Designing Instructional Tools to Engage Preservice Teachers in Human-Centered Design to Develop Social Empathy

• In Event: Reconceptualizing Designerly Thinking and Participatory Design With Students, Teachers, Administrators, and Community Members

Abstract

With the majority of teachers still coming from primarily white, middle-class backgrounds, embracing culturally sustaining pedagogy (Paris, 2012) becomes an urgent need. Culturally sustaining pedagogy encourages teachers to make space for students’ cultural heritages and out-of-school lives, but also to design instructional experiences that work to sustain students’ cultures. To support teachers in embracing culturally diverse heritages in their classrooms, we argue that teacher preparation include learning experiences that help develop social empathy -- “the ability to understand people by perceiving or experiencing their life situations and as a result gain insight into structural inequalities and disparities” (Segal, 2011, p. 266-267). Social empathy allows teachers to understand their students holistically, helping them create instruction that is culturally sustaining (Paris, 2012). In this work, we explore how engaging pre-service teachers (PSTs) in human-centered design (HCD) impacts their development of social empathy.

Theoretical Framework. HCD is a problem-solving approach that identifies the unmet needs of a population in order to collaboratively and iteratively develop solutions (Brown, 2008). HCD offers an instructional vehicle for fostering social empathy in PSTs, which could help them respond to systemic barriers facing marginalized groups. Hess and Fila (2016) presented 12 empathic techniques that are observable in those who demonstrate social empathy while engaging in HCD. Designing instructional approaches where PSTs engage in these empathic techniques can provide them opportunities to understand their students’, including the diverse social worlds they participate in (Dyson, 1993). When PSTs empathize with their students, it sets them up to engage more effectively in culturally sustaining pedagogy.

Methods & Data Collection. We use design-based research methodology (Mckenny & Reeves, 2012) to design, implement, and evaluate the impact of an instructional approach including tools that engage PSTs in HCD processes to promote social empathy. With instructors, we co-designed instructional tools in two education courses: a social justice in education course (Authors, 2021) and an introductory teaching methods course. In both courses, PSTs were engaged in learning experiences and explicit instruction in eight of the 12 empathic techniques identified by Hess and Fila (2016) (see Table 1 after references). They participated in activities to explore and observe an educational setting, empathized with the stakeholders in the setting, reflected on their biases, organized collected information, identified patterns, defined design opportunities, and suggested potential solutions. Since Spring 2019, we went through two design iterations collecting post-survey data, classroom observations, PSTs artifacts (e.g., booklets and lesson plans), and PSTs and instructors’ interviews.

Findings & Implications. Preliminary analysis of the data indicated that PSTs had a clearer understanding of who their students/stakeholders were and designed solutions (e.g., lesson plans) that respond to students’ needs, signaling that HCD has the potential to foster social empathy. Additionally, the iterative design process allowed us to respond to both students and instructors' needs for explicit instruction on HCD, as well as scaffolds to support synthesizing empathic knowledge and recognizing patterns/insights. These findings support HCD as an instructional approach for social empathy for teacher education programs that prepare PSTs to implement culturally sustaining pedagogy.

Authors

• Carrie L. James, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

• Saadeddine S. Shehab, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign