Episode 12 - Design Thinking in the Classroom: A Conversation with Dr. Meghalee Das on UX, AI, and the Writing Process

Welcome back to the CFI Faculty Lounge Podcast, where we explore the experiences, challenges, and strategies of dedicated educators. In this episode, host Eric Magrum continues the conversation with Dr. Meghalee Das, diving deeper into how user experience (UX) design principles can shape more intentional and student-centered classrooms. 

Dr. Das shares insights on: 

• Applying UX design to create engaging learning experiences 
• Navigating the possibilities and challenges of AI in the classroom 
• Emphasizing process over product in writing and learning 

Tune in for part two of this thoughtful conversation with Dr. Das as she reflects on the role of design, technology, and reflection in fostering authentic student learning. 

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Transcript

“And again, as I mentioned, because I'm a UX researcher, the humanity of the instructor and the student and our audience, all of these things is what I emphasize in the way I teach. Like, I'm not a robot who is just telling you, this is how you write a proposal.

Welcome to the CFI Faculty Lounge Podcast, an outlet created for continuous learning and actual insights for faculty. I'm your host, Eric Magrum, inviting you to join us in conversation with dedicated educators who share their experiences, challenges, and effective solutions. Today, we continue our conversation with Dr. Meghalee Das, and we dive deeper into user experience design, AI, and the writing process.

Enjoy.

So we have discussed in our previous episode, instructional design or mentioned instructional design and user experience design. Can you tease out the difference between those? And then talk about how those things have influenced you or might influence others?

I know those are loaded questions.

Yeah. And so I'll start with user experience design first. So user experience is the study of a user's needs, goals, expectations, what they want, but also what they feel, whether they are satisfied with an experience or not, whether they find it memorable or not, whether they want to come back to that particular product or service or not.

So therefore, user experience is not just concerned with efficiency and usability, but also satisfaction. And this looks at the user as a whole and not just whether I could perform the task by using this product, but also whether I had fun doing it. And user experience research is conducted on various things.

You know, it could be the design of, like I said, a product, a service. A user can be an audience, it can be a student, it can be anybody who is using a certain service or a product. So that is user experience design.

And once we have the knowledge about what our users need, then we can design a product or service more efficiently and that caters to those needs. So that is basically the concept behind user experience design. Instructional design can exist without user experience design. 

Also, instructional design is essentially creating instructional experiences, whether it is online, in person, whether it is distant, but you are conveying information. Usually, it is related to perhaps a course or a certain thing that you're trying to teach to a class. And there are certain strategies that we can use in order to make sure that the learning outcomes for that particular thing you're trying to reach or instruct is met.

And there are lots of different instructional design theories. There is universal design, there is Adi. There are many, many other from even Inclusive Design.

There are different parts. And I have researched parts of all these different techniques. And all of them have advantages obviously.

Otherwise, they would not exist. But they also have certain things which I felt were not inclusive or meeting the needs of the current or the contemporary classroom that we have in higher education today. And so user experience with its focus on the student, in this case, the student user of those technologies, takes an approach where the focus is not just on the strategy, but on the student itself.

And from there, the strategies evolve. Also, you know, for example, UDL is sometimes a little rigid. And but as I mentioned, SEOL or the learner heuristic, we are constantly iterating.

We are seeking feedback. We are improving. So it is more flexible that way. 

SEOL and, you know, learner heuristic also talks about usability. There was a line where I talked about that, you know, we must adopt tools which are usable, which takes into account the fact that, yes, there are technologies being used, especially in online classrooms. And so we need to make sure that we also, you know, demonstrate what some of those tools are.

So user experience design thinks about these things because the focus is on the user and what they need rather than the end product and what. So the difference in, essentially, I would say, one is in the field itself, because as I mentioned, user experience can be anything, not just instructional design, but the approach is also slightly different, although the goals might be same.

So both are student-centered.

They are. They are student-centered. But as I mentioned, the approach of how they want to apply those strategies might be a little different.

And I can't remember the exact instructional design framework right now. But there are certain frameworks where you have a checklist, where you have a checklist of, I think, what's quality matters, I think that's what it's called. So basically, there are list of things that you must do.

If you do that, great. You will have a great class. Well, no, not always.

And that's where the user experience aspect comes. Like, yeah, these are great strategies. But then if you cannot adapt it according to what your users' needs are, and you can't keep changing those things and be flexible, then there will be some people who will be left behind.

And that is not what user experience research wants. And again, just to clarify, user experience research is not just related to instructional design. It is basically UX research that we conduct on whether, you know, I am creating a new software or this new TV.

It can be anything that is UX research. But in this context, yes, I'm talking about the user as a student and so what their needs are.

And so, one could... In my classrooms, I tell my kids straight out, if I am having fun, that means you're having fun and we're probably learning. If I am not having fun, that certainly means you're not having fun and you probably aren't learning very much.

And I think you could help somebody learn with instructional design and they might be having fun. But I think focusing the UX, at least in my experience, the user experience design puts more the onus on the student and what is happening, what they are, no pun intended, I guess, experiencing in real time while they are learning. If we can get the student to have fun while they try to learn, I think that's gonna be, I think that is as close to magic in the forest as we can get.

Absolutely.

And I might regret saying this, but it almost sounds like, if I'm just listening to this, it almost sounds like edutainment.

Yeah, that's a great term.

And I know some of my colleagues, and I would absolutely have scoffed at this earlier, but I actually believe in the edutainment idea. I believe that if somebody is experiencing something and they're enjoying what they're seeing, now, this does not mean I'm bringing lions in and I'm taming them in front, but it does mean that if I can present the information in a palatable, enjoyable way, a way that folks are, like, I want to come to class, that's going to be winning.

Oh, yeah.

As opposed to I am covering the material. In a way that is maybe perhaps more clear but less entertaining, I think I'm losing somebody, or I think I'm going to lose something.

Can you speak to that?

And that might just be my own personal teaching style, philosophy, etc.

Yeah, and I definitely have a similar teaching philosophy, and I, you know, when I get my student evaluations at the end, there will always be some comments about like, like she really loves this course, and like she really likes teaching this course, because I am somebody who will, you know, again, it's a personality thing also. I believe, you know, some people are just more extraverted, and I really like my field, and I really see the value in conveying that. And sometimes I have concerns, I convey that also.

And, and again, as I mentioned, because I'm a UX researcher, the humanity of the instructor and the student, and our audience, all of these things is what I emphasize in the way I teach. Like, I'm not a robot who is just telling you, this is how you write a proposal. Like, essentially, it is that.

But then, like, why are we writing this and not writing it this way? What do you think about it? How would we change things?

What will be the effect then? And so the more students get to do and get to critically think, and then they have fun doing it, and sometimes there might be debates also, I think that stays with them and they see like, oh, this is why we are doing this. Oh, I didn't think about that.

And again, there's a lot of like exchanges that happens. But it's absolutely, you know, most of us love our fields, that's why we are in this field. But then to convey that enthusiasm, like, just imagine you're meeting somebody and you're like talking to someone, and if they're like so bored, and they are, you know, just kind of distracted, if you're not going to remember that interaction much, I will think like, that was a weird interaction.

Or you'll remember it in a bad way. In like, yeah, I don't think I ever want to see that person, or like, I'm going to walk the other way.

Right, exactly. No, I am definitely, you know, I believe in some of those things, I have seen the results, and again, it's not like this 100% perfect solution, and that's why it is important to take feedback and iterate and adapt yourself to whatever the changing conditions are.

Now, I also want to say for learners or listeners, rather, this is not a you need to adopt this, this is just a way to do it. I also think you hit the nail on the head with the personality deal. I think far too often in education, we think or we are brought to believe that you have to do X, Y, Z in this order, and this is not that.

This is you need to choose your own adventure and match your adventure or however it is that you want to teach your class with your personality as much as you possibly can, and what you feel is authentically best for you and your students, you should do that. These are just two people talking that happen to have had success with user experience design and tend to enjoy that, and it matches their personality.

Absolutely, yeah, this is not like a yeah, you must do it if you don't do it, like, you're a failure. And I have had instructors myself who have different teaching styles, different personalities, and some of them are still very memorable to me. And it's not that everybody had the same strategy, but then one of the things, as I mentioned, that my participants in the study reported on was instructor qualities.

And so some of those instructor qualities, nobody said that my instructor has to be extroverted and must be like enthusiastic about what they do. But it is again comes back to that empathy, comes back to kindness. In fact, one of the top needs that students had for their instructors was actually credibility and knowledge about the field.

That was the number one thing. So they want the instructor to be like an expert in the field. That is what they care about.

But they would also like some cultural awareness. They would like to have their names pronounced clearly, or they would like a little bit of flexibility because there is a power cut that, forget about Wi-Fi, there is no power in the whole city, in their hometown, in their country or something like that. So if we don't extend this grace to others, how can we expect it to be extended to ours?

Because we don't like it when someone does it to us too, right? And so I think that there is no perfect solution to this. But if we focus on what those needs are and take some steps to do certain things, it always, always helps and it bays off in the end.

And I think this would aligning, and going back to our aligning your instructional philosophies with your personality, I think it would help with your overall wellness. Your contentment, your work-life balance, because it doesn't, when you get to do things that feel authentically like yourself, instead of trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, I think that requires more emotional labor. And so I do think, we don't often talk about aligning your personality or what you believe to be the best with some of these strategies, but I think that ought to be something we focus more on.

Definitely. Okay.

One of the things that is very, very large right now is artificial intelligence. So I'm curious, as somebody who has written on the topic, artificial intelligence and writing, nonetheless, and advice for other professors, other instructors, other people in spaces for AI., can you just, I'm just going to open the AI door and let you walk through it in whatever way you want.

Oh, AI. Yes. I always tell people that as a writing instructor, AI is like an existential crisis, you know, like as somebody who teaches writing and wants students to develop those skills, and you have like this writing assistant who does things for you.

How do we navigate this? This is, and again, I don't have the solution for it. It is such a rapidly developing area, a tool, whether it's a research area or it's a practical tool, it is, there's a lot happening, and I won't have the perfect solution to it.

But I can share like what I believe in. No matter what we do, AI is not leaving. It will stay.

It will develop. God knows what it will develop into. It will stay.

And there are already multiple industries, companies, at least in my field, that are already using some form of AI. Sometimes it's an in-house AI tool, or it is something like a ChatGPT or something that they are using in their writing already. So how do we strike the balance of helping students develop the writing skills, the critical thinking skills that we need, but also not just act like it doesn't exist and then protect them from never ever using it?

I do not believe. I mean, there are definitely a lot of ethical things that we can talk about when it comes to critiquing AI. But they're not talking about it and not exposing them to it, in my opinion, is not the solution.

I can share some things that I do with AI in my classroom. Wonderful. So for example, last semester, I taught a class on intercultural technical communication.

And one of my classes was about AI. And it was about the cultural, linguistic, racial, ethical biases and issues that is associated with AI. So I had a lecture and I talked about these things, a little bit about theory, some of the issues.

And then I had an activity where I asked students. So there were different small activities. Again, these are the small group, low stakes activities that students do in class.

So for example, one of those activities was I asked students to type in a phrase which was in English, like an idiom, and then just asked Chad GPT about what this means. And there were also other idioms. One of them was in Japanese, another one was in Swahili, and I asked Chad GPT to explain that.

So this was again just one of the activities. And then I asked them to report back. And they said that the one which was in English had a multi-page explanation about the origin of the term, and the story behind it, where it is used, lots of details.

On the other hand, the Japanese and the Swahili phrases barely had like two lines or three lines or something like that. And there is hardly any information there, very stereotypical information, just the basic translation, that's it. And this was like, and there were like other activities that they did, which showed them in real time, how AI data is trained on this very limited set of information that is more Western-oriented.

And the English is also very like American English or even say, like Western English. But we know that there are various Englishes around the world. And so what does that mean?

And so when you use a tool like that to write something, and perhaps you are writing for an audience who is based in Malaysia or China, and can you rely on a tool like that? And I can tell them like, oh, don't use this, but then for them to see some of those linguistic biases and differences in the results. I think that was really eye-opening for a lot of students.

So that was just like one example where I think that there are, because we don't have one policy across like JMU, right? We don't have that, which means that every instructor needs to have their own policy. So I do include an AI policy, but it changes slightly depending on the class that I teach.

I tell them that if you just write a whole paper and then submit it, that's plagiarism. I'm not going to accept that. In my courses, I also have an entire class where we talk about hallucinations.

So these imaginary sources that AI creates, which actually don't exist, they have excellent titles. I'm like, this is a great paper. I'm like clicking, oh, this is error or does not exist.

And so I tell them that, look, like, let's talk about misinformation. Let's talk about how AI creates hallucinations. And we see examples in real world where it has happened.

People have used it and believed it. And so you can't just use AI as a database. No, you must learn how to use the library for research.

So yeah, these things help them to like use it, but also see like, okay, here's where it's harming and I incorporate it in my teaching in this way.

Yeah, I think it's really helpful to have an open mind about AI. Because I'll be honest, I went from one side of the continuum to, oh no, I'm straight up afraid of this thing, to I use it almost daily. And I'll use it to, it's really great to learn on topics that I know next to nothing on, or really great as it can be a confidant, it can be a, hey, can you help me analyze my thoughts?

Like this really bothered me? Like my brother sent me a text, or so my dog did this, and why did it bother me so much when it shouldn't have bothered me? Can you help me walk through?

And it can ask you a series of questions, or it can talk about online learning. It can, if you have an outline for your class, I use it to create engaging announcements. So I do daily announcements, and I'm like, all right, I want to enhance clarity, tone, and engagement for students with this announcement.

So can you help me do this? And it creates things that I never could. It would take me four hours to create one announcement when it spits it out in about five seconds.

And I think those little things are really helpful. Again, we're not even talking about the ethical or the environmental. Those are topics for probably not even this podcast, a different podcast.

But I do think I agree fundamentally with the stance that it's a tool almost like the calculator we thought everything was going. I wasn't very old when that happened, but we thought everything was going to a hand basket when the calculator got implemented, but it didn't, or Google. And now it's AI, but we need to teach people how to use it because I would be willing to bet you the vast majority of people don't know how to use it.

Prompting.

Prompting, yep.

Prompting and then being able to say, yeah, that's not right.

Yeah.

So you have to have a certain amount of content knowledge to be able to say, yeah, that's not right. And if we don't, if we aren't critical enough, we're going to believe whatever it says. And there are absolutely times where it is wrong.

Yeah. And if you think critically about it, or you know enough about a certain area, you're going to be able to pick that up fairly quickly. But if you're a student who's just trying to use it to finish an assignment, that's when it is quite obvious.

It is quite obvious. And one thing that I always, always say in every class that I teach is that I am interested in your voice. I want to know what you think about this topic.

So for example, in the first year writing class, students have to pick a civic topic that they care about. And that's the topic that they work on throughout the semester. They write annotated bibliographies, literature reviews, things like that.

And so I tell them that, as somebody who's grading say 25, 20 papers, it sounds the same if you use AI. I don't get to hear what your values are and what you mean. And I think if we make students feel that, no, I do not want a stereotypical same answer, but I want to know what you believe in and how you came up with that.

And that is why almost all those writing projects have a reflection assignment with them. And they tell me their goals and choices, what risks they took, what work, what did not work, what will they do differently. And fine, if they use it to like fix grammar and stuff, I'm okay with it.

We have spell check and grammar check in Microsoft Word. But then as an instructor, in our field, we have this word called process work and product. So the product is the actual assignment that you're turning in, but the process is those pure feedback, discussions.

We scaffold a big assignment into smaller parts. And in every single part, they are really breaking it down. And so by the time they turn in, say, an essay, they have actually worked on this essay, which is, say, worth 100 points.

They have actually worked on another 100 points of like 10 discussion boards about that already, where they are talking to other classmates, they are researching things, they are changing things. And so I emphasize the process also, because ChatGBT is giving you the product. I'm like, that's not just the focus.

How you reach that part is also. And so I think as instructors, we can definitely incorporate that in our course preparation, the kind of assignments we do also.

So would you agree or disagree, or somewhere in between if the statement of, okay, you're going to turn in a product. I want it to be your product. The bones of the product have to be yours.

But if you use AI to make the bones even better, if you use it to give you a better overall product, you put your product into the AI machine to help it make yours better. Are you okay with that or is that?

As of now, no. As of now, I don't do that. Mainly because, again, as a writing instructor, I really want them to practice writing as such.

And again, if you know how to write, you can make it better and you can identify like, oh, here's where it's wrong. And so some of the places where I allow AI would be at the brainstorming stage, at the outlining stage. So I, in fact, have an activity where students do, again, a small group activity where they have a topic.

And then I call it, it's called, I don't call it, it's called like a brain mapping. So basically you have a topic, and from that you derive like smaller topics. So climate change can be related to the oceans or, you know, like the forest, and it keeps, you know, breaking down.

And from that, you know, and there are these prompts that they have to put, and I tell them like how to put them, because prompt engineering or writing is part, it's a part of, you know, modern day writing. And so how they basically take that broad topic, and they create a mind map of the topic, and reach a research question ultimately, that they are going to be pursuing in this course to, you know, for their project. And so for these kind of activities, I think it's like a brainstorming tool that perhaps you would talk with a friend.

And so for that, I'm okay with making an outline. I'm okay with that too. And again, this is a very personal decision.

Every teacher might have different comfort levels, but in my field, I think these things, if you have a writing assistant that helps you do that, I am fine with that because in my field, that was something they would be doing anyway if they go and get a job. But then the actual writing part, that is the part that I would like them to practice. And the process work helps that because they are not writing the essay in one go.

They are writing the introduction for like one whole week, and they are having discussions, they're changing things. Whether these are online discussions, they're in person, I'm giving them feedback. Then they are moving on to source one or theme one.

So that way, what's happening is that they are already refining these things through these various feedback that they are getting, and not just from AI. And then you have the final product, for sure. Wonderful.

Wonderful. Anything else you want to share with listeners?

No, not really. I guess, you know, I'm excited to be here. This is my, you know, almost one year over, and this has been a great experience.

GMU has been great. And I hope, again, we never forget the humanity in all of us, whether we are interacting with students, with colleagues, with just people. I think in this time, it is all the more important to not lose that and keep that intact.

Well, thank you very much. We've enjoyed having you on the podcast.

Thank you. Thank you for having me.

That's it for today's episode of the CFI Faculty Lounge Podcast. A big thank you to our guests, the CFI Ops team, Sarah Rush, Zach Williams, and most importantly, you, our listeners. If you enjoyed this conversation, be sure to subscribe, leave a review, and share it with a colleague.

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