Advocating for blended pedagogy as a shift to more holistic inclusive geography

Bibliographic Data

ID11954005
AuthorsSiobhán McPhee (0000-0002-4463-8634, Department of Geography, The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, corresponding author)
Year2021
Volume46
Issue4
Pages495-506
Publication date2021-07-22
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Geography in Higher Education (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0309-8265 • E-ISSN: 1466-1845
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/03098265.2021.1957802
OpenAlexW4205711342
LanguageEN
Citations received4
References cited22

Applied geography represents the dialectic relationship between theory and application (Pacione 1999 Pacione, M. (1999). Applied geography: in pursuit of useful knowledge.Applied Geography,19(1), 1–12. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0143622898000319[Crossref] , [Google Scholar], 2004 Pacione, M. (2004). The principles and practice of applied geography. In Applied Geography (pp. 23–45). Springer, Dordrecht. https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-1-4020-2442-9_3[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]). A well-informed rigorous pedagogy must represent this dialectical relationship (Pacione 1999 Pacione, M. (1999). Applied geography: in pursuit of useful knowledge.Applied Geography,19(1), 1–12. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0143622898000319[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]). How then can the relationship between the theoretical and the applied be challenged within the “spaces” of the university? I provide a critical discussion of the use of a blended learning pedagogy (Davis & Fill 2007 Davis, H. C., & Fill, K. (2007). Embedding blended learning in a university's teaching culture: Experiences and reflections. British Journal of Educational Technology,38(5), 817–828. https://bera-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1467-8535.2007.00756.x[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) in challenging that there is a separation of theoretical and applied geography. A blended learning pedagogy allows for the inclusion of emerging media and learning technologies as tools in developing a new “space” for teaching and learning, a “space” which is focused on active learning. The walls of the university lecture room become porous, as students begin to make critical connections between theory and application. I unpack the pedagogical justification for a shift to a blended learning approach. I support this justification with evidence from curriculum design in a first-year geography course, and the student experience of implementation of this blended learning approach. I assess student engagement with theory through the integration of real-world case studies into a blended delivery approach. I evaluate their critical engagement by applying a mixed-method approach to a survey and follow-up focus group

Critical geography · Cultural geography · Dialectic · Epistemology · Human geography · Inclusion (mineral · Mathematics education · Pedagogy · Social science · Sociology · Computer Science · Geography and Education Methods · Geography Education and Pedagogy · Global Education and Multiculturalism · Philosophy · Psychology