Sense of belonging and interactive pedagogies

Edward Venn (School of Music)

Project overview

This project will research the factors shaping students’ sense of belonging within interactive pedagogical environments, in order to identify practices that enhance such a sense, and those that inhibit or reduce it. If good practice with interactive pedagogies and sense of belonging is to be identified, current scholarly literature suggests that we need to

Understand the multiple dimensions of sense of belonging;
Know how enhancement of (and for that matter, constraints upon) sense of belonging might be meaningfully evidenced;
Develop clearly focused studies that can draw on such evidence to demonstrate in practice how interactive pedagogies enhance sense of belonging.

The aim of this research is ultimately to transform ways of thinking about interactive pedagogies and student sense of belonging. It has the potential to impact four distinct groups:

Teachers who employ, or look to employ, interactive pedagogies;
Managers of student education;
Learning technologists supporting and enhancing interactive pedagogies;
Staff engaged in training and delivering professional development.

The research approach

Research methods will include:

An integrated review of the literature on the theories and measurement of sense of belonging in the academic classroom;
In the light of the findings from (1), gather qualitative data (questionnaires, interviews) from staff and students in targeted modules in the University of Leeds to understand better sense of belonging in an interactive pedagogical environment;
Conduct a thematic analysis of data from (2) and report findings.

If you would like to find out more about the project please contact Edward (E.J.Venn@leeds.ac.uk).

Each fellowship has a project sponsor that helps the fellows achieve impact across the institution. The sponsor for this fellowship is Louise Banahene.

Project start date: October 2021