Center for Engaged Learning

COVID-19: An Unexpected Adversary—and Ally—for Immersive Learning Research

by Phillip Motley I was on sabbatical in the spring semester of 2019 and thus escaped much of the turmoil of the COVID-19 pandemic that affected students and teachers alike at Elon University and most other institutions of higher education. …

Service-learning/Community Engagement Opportunities and Immersive Learning

by Phillip Motley Like many higher education institutions, Elon University is many things, including a place of opportunity and possibility. Since my last blog post, I was selected to serve as Elon’s next Faculty Fellow for Service-Learning and Community Engagement …

Research on Immersive Learning: How to Know When Enough is Enough?

by Phillip Motley In short order, I’ll have collected close to 25 interviews with colleagues who are involved in some way with immersive learning. Most of the interviews are with Elon faculty and staff, but a few are from colleagues …

Immersion is a Structure, and a Construct

by Phillip Motley The coronavirus pandemic has slowed, but not stopped, my investigation of immersive learning practices in higher education. In particular, my plans to conduct in-person interviews of university teaching faculty about their experiences with immersive learning have been …

Defining the Characteristics of Immersive Learning

by Phillip Motley Attempting to fully define the characteristics of immersive learning is a distinct challenge. What pedagogies count and which ones don’t? Is there a specific line in the sand that demarcates what is and isn’t immersive learning, and …

Curricular Structures That Facilitate Immersive Learning

by Phillip Motley As part of my exploration of pedagogies that constitute immersive learning, it is hard to ignore Elon University’s robust use of a specific curricular structure: our winter term. Every January at Elon, students can elect to enroll …

Immersive Learning at ISSOTL

by Phillip Motley My previous two blog posts on immersive learning have touched on experiences that I am directly involved with at Elon University. While I feel strongly that both approaches to teaching and learning are clear examples of immersive …

The Design Thinking Studio in Social Innovation

by Phillip Motley In the spring semester of 2017, four faculty members and fourteen students at Elon University embarked on an immersive semester exploration of using design thinking tools and processes to address social challenges in the community surrounding the …

International Service-Learning

by Phillip Motley Imagine a group of college students, under the guidance of a professor, working on a community-driven project where the lived experience of members of that community and the problems they would like to solve are the driving …

What is Immersive Learning?

by Phillip Motley As Elon University’s newest Center for Engaged Learning Scholar, I am embarking on a two-year study of what constitutes “immersive learning” in higher education. I have been interested in this topic for quite a while, although I …

An International Center for Research on Engaged Learning