Submission Type
General Submission
Abstract
Student evaluations of teaching (SETs) help faculty to get feedback on their teaching, identify areas of strength and growth, and document their teaching effectiveness from the student perspective. While much has been written about whether or not student evaluations are biased (Benton & Cashin, 2012; Kogan, et al., 2010; Shorter, 2023), about the validity of student evaluations in measuring student learning (Uttl et al., 2017), and how to interpret data (Davis, 2009; Hoover-Dempsey n.d.; Lewis, 2001; Linse, 2017; Perlmutter, 2011; Petchers & Chow, 1988; Reibman, 2004), we offer a new, mindful approach to reading student evaluations that might help instructors engage more thoughtfully and deeply with student feedback: slow reading. Slow reading has been associated with deeper, more meaningful, and clearer understandings of texts (Bach & Alexander, 2015; Corrigan, 2013; Elkins et al., 2019; Haight, 2010; Kahane, 2014; Keator, 2018; & Lichtmann, 2005). In this reflective essay, we make visible our efforts to engage in a deliberately paced, mindful, and reflective reading of SETs over the period of multiple months, resulting in increased equanimity in the evaluation process, deeper engagement with student perspectives on learning, and greater intimacy with the features of our courses.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
Recommended Citation
Baldi, Brian and Kuusinen, Colleen M.
(2025)
"Slow Reading Course Evaluations: From Discomfort to Discovery,"
Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education: Vol. 3:
Iss.
1, Article 8.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.25035/jche.03.01.08
Available at:
https://scholarworks.bgsu.edu/jche/vol3/iss1/8
Included in
Contemplative Education Commons, Holistic Education Commons, Humane Education Commons, Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Commons