Empathy-Driven Lesson Study: The Case of the Community Garden Design-based Lesson

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Sunday 11:45 am - Gold 2
  In Roundtable Session: Digging Deeper: Transforming Practice Through Lesson Study: Core Insights, Empathy, and Critical Perspectives

Abstract

The paper shows a case where lesson study helped to introduce a novel teaching approach. Using a framework for empathy in design, the paper analyzes a lesson study with four middle school teachers who created a design-based lesson. The qualitative analysis of teachers’ discussions show that the teachers empathized with the students during the planning phase. During the planning and reflection phases, the empathized with the community where the lesson took place. We introduce the notion of “projected empathy” regarding teachers’ anticipation of community needs to design a lesson for students to empathize with the community. Lesson study was instrumental for teachers to learn how to design and implement a lesson for students to develop an empathic stance.

Authors

• Gloriana Gonzalez, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

• Sourabh Garg, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

• Jane Pak, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign