Celebrating Teachers as Co-Designers: A Look at Their Journey

Over the past year and a half, 12 dedicated high school world history educators from around the country have collaborated with researchers at Digital Promise, OER Project, and the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education. Together, these educators and researchers are designing world history curricular resources to support powerful classroom learning experiences for students, especially those who have been historically and systematically excluded.

The Deeper Discussions in World History project team has learned with and from these teachers about how to elevate their teaching expertise and insights into the design process and developed resources. As the co-design phase of the project concludes—during which teachers and researchers collaborated to design lesson plans and resources—the team would like to recognize and celebrate this phenomenal cohort of educators and their journey.

Celebrating Teachers’ Co-Design Achievements

These resources could not have been developed without teachers’ continued commitment to this work. Teachers not only contributed their invaluable input, but also devoted their time and energy to three successful in-person design workshops and weekly virtual design meetings.

Members of the co-design team, including teachers and researchers, met virtually to share updates on the pilot lessons being developed.

We celebrate each co-design teacher and their remarkable achievements, which include:

• Developing and piloting 16 discussion-based lessons in their classrooms
• Designing and refining the lessons based on multiple factors, such as student input, research-based frameworks, and team feedback
• Reflecting with other co-design teachers in a professional learning community environment about their implementation successes and challenges to develop practical classroom strategies
• Submitting conference proposals and presenting aspects of their co-design work to practitioner and researcher audiences at the National Council for the Social Studies Conference

A group of five co-design team members stand in front of their poster at the National Council for the Social Studies Conference in December 2023.

Teacher Reflections on Their Co-Design Experience

Through informal small group check-ins, one-on-one conversations, and post-workshop surveys, the project team continuously captured and documented teachers’ authentic reflections throughout their design journey. This process helped center teachers and their students’ voices in the co-designed resources and helped the project team make timely refinements and improvements to the overall design process.

For many of the teachers, this project was the first time they had engaged in co-design. They reflected positively on the experience, sharing how their engagement has shifted their mindsets, influenced their teaching practice, and supported their ongoing professional development.

“So I think this project is seeing [team member’s] thinking change and to just open my mind up to all the different types of [classroom instruction] that are possible. But I wouldn’t say that only has influenced World History for me. I would say that’s going to influence all my teaching.” – Maya Jonsson

“There are a lot of things that I wouldn’t have tried had I not been exposed to all the awesome people that are part of Digital Promise, that are part of this project. Being in year 14, I think I have like a routine of what I think good teaching looks like, what I think learning looks like, what I think student achievement, growth, all of that stuff looks like, [but in] one area where I wasn’t taking risks, I wasn’t letting students, I wasn’t ceding control of my classroom to students.” – Steven Virgone

“This has been a wonderful experience to be able to [collaborate among teachers]. I’m used to working with the teachers in my school, but to work with teachers who teach in different states and different districts with different accountabilities, it’s been a very good experience. It’s taught me a lot about myself and my district and my own teaching. So I’ve really enjoyed that. I know others in the group have enjoyed that as well.” – Melissa Quinn

Many teachers also shared their sentiments and hopes for the co-designed resources and the potential impact for students and world history teachers broadly.

“I really hope this curriculum gives teachers an opportunity to have students doing history, interpreting primary sources together, making meaning together. I think in the process they learn competencies. They learn skills that hopefully they’ll take with them in the rest of their lives. So I think that this is probably the most important in the social studies curriculum or in the social studies classroom. And I hope that teachers will use these tools to challenge their students and to trust them to be the sense makers.” – Adam Esrig

“And for teachers, especially new teachers who are working so hard on classroom management, for them to feel confident and comfortable enough to let go and actually be a facilitator, that doesn’t normally happen in those first few years of teaching. And so I would love for them to be able to look at our research and resources and feel comfortable enough to try it.” – Dani Jennings

The research reported here was supported by the Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education, through Grant R305A220457 to Digital Promise. The opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not represent views of the Institute or the U.S. Department of Education.