Bonni Stachowiak [00:00:00]:

Today on episode number 523 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast, communication literacy in an AI World with Judith Dutill. Produced by Innovate Learning, Maximizing Human Potential. Welcome to this episode of Teaching in Higher Ed. I’m Bonni Stachowiak, and this is the space where we explore the art and science of being more effective at facilitating learning. We also share ways to improve our productivity approaches, so we can have more peace in our lives and be even more present for our students. I am so excited to be welcoming to the show Dave, Judith Dutill. She’s been a dedicated educator in higher education for 19 years. She’s passionate about helping students become more confident communicators as you’ll hear throughout today’s episode.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:01:08]:

Beyond the classroom, she has extensive experience in instructional design, faculty development, and assessment. Currently, Judith serves as the manager of institutional research and assessment at Urban College of Boston. She lives in Lancaster, Pennsylvania with her family and their beloved mini poodle latte. And, Judith, I wanna welcome you and also say that is the cutest pet name I may have heard on the show all this time. I’m so glad that you’re here.

Judith Dutill [00:01:38]:

Thank you, Bonni. I’m so happy to be here, and I will say Latte came with her name.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:01:45]:

Okay.

Judith Dutill [00:01:45]:

It came that way, but it fits her personality perfectly. She’s she’s adorable and full of energy.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:01:51]:

I love that. Well, today, we’re gonna be looking at communication as illiteracy, and there are so many literacies that are filling my mind recently looking once again at digital literacies and how artificial intelligence is impacting those things. So I’ve been looking forward to today’s conversation since we scheduled it together, but I need you to take us back first. Did you tell us about a time where you started to see this real tension between what we teach as far as communication literacies or what we think we teach and what actually shows up in a different context outside of classroom.

Judith Dutill [00:02:30]:

Yeah. Absolutely. I have a lot of experience listening to student presentations. I’ve listened to 1,000 of them at this point in my career, and there’s there’s certainly a lot to say about those presentations. But what I’m thinking about as something that I would like to shine shine a light on, concentrate on, and focus on today is inner personal communication and the importance of conversation skills and interviewing skills. And we had at my previous employer, we had student workers who would work the front desk, greet people, and get them what they needed. And I lost my keys one day at work. I went to the desk.

Judith Dutill [00:03:18]:

I asked the worker if we had a lost and found. They said that there is a lost and found, but it’s at the student union building. I asked the student if they could call the student union building for me to check to see if they received a set of keys. And the student looked at me and looked at the phone and looked at me and looked at the phone, and I could just see panic washing over them that they were going to have to place this phone call. And at that moment, my communication educator persona kicked in, and I just thought, okay. We’re in this now. We’re we’re making the phone call. So I walked him through making the phone call and asking the question, and it really did leave an impression on me, a lasting impression, about the importance of this skill.

Judith Dutill [00:04:10]:

And it’s only reinforced by other work that I’ve done for communication disciplines at other institutions where I’ve served on advisory boards. And we hear from local regional employers, and they say, yes. Communication is still a top skill, and we need employees who are better at it.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:04:31]:

And I’d love to hear you share a little bit more about that. I also very much am interested in the surveys that I see that come out from employers. However, in the conversations that I have been able to participate in, I often have a sense I don’t have a lot of data to back it up, Judith. That’s why you’re here. But I just have the sense that when employers are saying that, it’s often showing up, you know, in a chart, number one skill, communication. Oh, the following year, number one skill, communication. But I just don’t see the conversation going far enough to even have people who have spent much of their career in an academic context to know what that means. Could you share a bit about what you have found employers mean when they say, we need better communication skills from people graduating from universities and what we often think of.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:05:25]:

And I certainly don’t wanna stereotype us as faculty. I wanna be very careful of that. By the way, I was also laughing at the student, but also laughing at myself because sometimes I don’t like making phone calls, especially if it feels high stakes. If it’s in a medical context, I just feel like I could cry at any moment. So when I was laughing, I’m laughing with the student you’re talking about. And when I’m talking about faculty, I think all of us just need to be emphasizing preparing students for a different context than what can sometimes show up in a classroom. So let me let you answer the question because I know you’ve got lots to share.

Judith Dutill [00:05:58]:

Yeah. I think that’s such an important question. We hear from employers about communication all of the time, and what they’re talking about is interpersonal communication, typically conversation skills, being able to engage the client or, in a health care setting, the patient, being able to clearly explain things, being able to demonstrate steps in a process, being able to respond to the questions or needs of that individual, being able to anticipate the questions and needs of that in individual. And just me explaining that, just thinking of that smallest, how many skills that involves and how I believe I’ll speak for myself. I’ve taken for granted the practice that I’ve had to be able to confidently do that type of work. And the reality is is that in the classroom in the college classroom, we don’t often emphasize that type of communication as a skill that’s worth teaching, talking about, assessing, and we focus instead on more formal types of communication. What’s interesting is National Communication Association has a basic course group that focuses on upholding the tenets of the basic course and keeping it relevant and important. There was a period of time, in the early 2000 where the basic course was kind of under attack.

Judith Dutill [00:07:41]:

Is this really necessary to have? Do we need to have a basic course in communication when, as we know, communication occurs across the discipline? And what National Communication Association believes is that, yes, it’s important to treat this like a skill. And, traditionally, many colleges have interpreted this as public speaking, making presentations and using that context of communication to focus on. And what’s interesting and not probably as well known is that National Communication Association does acknowledge other context of communication that are appropriate for the basic course. They can include interpersonal communication, small group, and business and professional communication that you can really stylize or specialize the course to the needs of the the audience, your students. And when I learned communication as a student, there was a lot of formality in it. I remember for business and professional communication, I needed the blue suit, the navy suit. I needed a barrette for my hair. I needed pantyhose.

Judith Dutill [00:08:56]:

Love it.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:08:58]:

I love it. I don’t remember the barrette days, but I certainly remember the pantyhose days. Yes.

Judith Dutill [00:09:04]:

That was professional communication. It was an element of it. Style is part of communication. Yes. It’s but it’s culturally relative part of communication. It changes over time. And what our curriculum’s not great at is responding to those types of changes and making sure that the curriculum that we’re teaching and the way that we’re talking about communication with our peers is focused on the relevant types of communication that people need to use.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:09:41]:

I wanna be careful how I tell this story. It was a long time ago, and I know that anytime we bring a memory up from the past, we’re altering the memory, so I wanna be cautious. But I had a student who was very concerned. I’ve I had come to know her well, and so I feel like she felt more confident about pushing back to on me than she might have in other context with her professors, and she was upset about that my grading for their final presentation, that they would be marked down if they held a note card during it, and this was very upsetting for her. I had seen her communicate so many times in the classroom extemporaneously, and I do realize that there would be lots of disabilities that might fall under why someone would need an accommodation. So she and I just agreed that, because I had seen her so many times speak without notes in the class, would she be willing to try to give the presentation without the notes? And that if somehow it did without a note card, somehow it did affect the grade that she could get. Could we talk about it afterward and have any number of options? So I was able to gain her trust, but I feel icky even telling you this story, Judith, because I the lesson here is not don’t listen to people’s accommodation letters. By the way, she did not have in her accommodation letter any mention of having to have a note card to support her in communicating.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:11:06]:

But I just I guess for me, I wanna so difficult to know. Oh, by the way, I should end the story in the happiness that it was. She, as I suspected, was phenomenal. I mean, she was phenomenal. She did not need that as a tool to be an effective communicator, but she thought that she did. But I just wanna be careful because we’re not always going to be able to parse out very well what people’s absolute needs are for accommodation. So I don’t want the lesson to come to anybody listening. Like, don’t listen to what somebody tells you they need.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:11:42]:

But at the same time, that compassionate challenge, and I’m saying that from so many lessons I’ve gotten from Sarah Rose Cavanagh about compassionate challenge, and that’s what I was attempting to do. I was successful in that particular context with that particular student. But any advice that you would have for us as we’re thinking about compassionate challenge to help people be more confident and clear in their communication when it is incredibly challenging and they’re gonna want and and we also model for them. You see the faculty who will put all kinds of notes on their slides. And when you suggest that perhaps the notes wouldn’t have to be on the side, but I need those notes in order to remember what I’m gonna say. So we shouldn’t just be pointing our fingers at the at the students either. So what’s your reaction about how do we kinda separate? What does compassionate challenge look like in helping students grow this kind of communication literacy that you’re describing, and where maybe would someone like me have gone too far in that example that I gave you?

Judith Dutill [00:12:44]:

I I this is a really important question as well. There is a lot of tradition that comes along with public speaking and some, like I said previously, culturally relative conventions that we believe, for some reason, need to be followed. And I think that is what makes it challenging. I have a very unscientific theory, so bear with me. Just through my observation as an educator and someone who works with other educators that when a discipline is very subjective, and it’s going to be your job to assess the work that you’re presented that we look for objective things to be able to obsess.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:13:39]:

Mhmm.

Judith Dutill [00:13:39]:

Things like, did the student have a note card? Did they have a visual aid? Checking the boxes of did they, did they, did they, did they because it’s yes or it’s no. Whereas in reality, communication is a very subjective thing, but I think there is a common definition that we could all agree on that effective communication is creating meaning and being understood. And if we can achieve that at the end of the experience, that the the purpose has been served in the work that that that individual has done. It’s hard because we know too that that our students need to learn some of these conventions because they will be assessed on them outside of the classroom as well. So I think that we would be remiss not to talk about things like tone of voice and and performative aspects of communication and the importance of those in creating meaning, but it’s not the whole thing. Right? There’s something else that we’re looking for, and we really need to know what that is. If we’re presenting something as an opportunity to show me what you’ve learned, what you know, what you can do, do I have to be so prescriptive in all of these other areas?

Bonni Stachowiak [00:15:11]:

And so what would your advice have been to me had you been sitting with me before I met with the student who had concerns about the note card? What would you told me?

Judith Dutill [00:15:18]:

If you need a note card, use the note card. If you if you feel that you need something to be a better presenter, if it’s going to give you that confidence, I think it’s okay keeping in mind that the context where that student is presenting is the classroom, and you are making the rules for that classroom. That is a context that what is appropriate is really determined by you and your students. And I think that that that that’s okay. And I run into this all of the time with, do I have to stand during my presentation? Can I hold something? Can I have water with me? All of those things that at the end of the day, do they really matter? How much do they affect the outcome? And what message are we sending to our students when we say, absolutely not. No. You cannot have these things to take care of yourself.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:16:19]:

As you’re saying that and thank you for that feedback. As you’re saying that, what I’m realizing might have been happening is I was probably assigning the wrong thing for the skills that I was hoping to gain. What I try to think a lot about and, by the way, it’s been a long time since I have taught a class in that type of a vein, so we’re talking 10 years ago at this point. But what what I remember wanting to attain was for not just this young woman, but anyone coming through to be able to communicate in an organization. And in an organization, you don’t have the time to have note cards. Most of their communication isn’t going to come from these formal presentations in which you’ve had a lot of time to prepare. And most of their communication, in my mind, as you gave this definition, creating meaning and being understood, to me, that is one aspect of communication. It misses out the whole other person and people on the other side, which is what makes it so complex to attempt to equip students.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:17:18]:

And so, anyway, that’s really helpful. I guess one of the things we’re talking about here is really these literacy frameworks. And so I I think what we’re starting to see some tension in our conversation around are the literacy frameworks that we have embedded through professional associations, such as you mentioned, the National Communication Association. Of course, there are so many which might stress the more formal type of presentation. And you’re saying, no. No. No. No.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:17:46]:

No. We’ve gotta be really equipping people. How would you redesign whether you wanna do this on a class level or even if you wanna look at maybe curriculum more broadly speaking to be equipping students better for the kinds of literacies that these organizational leaders are telling us they need more of in our students? How would you redesign if you could just just think from the very beginning what might be different?

Judith Dutill [00:18:10]:

I think we have to think about the the position that our students are coming from in terms of what has prepared them for this moment, and it’s probably less than you think. So if I think back to when I was a child and I’m learning to communicate, and it’s a skill that is very much learned, I remember and I don’t know if you had an experience like this, Bonni, but I remember being taught to answer the telephone and being told some very specific things to say that, you know, it’s the La Perra residence, which was my name at the time, and that mom can’t come to the phone right now if she is unavailable or not there. Heaven forbid anybody know I’m home alone because they will come and steal me. That’s a whole another conversation.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:19:02]:

Yes. Yes.

Judith Dutill [00:19:05]:

But if you think about what that provided for me and, you know, for us, It’s the first type of informational interview, really, that we learn is that exchange on answering the telephone, or we learned, I should say. And that’s not an experience that my daughter, Joanna, who’s in 4th grade, has had herself because she has not had to answer the home phone. And her telephone skills are really different than my telephone skills. And what’s interesting is that in the workplace today, my telephone skills are still relevant because for the most part, it’s still the way things are being done. There’s an office phone that needs to be picked up. The person needs to have that little interview. But I’m not a 100% convinced that that’s going to be my daughter’s experience. The way that she uses the phone is it just looks so different than what I was used to.

Judith Dutill [00:20:08]:

She she talks to someone. She sets it down next to her. She has periods of silence where they’re just doing something else. Yes. Yep. While they’re on the phone together, in many instances, they can see each other. That’s not that’s not an experience that I had. So just really understanding that where they’re coming from as far as training and preparation, it’s really different.

Judith Dutill [00:20:36]:

Basic literacy in the beginning of education, it’s reading, it’s writing, it’s listening, it’s speaking. As we develop in higher education, many of us, and I do I do subscribe to this framework, believe in multiple literacies. And critical literacy is a school of thought that says literacy is multimodal, digital. There’s media literacy, visual literacy, information literacy, and critical literacy. And it’s important to develop in all of those areas, not just one. Or just the the specialized 4, reading, writing, listening, speaking. Because it’s gonna give you a more holistic experience and teach you aspects of communication that I feel I also lacked in my education, things like emotional intelligence, for instance, and being able to really accept more informality and communication and things that are just they’re just part of what communication looks like now and didn’t necessarily in the past. So that’s not our experience.

Judith Dutill [00:21:49]:

I think going back to the point that I’m trying to make that, like, they the the preparation isn’t what we expect it to be. It’s a good reminder that we should in involve our students as much as possible in kind of negotiating our understanding of of what is communication because we may not share meaning around that. And it’s important that even even though we’re not going to probably radically change our own communication, but that we openly understand differences in communication.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:22:27]:

Boy, that last part that you were talking about with the multiple literacies was really helpful to me, and I’m just gonna briefly share that I’m very grateful that our children at their school, they are regularly asked to present, and we have a like you, we have a daughter who’s in 4th grade, and then our son’s in 6th grade right now. And so at such a young age, people do tell me that they’re often surprised the extent to which their school and their teachers really does ask them to present. Our daughter this year in the fall presented in her class, and the teacher the fact it’s hanging on her bed hanging above her bed on the wall. This is how precious that feedback was to her, but said it was the best presentation that she’d ever heard in her career. And I don’t say that to brag about her. Yeah. It certainly would not be my intent, but, my gosh, think about who her parents are. And so both of my husband and I both do podcasts, and so it isn’t often that people would hear the kind of feedback that we get to hear.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:23:24]:

Now our podcasts are both edited, and so thank you, Andrew, our amazing podcast editor. So he saves me from myself. I’ll be like, could you please is there any way we could take that story and tighten it up a bit? And sometimes it can, and sometimes it’s like, you you dug your own Dave. You’re gonna have to lay in it. But but I think about I mean, most people aren’t gonna have where the parents will sit with them for 5 nights in a row before they give it, and there are multiple times a night practicing. That’s just not going to be what it’s going to look like for most. I know you really stress. This is not just a class that you take as part of your general education curriculum.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:24:05]:

We need to be having more interdisciplinary conversations and building these skills in an interdisciplinary way. So if you could help us imagine a little bit, what might that look like? How could we get better at that collectively in higher education such that we are able to take them from where they are, and you’ve said many of them haven’t had some of these basic fundamental things, and do that in a more cross disciplinary way.

Judith Dutill [00:24:32]:

I hear a lot that communication is not important in my course. It’s not relevant in my course speaking about, like, oral communication. And I think inter the thought is, as as we’ve shared earlier, a formal presentation. But if your discipline involves speaking and listening, communication is at the center of it. And it’s it’s really important for our students that they understand that communication, confidence, it it does that transcend context? Like, if you are in a certain discipline, we want you to be conversant with that discipline, and they need opportunities to practice that. And I think that so for me, an example that I I see often in in student presentations is when they’re using the terms related to their topic, related to perhaps their discipline. And, of course, they’re rooted in Latin. We don’t know necessarily what they should sound like.

Judith Dutill [00:25:42]:

And they realize as they’re presenting, I don’t know how to say this word. And it’s a huge learning moment. I I I I will not ever tell somebody that they were wrong to to come up there without knowing how to say it because they have already experienced that feeling of being very raw

Bonni Stachowiak [00:26:09]:

Yeah. To

Judith Dutill [00:26:09]:

to not have practiced those things that they they were going to say. And it’s not just applicable to group settings. We also need to be able to do this in conversation too. So we, I think, tend to focus on that there’s a performative aspect of speaking. Speaking helps us learn. It is a cognitive tool. It aids retention, comprehension, synthesis, application, evaluation, creation, all of them. Right? All all the levels.

Judith Dutill [00:26:46]:

And there is a developmentally appropriate way for you to incorporate speaking in your class where it’s going to be a learning experience for the student. A lot of communication apprehension comes from negative reinforcement. That’s what research shows us. They’ve had a past experience where it went wrong and they were punished, criticized, humiliated, whatever it was that happened that has now created an apprehension to do it again. And that’s something that we could change for our students. We don’t have to make it a scary intimidating, scary awful experience. We can share with students that we had to go through it too. We we needed to learn to speak the language of our discipline.

Judith Dutill [00:27:40]:

We understand that it’s challenging and it’s difficult. We also want you to understand that it’s important and it’s to your benefit. And and those conversations, I think, should be had. It just shouldn’t be an assumption that that is happening.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:27:59]:

Boy, your story is so powerful, and I’m sitting over here chuckling not at what you just said. But I’m thinking about this podcast that we I think whenever we pay for podcasts, it kinda tells you something since the most of them are free. So the ones that are paid, I I feel like that’s you know, they gotta be valuable in that case. I listened to a very geeky one, sort of about technology, technology industry broadly speaking, it’s called Stratechery, and I laugh so hard because they are they’re both the both of the hosts, co hosts, they’re both very smart. They really know what’s happened. I wouldn’t listen if I, you know, I didn’t feel like they knew what they were talking about, and they also, I don’t always agree with the way that they view that business and the industry. So it’s I feel like it’s a really good exercise to be thinking with more of an open mind and hearing different perspectives. Each one of them will mispronounce words on a pretty regular basis, and sometimes it’s like an inside joke because it’ll happen across more and they’ll be, boy, don’t you remember 2 episodes ago that you said? And it’s and it makes me laugh.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:29:00]:

And I wish I could remember what the word was because I think it might make people on the podcast laugh too because it was like, I start to find myself yelling into the, you know, podcast player. That’s not how you say the word. And sometimes it takes the other one. He’ll let the other cohost say it, like, 3 times before he corrects him. It’s so Bonni, but part I think that’s until you said that, Judith, we need to just be able as a people to make mistakes and learn and move right along and recognize that doesn’t mean that you’re not a competent person because we also need to be a people that are taking risks and that are experimenting and trying things on and all of the things. And I know you’ve done so much work in looking at artificial intelligence, and, my gosh, could there be a better space to be thinking about ways we need to be just kind of thinking critically. All the literacies that you mentioned, multimodal information literacy, emotional intelligence coming up in all of these areas, so that was really, really helpful. Before we get to the recommendation segment, I would love to get your advice on one more thing, and that is that you mentioned we should be incorporating these things into all of our classes.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:30:11]:

And so I, in the spring of 2024, had such a wonderful time to get to go watch some kinesiology students at my university and do a poster session. And just exactly like you were saying, I was able to go and converse with each one of the students, hear about their research. One of them stands out because she was studying artificial intelligence in telemedicine. You can imagine I pretty much just wanted to sit down with her and talk to her the whole night. But I think about all the opportunities that they had to learn and practice these skills. Besides poster sessions, what other advice do you have for people listening in different disciplines or maybe, actually, also including the discipline of communication for getting opportunities to practice this interpersonal communication.

Judith Dutill [00:30:58]:

I’ve had this I’ve had similar experiences at those student research events where it really does reinforce to me how important the skill is in so many different ways. Because when the students are presenting their research, it is with such pride and excitement, and they’re happy to talk about the things that they’ve discovered, the experiences that they had. And they can only do that because we have not structured it to the point that they cannot have original thoughts in the moment. And they’re not being forced into this formality. And what I love about those experiences is the way that it builds the confidence of the learner, and it also is building their love for what they’ve learned. And I think that that is that is the positive reinforcement that we want everybody to have, all of our students. And I’ll speak for myself, but I I want my students to love learning. I I just I I want that for them.

Judith Dutill [00:32:11]:

I think that that is the skill that really takes you wherever you wanna go. And I just love that communication can provide those opportunities. So I would say if you wanted to bring that style of assessment into your classroom, that there are small opportunities to do it. It doesn’t have to be a formal presentation. I love interviewing as an assessment style. I think, like, we were talking about taking the phone message, just knowing how to ask questions. The conversation we’re having right now where we are sharing our experiences, relating to one another, It’s centered around a topic. It’s centered around knowledge.

Judith Dutill [00:32:57]:

It is it it it’s learning still. We’re learning from one another, but it’s not so restrictive.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:33:04]:

And when you say interviewing as an assessment style, this is a you’re kind of expanding my imagination, but am I being assessed right now, or are you or both in the way that you’re envisioning this potentially working?

Judith Dutill [00:33:17]:

I think that is is the beauty of it. It could be so many things is that it could be, an interview where you’re asking questions of your learner and you are assessing their responses. It can be a conversation where you’re listening in. I think it also can be go find a professional in your field who’s had this experience or, you know, whatever it is that’s related to the content that you’re teaching, and let them have the opportunity to to lead a conversation. I would say that the one thing you wanna think about is that developmental appropriateness, that we are not pushing a student beyond what they have learned and beyond that comfort zone because we don’t want it to be a negative experience. But encouraging students to express themselves with less rigidity, I think, is is just going to change the dynamics of your classroom too because it’s a less intimidating space. You can talk about communication during discussion. Pointing out the way that the exchange has created meaning is is this better cognitive experience that helps students learn.

Judith Dutill [00:34:36]:

So things like, I hear what you’re saying. This is the meaning that I’m getting. What’s influencing you to feel this way? Questions that can really help folks reflect on why this was the takeaway from the communication experience or why I conveyed it in such a manner as I did. And they can reflect on how they’re going to have to use those same skills to convince you that they have learned and that they know something. And those conversations can be small but really valuable. I think of, Karen Costa, small as all, and it’s it really is. These small moments can do a lot. Inviting natural language functions into the space, requesting information, expressing preferences, practicing being able to ask for what you need even if you don’t know what it’s called.

Judith Dutill [00:35:30]:

That’s something we all have to do.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:35:33]:

Mhmm. I love that.

Judith Dutill [00:35:34]:

The doctor’s office, and we say there’s a thing, and I saw it on the TV. And can you tell me more about it? And we we need to feel that it’s okay. It’s more important to try to try in the communication than not to try. So focusing on meaning making exercises that look for comprehension and comprehensibility.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:35:59]:

Oh, I love it. I I feel a little bit like I have to Karen Costa’s, if she’s listening, is yelling into her podcast player right now because she wants us to say small is all. She’s quoting adrienne maree brown, so I just have to get that straight because otherwise, Karen would never let me live it down. Yes. And then I do have to say you brought up pantyhose earlier. And as the example that you just gave of explaining something when you don’t know what it is, well, I traveled in my twenties. I used to to go all around the world, to run these international conferences. And one time, I left my nylons and underwear at home.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:36:36]:

And I think this attributes back all these decades later to one of the reasons why I’m a nervous traveler because I I I knew that horrifying thing. And where one of the times where I went was London, and that’s not what they’re called there. Tights and tights and, nylons are called tights and knickers. There we go. But and then one time, had my curling iron set on fire in Malaysia. They don’t call them curling irons in Malaysia. And so, like, that that ability to do that, I mean, I’m just thinking about, all of the very awkward conversations I had in both of those cases to discuss those things because, yeah, it’s very, very hard to describe them. Yes, but I did manage to replace the much needed items.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:37:17]:

Anyway, we should probably move on to the recommendation segment, and I’ve got a good one today, Judith. So when David Clark was on, he recommended a board game called Watergate. And I’m not sure what it was because I don’t play board games. I should say I used to not play board games often and right up until Watergate came into our life. So for those listening who may not be familiar with this, this was in the United States. We had a a president Nixon who he had an so I’m not sure why I’m explaining it to you. I should just tell you Watergate was a big piece of political history in the United States. And I can also tell you, it doesn’t matter how much you remember about it or how much you know about it.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:38:03]:

It. It is a game that anyone could play no matter if you know anything about that particular piece of US history. I have found myself getting more curious to go back and learn more about it, but it only the only thing that the gameplay has done for me is make me more curious. Like, oh, I don’t remember that name. I don’t remember how that person was involved in that particular thing, but I don’t have to, like, have much of the historical knowledge. I’m just getting more curious as I play. And so one of you plays the Nixon administration, and the other one plays the journalists. And so the journalists are trying to connect the dots.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:38:37]:

So the board game looks like an old fashioned detective’s board that a pin board. And so there’s little red pins, and there’s string, and you’re trying to connect the people who can provide you with information to what happened. And then if you play the role, it’s a 2 player game, I should say, although you could probably get creative and play it with multiplayer if you wanted to. But Dave and I, my husband and I, Dave just been playing it together. The reason I find it so fun, it’s part strategy, part luck, and the gameplay moves so fast. You will totally think that you’re winning 1 minute. And the next minute, you so, I mean, if we ever if Dave or I ever allow ourselves to get a little bit a little bit sassy, like, think we’re gonna be winning. We’re so close.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:39:21]:

Like, you could just go down the very next turn. So it has these huge swings, highs and lows, and is so so much fun. We are just we’re we’re playing it an awful lot, and we’re not big board gamers. And so, the last thing I wanted to say about it is another game that’s been recommended in the past, a couple times actually, is called Wingspan, and it’s a beautiful board game and a work of art. And I spoke recently with the University of Arkansas faculty, and the whole talk was called bird brains. So birds are a lot in my brain right now. And I’m not ready to recommend it yet because I haven’t actually played it because Dave was out of town recently. So but I opened up the box.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:40:04]:

It is a beautiful work of art just like we were told, but it has onboarding. It’s kind of interesting because it took took Dave and I a while to figure out how how Watergate works because we watched the video. And I might by the way, I would just say read the directions. If you order Watergate, just re you’ll be fine. Read the directions. But both of these games do require a little bit to learn how to play the game. And in the case of Wingspan, what I’m really enjoying is they have onboarding I don’t think they call them onboarding cards, but they basically prescribe 3 rounds of play just so you can get a sense of it rather than try to explain everything that you need to know about how to play the game. They’re like, here, hold this card, play this bird, lay these eggs, move to this habitat.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:40:49]:

And so I was kinda like before Dave got home, I was just trying to see how does this whole thing work. And I kinda think we should just be thinking about how do we bring people into something that is new to them. And just like Judith and I have been talking about this entire time, it’s almost like if these are things that you do have some competencies at, it becomes even harder for us to be effective teachers then because we forget we don’t have that beginner’s mind. So I guess we could be thinking about our classes and how might we have beginner’s mind. And if this piques your interest, by the way, someone’s already contacted me about something that we had a conversation about on another episode. So if this is intriguing to you, this idea of how do we have more beginners mind with our classes and bringing people on, that’s gonna be a future episode, so I’m excited about that. And, Judith, I’m gonna pass it over to you for whatever you’d like to recommend.

Judith Dutill [00:41:39]:

That’s hard to follow. I’m very excited about these 4 games. We’re we’re game players in this house too.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:41:44]:

So that seems

Judith Dutill [00:41:45]:

like a lot of fun. And what a great communication recommendation as well. And what you said about instructions, that that technical communication aspect that we can bring into our classrooms is so important.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:41:58]:

Mhmm.

Judith Dutill [00:41:59]:

Explain to me how to do this.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:42:01]:

Yes.

Judith Dutill [00:42:02]:

And explain to me knowing that I don’t know anything about it, like you said, with the beginner’s mind. I love that.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:42:08]:

It’s hard to do though without over explaining, which I probably just did with Watergate, by the way.

Judith Dutill [00:42:15]:

But we learn from that too. We learn from that. Okay. Next time, I’m I think I’m just gonna get to the point. I used to I used to teach the same class very early in my teaching career 3 times in a row.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:42:27]:

Mhmm.

Judith Dutill [00:42:29]:

That first class, I always ran over by the last class. I was like, I got it.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:42:33]:

Yep. Yep. I did the same thing too. I used to do the same thing too. Yep. Yep. Yep. But what you don’t do, by the way, if anyone listening does teach the same class, 3 sections in a row, do not allow yourself to be like, well, with this class, then I ran over, so I’ll just cover that on Wednesday, but with the other two classes, I won’t do not allow yourself to go off track.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:42:56]:

You you will not be happy. So that’s our little our little extra recommendation for this.

Judith Dutill [00:43:01]:

That is a great tip. A 100% agree.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:43:04]:

Just don’t it’s not gonna be worth it. Whatever you might catch up on the Wednesday, oh, no. No. No. No. You will mess yourself

Judith Dutill [00:43:14]:

recommendations my first one is, I guess, a a little bit more out there, I guess, and it’s to reconnect with your discipline. And I feel like there’s a reason why we all have gravitated toward the subject that we teach. And it probably has something to do with something that you’re passionate about, an experience that you’ve had, a person that you’ve met who changed your life. There’s something that drew you to that discipline. And this summer, if you can, just reconnect with that. I feel like it’s one of the best ways to refresh your teaching, to to get excited about teaching, but also to remind yourself why you think it’s important enough to spend your time doing it. And when I think about why I teach communication, I see all the benefits that my students will receive. Even if they don’t see it, even if they won’t see it while they’re with me, I know eventually it’s going to happen.

Judith Dutill [00:44:18]:

And it really keeps me going, and I have to I have to go back to my discipline. So while I love reading about teaching and learning and becoming a better teacher because it’s what I do. What I talk about is is equally important to me, and I want to stay up to date with that information as well. I would also say to create interdisciplinary opportunities wherever possible. Find other people who are looking to innovate in their classrooms. Figure out how you can do it together so that way you can bring you can make you can help make the connections. Sometimes students look at or I did anyway, classes as individual units instead of, like, the the narrative of a story that’s being told. And we can help them make the connections that they understand.

Judith Dutill [00:45:11]:

Okay. This is a story.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:45:12]:

I love that so much, the narrative of a story. How beautiful to have those kinds of conversations where you can see how the things are weaving together. That’s great.

Judith Dutill [00:45:22]:

And that’s I maybe someday, I don’t know when, but I was like, that would be such a cool podcast is to just ask scholars, why why do you study this? Just tell me why you study this.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:45:32]:

Yeah. It would be. It so would be. We have for our new faculty experience, we have people share 3 artifacts. That they create a little screen cast, and the 3 artifacts are what one of them is what what is it that’s most interesting to you about your discipline? And it’s oh my gosh. It’s so it’s always so memorable for me too, because they’ll do it when they first start. And years later, I’ll often still remember the artifacts and what their video was about.

Judith Dutill [00:46:00]:

Because they really cared about it.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:46:01]:

Mhmm.

Judith Dutill [00:46:02]:

And and you felt that. And I I that is just something that taking that moment to reflect back, to get that excitement back.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:46:10]:

And the constraint, though, of an artifact as opposed to the 72 reasons why you love your discipline, which I’m sure we could Absolutely. We could totally do. Yeah.

Judith Dutill [00:46:19]:

So my other recommendation is to take an improv class. And the reason why I say to do this is because there’s so much that can be learned about yourself through taking an improv class and just communication in general, how people relate to each other, and taking risks and building confidence. And there are so many improv troupes who yes. It was happening before COVID, but since COVID, it’s happening a lot more. They offer professional development types of experiences where if you have if you have the funding for it, you can bring them in to run a workshop for other faculty as well as students. And maybe you could even partner with your student life to to find some of those funds too. But I think that it’s one way is just being playful, having fun with one another, one way to help overcome communication apprehension. Also, if you can involve your students, showing them what risk taking can look like, that you’re not afraid to embarrass yourself, all those things that help us get through communication apprehension and anxiety.

Bonni Stachowiak [00:47:38]:

Oh, that sounds so amazing. Erin Wittig, when she was on the show, talked about taking or maybe she didn’t even mention this on the show. It’s sometimes hard to separate what conversations happen on the podcast and which ones don’t, but she had talked about it, but you just went into more detail about I didn’t really realize what that these kinds of troupes exist and how you might work with them and the idea of incorporating students. What a powerful, powerful example. Well, it has been such a pleasure to get to have you on the show, Judith Dutill. Thank you for being a guest on today’s episode. Today’s episode was produced by me, Bonni Stachowiak. It was edited by the ever talented Andrew Kroeger. Podcast production support was provided by the amazing Sierra Priest. And if you’ve yet to sign up for the weekly updates from Teaching in Higher Ed, I encourage you to head over to teachinginhighered.com/subscribe. And if you do, you’ll get the links to things like, you know, Watergate and to Judith’s recommendations, but you’ll also get some recommendations and other sources that don’t show up in the regular show notes. So head over to teaching in higher ed dot com slash subscribe. Thanks so much for listening, and I’ll see you next time on Teaching in Higher Ed.

Teaching in Higher Ed transcripts are created using a combination of an automated transcription service and human beings. This text likely will not represent the precise, word-for-word conversation that was had. The accuracy of the transcripts will vary. The authoritative record of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcasts is contained in the audio file.