Journal of Transformative Learning

Japanese Nursing Faculty’s Frames of Reference During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Oyamada Kyoko, Aoki Mika, Watanabe Naho, Hayashida Seiko — Tue, 05 Mar 2024 00:00:00 -0800

Nursing faculty’s frames of reference are likely to have a significant impact on their education methods. Thus, this study aimed to describe Japanese nursing faculty’s perceptions of their own frames of reference during the COVID-19 pandemic based on Mezirow’s transformative learning theory, as well as how these frames of reference and faculty’s teaching-related behaviors were transformed. A qualitative descriptive research design was adopted, and semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 nursing faculty from February to March 2021. The results indicated that nursing faculty’s frames of reference seem to be influenced by their own childhood learning, learning about teaching methods, and colleagues’ perspectives and practices. No transformative learning experiences were described because the faculty lacked adequate time and space for dialogue. We believe their transformation was still in progress.

Teaching Leadership Through the Lens of Gender as a Practice of Transformative Learning

Trisha Teig, Brittany Devies, Kathy Guthrie — Tue, 05 Mar 2024 00:00:00 -0800

Leadership education is undergoing a paradigm shift to redevelop and redefine leadership utilizing theoretical lenses as tools to examine and critique traditional, hegemonic narratives. Through an instrumental case analysis of a gender and leadership course, this study examined the phenomenon of transformative learning by teaching leadership through the lens of gender within an environment of critical feminist/engaged pedagogy. Findings include the importance of the learning environment in building affective and cognitive frames for scaffolding student learning, the relevance of engagement in vulnerable storytelling as a peer-to-peer learning device, and the need for strong preparation as a facilitator of the engaged learning environment. We call on higher education educators to transform their learning practice and consider gender theory and critical feminist-engaged pedagogy as tools to facilitate a new learning perspective.

(Re)considering Writing Assessment in the Wake of AI

Dan Frank — Tue, 05 Mar 2024 00:00:00 -0800

A student-centered, metacognitive, process-oriented approach to AI Writing. For teachers, scholars have argued that ChatGPT can assist in developing lessons, assignments, assessments, and other course materials. By generating and refining content, ChatGPT can free teachers' time from repetitive tasks and allow them to focus on higher-level instructional strategies.

The Transformational Teacher's Caring Presence

Ronald D. Gordon — Tue, 05 Mar 2024 00:00:00 -0800

We regularly stray from honoring the centrality of our own humanity, and that of our students, in the teaching process. We become distracted by our routine tasks, preparations, meetings, tests, technological tools, and myriad other elements embedded in the teaching profession. Yet to respond to the call to teach is to accept the invitation to become an ever more Caring human being, and to communicate this ongoing Caring so that it is richly experienced by our students, especially at this point in time when stress, anxiety, confusion, and fear are at record levels among our students. To reclaim our personal sense of agency and more fully emancipate our human Caring for our students can be restorative, revolutionary, and transformational. This paper is a reflection and a call.

Contemplative Clinical Supervision: Secularized Lectio Divina to Cultivate Multicultural Awareness

Julie Quigley, Christie Nelson — Tue, 05 Mar 2024 00:00:00 -0800

Research has shown that when educators present information creatively, it strongly influences the connection to the material. Contemplative practices offer a creative method to incorporate multicultural training into clinical supervision through transformative learning experiences. This study explores the impact of a contemplative learning tool, Lectio Divina, on students’ level of multicultural competence in a clinical supervision course (n = 21). A mixed method design was implemented to capture pre and posttest scores using the Multicultural Counseling Inventory (MCI) by measuring students’ multicultural competence. Qualitative data captured counseling students’ experiences during each step of the Lectio Divina intervention to catalog students’ insights and to gather a deeper perspective of the contemplative technique. Quantitative analysis revealed an increase in counseling students’ multicultural awareness. Themes that emerged from the qualitative data were challenging assumptions and biases, judgement and lack of empathy, challenging and suspending judgement, and the power of empathy. Together, findings demonstrate the value of transformative learning applied to clinical supervision, delivered through the contemplative practice of Lectio Divina to foster counselor introspection and increase multicultural awareness.

Can adolescents undergo a transformative learning and teaching process? Extending Mezirow’s Transformative Learning Theory (A South African Perspective)

Ashne Billings-Padiachey, Casey Motsisi — Tue, 05 Mar 2024 00:00:00 -0800

Transformative learning engages learners in drawing on relevant experiences, peer dialogue, and self-reflection in order to respond to challenges encountered in their lives. While much literature suggests that transformative learning is for adults only, our findings, together with those from several recent international studies, as well as authors who have contributed to seminal work, indicate that transformative learning and teaching is also applicable to and valuable for adolescents. This paper also suggests that although South African adolescents in a pre-university program—The Targeting Talent Programme—do not meet the pre-conditions for transformation learning set out by Mezirow, they do however meet the preconditions indicated by other seminal theorists; this is as a result of the peculiar context that these adolescents come from. Additionally, although literature reviewed for this paper focuses on the lecturer-student dynamic in transformative teaching and learning, we use findings from an analysis of questionnaire data obtained from young adult mentors and adolescent mentee in the preuniversity program to argue that mentors, and not just lecturers, can usefully facilitate such learning and that such learning is bi-directional. Mentorship is also regarded as a form of intervention support that student programs use to buffer poor student feedback and address retention and attrition rates. The findings show that mentoring indeed does facilitate intervention support and fosters transformative teaching and learning for higher educational success. Literature also reveals the need for various higher education institutions to put in place a mechanism which optimizes on the support of mentors to uphold students. Given the evidence from the Targeting Talent Programme and the value of transformative teaching and learning for both the psycho-social and academic development of adolescents and young adults, we recommend that higher education institutions consider including this approach in support programs offered at pre-university and undergraduate levels.

Transformative Experiences: A Phenomenological Study of Nursing Students in a Study Abroad Course

Madison Ollive, Jennifer Talleff, Luis Espinoza — Tue, 05 Mar 2024 00:00:00 -0800

Reflective daily journaling was utilized to enhance students’ intrapersonal growth and development. This phenomenological study utilized students’ daily journals from university students enrolled in a study abroad nursing course to identify transformative experiences. All journals were coded by an undergraduate researcher and two faculty researchers producing a kappa coefficient of 0.98. The major themes that emerged were the overall impact of common experiences and discoveries, the number of overall participants that reported a common experience or discovery, and the top three themes for each of the daily journal questions. This study demonstrates that reflective daily journaling utilized in a study abroad course can facilitate the achievement of a set of course objectives for student success in post-secondary education. The findings of this study were utilized by faculty to improve future study abroad course offerings which would help impact personal and professional goals for future nurses.

Who Benefits and Who is Excluded?

Tracie Addy, Tingting Kang, Tim Laquintano, Vivienne Dietrich — Tue, 05 Mar 2024 00:00:00 -0800

In our essay, we discuss equity implications surrounding the usage of generative artificial intelligence (AI) in higher education. Specifically, we explore how the use of such technologies by students in higher education such as, but not limited to, multi-language learners, students from marginalized linguistic communities, students with disabilities, and low-income students has the potential to facilitate transformative learning. We describe how such tools, when accessible to learners, can help address barriers that prevent students from fully engaging in their learning. Additionally, we explain how the usage of generative AI has the potential to alter the lens through which students view their learning, countering assumptions and broadening what can be considered an “appropriate” use of assistive technologies to support learning for diverse students. We also address various limitations of generative AI with regards to equity such as the requirement to pay to access some of the applications, as well as linguistic and other biases within the outputs produced, reflective of the data used to train the tools. Throughout this piece, we share insights from a study of undergraduate students’ perspectives and usage of generative AI and potential future directions for the technologies. This essay aims to increase awareness of the opportunities and challenges around who benefits and who is excluded when generative AI is used within colleges and universities.