DEFINING & MEASURING INTEGRATIVE LEARNING CIHE WORKSHOP, NEASC ANNUAL MEETING DECEMBER 4, 2013

1. DEFINING & MEASURING INTEGRATIVE LEARNINGCIHE WORKSHOP, NEASC ANNUAL MEETINGDECEMBER 4, 2013 Martha L. A. Stassen Assistant Provost, Assessment & Educational Effectiveness University of Massachusetts Amherst Steven F. Bloom Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs Lasell College

2. Workshop Organization Together, we will focus on three key questions: • How do we define integrative learning (i.e., what are our learning goals for students)? • What are the pedagogical approaches and curricular structures that facilitate integrative learning? • What kinds of student learning assessment strategies offer useful formative and summative evidence of effectiveness? Martha Stassen, UMass Amherst & Steven Bloom, Lasell College

3. Handout Martha Stassen, UMass Amherst & Steven Bloom, Lasell College

4. definitions Martha Stassen, UMass Amherst & Steven Bloom, Lasell College

5. The UMass Amherst Integrative Experience (IE) requirement … …addresses the challenges associated with educational fragmentation in the undergraduate experience. Positioned in the upper-division, the IE provides students with a structured opportunity to look back on their early college learning experiences (including General Education), reflect upon and make connections between those earlier experiences and the more advanced work in their major, and use their integrated learning to prepare for the demands of the world beyond the University. The IE addresses these goals by fulfilling each of the following three criteria: • Providing a structured, credited context for students to reflect on and to integrate their learning and experience from the broad exposure in their General Education courses and the focus in their major. • Providing students with the opportunity to practice General Education learning objectives such as oral communication, collaboration, critical thinking and interdisciplinary perspective-taking, at a more advanced level. • Offering students a shared learning experience for applying their prior learning to new situations, challenging questions, and real-world problems. These three criteria are the key ingredients for proposals to meet the IE. At the same time, it is important to note that there are many different upper-division and credit-bearing formats, options, or structures that can be proposed and approved, in light of the three key criteria. Martha Stassen, UMass Amherst & Steven Bloom, Lasell College IE activities made possible through the generosity of the Davis Educational Foundation. The foundation was established by Stanton and Elisabeth Davis after his retirement as chairman of Shaw’s supermarket.

6. The Lasell Core Curriculum: • Features knowledge, dispositions, and skills that embody Connected Learning; • Crosses disciplinary and division lines to integrate a common set of learning outcomes throughout students’ programs; • Follows a developmental arc, incorporating increasingly complex concepts, thinking, and professional applications; • Engages students in reflecting on and demonstrating their competence in the Lasell Learning Outcomes and in their growing professional skills. • Organizes institutional learning outcomes into 3 broad goals: Core Intellectual Skills, Core Ways of Knowing, Synthesis & Application Martha Stassen, UMass Amherst & Steven Bloom, Lasell College

7. The Lasell Core Curriculum:Core Intellectual Skills • Read and respond in an informed and discerning way to written texts of different genres • Write clear, well-organized, persuasive prose • Use listening and speaking skills to express ideas and information clearly and confidently in a variety of settings • Apply quantitativereasoning to solve problems effectively • Use appropriate technologicaltools to solve problems efficiently • Collect, analyze, and synthesize appropriate data and sources effectively, ethically, and legally • Work effectively in collaborative settings Martha Stassen, UMass Amherst & Steven Bloom, Lasell College

8. The Lasell Core Curriculum:Core Ways of Knowing • Experience modes of self-expression and creativity (Aesthetics & Creativity) • Apply the process of scientific inquiry to comprehend the physical world and to solve problems (Scientific Inquiry & Problem-solving) • Interpret and analyze the complex interrelationships and inequities in human societies in a global and historical context (Global & Historical Perspectives) • Evaluate and understand how individual differences and societal contexts impact human behaviors, beliefs, values, interactions, and emotional and intellectual processes (Individuals & Societies) Martha Stassen, UMass Amherst & Steven Bloom, Lasell College

9. The Lasell Core Curriculum:Synthesis and Application • Analyze how meanings and knowledge are created by diverse cultures and how they evolve over time • Respond critically and analytically to moral issues and make informed, ethical decisions • Participate actively as a citizen in local and global communities Martha Stassen, UMass Amherst & Steven Bloom, Lasell College

10. Curricular Design & Pedagogy Martha Stassen, UMass Amherst & Steven Bloom, Lasell College

11. The LasellCore Curriculum:A Four-Year Plan Martha Stassen, UMass Amherst & Steven Bloom, Lasell College

12. Assessment strategies Martha Stassen, UMass Amherst & Steven Bloom, Lasell College

13. UMass Amherst IE Assessment Implementation • Evidence Gathering and (to varying degrees) analyzed to date: • Literature and other Universities’ Practices Review • Student Focus Groups • Senior Survey Item Addition • IE Course Proposals & Syllabi • Faculty Surveys at Workshops • IE Enrolled Student Survey • Enrollment Tracking & Reporting • Direct Assessment of Student Work from First Year of IE courses • Next Steps • IE Instructor Survey • IE Instructor Interviews • Ongoing instructor workshops • “Quinquennial” review of IE courses by Gen Ed Council

14. Resources Ambrose, Susan A. & Colleagues. (2010). How Learning Works: 7 research-based principles for smart teaching. Bransford, John D. & Colleagues. (1999).How People Learn: Brain, mind, experience, and school. Huber, Mary Taylor & Breen, Molly. “Integrative Learning: Putting the pieces together again. http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/perspectives/integrative-learning-putting-pieces-together-again Huber, Mary Taylor & Hutchings, Pat. (2004). Integrative Learning: Mapping the Terrain.http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/sites/default/files/publications/elibrary_pdf_636.pdf. Pellegrino, James W. & Colleagues, (eds). (2003). Knowing What Students Know: The science and design of educational assessment. Zull, James E. (2002). The Art of Changing the Brain: Enriching the practice of teaching by exploring the biology of learning. Martha Stassen, UMass Amherst & Steven Bloom, Lasell College

15. Contact and Additional information • Martha Stassen, mstassen@umass.edu • UMass IE Website (IE Criteria, Sample Assignments, Descriptions of Courses): http://www.umass.edu/gened/teachingAdvising/integrativeExperience/ie.html • Steven Bloom, sbloom@lasell.edu Martha Stassen, UMass Amherst & Steven Bloom, Lasell College