Teaching
Featured Course: Human Rights in the Digital Age
About the Course
My new course Human Rights in the Digital Age was offered for the first time this Summer. Students gained insight into how information and communication technologies and networked media both uphold and undermine Human Rights. I have posted some reflections on teaching the course on my blog.
Course Description
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), negotiated and affirmed by governments of the Unites Nations, stand as a firm commitment to uphold and protect fundamental human rights, the dignity and worth of each person and the equal rights of men and women. Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) present tremendous opportunities to enable individuals, communities and peoples to achieve their full potential in promoting their sustainable development and improving their quality of life. This course explores each section of the UDHR as applied to the Internet, to examine how the Internet can evolve in a way that further expands and supports these rights.
View course Wiki
Course Recommendation
"Dr. Robert Bodle is an outstanding professor at the College of Mount Saint Joseph. He is extremely passionate concerning Human Rights in the Digital Age which was a recent course I pursued at the College of Mount Saint Joseph. He is engaging, understanding, energetic, and intelligent. His extensive knowledge intertwined with his creativity opens up a whole new arena of thought. Best of all, he is approachable, and is always willing to answer any questions. I came away from this course exceedingly knowledgeable with the intricacies of new digital technology with human rights implications. I highly endorse Professor Bodle’s teaching style and if I get a chance to work with him again in the future, I will surely enjoy another academic encounter under his tutelage. Marianne Carella Supply Chain Professional" Marianne Carella, Student, College of Mount St. Joseph, July 28, 2010
Other Courses
Teaching Philosophy and Approach
Creating a Healthy Climate
I have found healthy climates to be a gateway to trusting, sharing, confirming, and most importantly, learning. If students are not comfortable they will tune the professor out no matter how impassioned or expert they are in their field. I work quite hard to create a comfortable and trusting environment (climate) in all of my classes. I establish a common ground by disclosing some of my life experiences, "integrating life and learning," so that students perceive me to be a unique individual. Part of my approach, then, is to connect with students using real life examples and sharing my own opinions while encouraging counter-positions, even rewarding those who disagree and take a well-argued stand on an issue. In class discussion, I often push students to clarify, articulate, and provide supporting evidence. I also use class discussion to confront fallacious arguments including contradiction and hasty generalization. But I am only able to push students to test and challenge their thinking because there is a basis of trust that is established. Students know that they will not lose face if they change their minds, fight hard for their positions, and express themselves. I work to foster a healthy class climate, enabling me to guide student learning through humor, self-disclosure about my own learning process, (including my reasoning and active scholarship), and by establishing mutual respect.
Respecting Diversity
Establishing mutual respect requires acknowledging and supporting diversity in the classroom. Diversity of opinion often expresses social standpoints based on age, race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, socio-economic background, and life experience. Adult learners, first generation college students, people of color, people from working class backgrounds, and others are empowered in classes that respect diversity of opinion, race, class, faith, and sexual orientation. By responding positivity to diversity I encourage a healthy climate that enables student learning, independent thinking, and social learning.
Watching Me Think: Collaborating in the Learning Process
Hubert Dreyfus, Professor of Philosophy at UC Berkeley, suggests that there is no one right way to teach, rather each class is a collaboration with students who are encouraged to think through problems, issues, and material along with the instructor. Dreyfus explains that he encourages his students to watch him think. This suggests that that while instructors impart knowledge, they are also learning with students. I provide access to my learning process by integrating my research and scholarship into lectures and class discussion. Students are encouraged to watch me think, to see how I frame issues and arguments, use evidence to support my assertions, and challenge assumptions. Students are encouraged to collaborate with me in testing my hypotheses, claims, theses, and findings.
Social Learning in the Digital Age
Recent studies suggest that students of today (Milleneals, Net generation and digital natives) primarily learn through social interaction and self-directed learning. In their essay, Minds on Fire: Open Education, the Long Tail, and Learning 2.0 (2008), Brown and Adler suggest that learning involves participation, peering, informal environments, and collective problem solving. In a recent study, Living and Learning with New Media: Summary of Findings from the Digital Youth Project (Ito, Horst, Bittani, boyd, Herr-Stephenson, Lange, & Pascoe, 2008), teens were found to learn online in the least likely of places, in chatrooms, on social network sites (SNSs like Facebook), virtual worlds, and gaming environments. Young people in the digital age are often gathering information by "grazing," taking a "deep dive," and through the "feed-back loop" (2008). Students scan information from several sources (both offline and online), dive deeper into topics of interest (geek out), and engage with this information by reworking it in many online platforms, sharing with others. To better adapt to how young people learn in the digital age. I try to guide instead of control students’ education. I provide online resources, assignments, and environments to encourage social learning both inside and outside the classroom. I often set up course wikis with all course material posted online including: PowerPoints, journals, readings and viewings. I also provide blog sites for students to share information and engage with the course material in a more informal context. And I am actively exploring ways virtual worlds can be used in higher learning. By collaborating in the learning process and providing social learning contexts, I encourage students to be “self-directed learners” and "responsible decision-makers."
Learning Links
- Archbishop Alter Library
- Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education
- Atomic Learning
- Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education
- Librarian’s Internet Index
- MITOpenCourseWare
- National Association for Media Literacy Education
- Open Education Resources
- Open Learning Initiative
- OpenCourseWare Consortium
- OhioLINK
- Students for Free Culture
- Wikipedia
Developed Courses
Courses I have developed and taught include:
- Visual Communication
- New Media and Society
- Culture and Community in Cyberspace
- Issues of Access, Issues of Control: A Study of Cultural Activism on the Net
- Mass Media and Contemporary Culture
- American Film Authors
- History of the Motion Picture
- French Cinema
- Film in Social Context: American Cinema and Society Since the Late Sixties
- New Documentary and Social Change
- Non Linear Digital Editing
- Spoken Word
