesse for the sake of more pressing demands—preserving the overall integrity of learning spaces, bolstering student support, and meeting defined learning outcomes. Things were shifting daily, and the mounting anxiety about what we were to do now was visibly pressing on students and instructors. In attempting to regroup and recalibrate after the jolt of going fully online, Brian reimagined a “soundwalk” assignment for a community recreation course (Kumm, Schultz, & Pate, 2020). Brian’s goal was to afford students a space to engage with the natural world and the sounds of their changing communities. Informed by Louv’s (2005) call to intentionally engage the senses to build awareness and appreciation for our immediate, lived environment and communal spaces, students spent one hour in an outdoor space of their choosing where they felt safe. During that hour, the challenge was to listen, notice sounds present or absent, and reflect on how the experience affected various meanings associated with that space.
Some students struggled to fully engage with the assignment or find a suitable place to listen; however, those who did mostly reported feeling comforted and calmed during their experience. Based on comments during subsequent class discussions, the acts of disengaging from typical routines, shifting attention from daily stressors, and focusing on being present carried therapeutic benefits—a moment of calm in a semester of chaos. Building on these psychological benefits, the project was reimagined, renamed, and delivered as part of an environmental ethics and outdoor recreation course taught the following spring by the second author in an online format.
Revised project objectives were to: 1) build appreciation for multiple senses; 2) build online learning community; 3) identify and differentiate between anthropogenic and biological sounds; 4) assess effects of these sounds on human visitors; and, 5) build individual connections between students and their surrounding natural environs (Louv, 2005). Inspired by The Sounds of Your Park initiative (https://soundsofyourpark.com/), students spent 60 minutes in a nature place of their choosing, recorded 15 minutes of audio reflecting that place, noted the location using Google Earth, and posted their recording along with responses to five prompts. The prompts invited students to identify sounds that affected them, share why/how they reflected that space, note sounds that were missing, and discuss what role their listening had on understanding and relating to the natural world. Students then listened to two of their colleagues’ posts, visited the spaces virtually, and reflected on what they heard, their emotional responses to the audio, and their previous history (if any) with either space.
Students visited a variety of places including favorite parks, forests, lakes, backyards, and gardens. They noted special times of day in capturing audio (e.g., mornings) and how the audio reflected feeling safe, happy, and calm. Several students noted that not hearing anthropogenic noises was a reward for the sustainable actions they take on a regular basis. One student even shared, “There were ducks splashing as well…it just makes me smile!” Many students were initially somewhat resistant to the idea of this project, and expressed this in their reflections. However, universally, they all shared that at some level, this project was possibly one of the most positive experiences of their semester. They noted an increase in cognitive clarity, feeling encouraged, ready to re-engage with the responsibilities of the semester. It allowed them to understand that where we are right now is temporary and that the earth will keep turning and we will get through this somehow.
This pandemic has taught us many things, among which are the values of physical and emotional safety, collaboration with colleagues, and the healing power of nature. Collaboration with colleagues need not involve extensive meetings, detailed agendas, or deep engagement with diverse data to produce powerful outcomes. In fact, we developed this project over coffee. We were causally discussing how often students remarked on the positive role that forced time outdoors had on helping them cope with typical college stress. As we transition to our post-pandemic learning environments, we intend to fully embrace this project, adapting it to both our community recreation course as well as our environmental ethics and outdoor recreation course. Knowing that students need an increasing number of coping strategies to address mental health, this assignment offers an additional tool for instructors to modify and adapt to meet needs as we move back to more traditional learning spaces.
References
Hooker, R. (2001). MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors. New York, NY: Perennial. (Original work published 1968)
Kumm, B. E., Pate, J. A., & Schultz, C. S. (2021). The Future is Unwritten: Listening to the Rhythms of COVID-19. Leisure Sciences, 43(1/2), 85–89.
Louv, R. (2005). The Nature Principle: Reconnecting with Life in a Virtual Age. Chapel Hill, NC: Algonquin Books.