21: The Reacting to the Past Pedagogy and Engaging the First-Year Student

Abstract

This chapter investigates the value of the Reacting to the Past pedagogy with regard to engaging first‐year students. In recent years, calls to improve student engagement and active learning techniques have grown, and few have been as successful in producing the desired results as Reacting to the Past. This chapter investigates why Reacting is so successful in meeting the goals of high‐impact practices that increase student engagement and learning. We also examine how the Reacting pedagogy and first‐year seminars encourage problem solving, critical thinking, and writing among students.

Harnessing Students' Competitive Spirit: Using <em>Reacting to the Past</em> to Structure the Introductory Greek Culture Class

“…They also tend to take more of an interest in their own education and form learning communities with their fellow classmates. For information about and general assessments of Reacting to the Past, seeLightcap (2009);Lazrus and McKay (2013) andCarnes (2014). For formal studies of Reacting to the Past, seeHigbee (2008);Stroessner, Beckerman and Whittaker (2009);Olwell and Stevens (2015); andWebb and Engar (2016).…”