This article introduces an innovative approach to the role-play teaching technique: one driven by the presence of substance incentives. We analyse the effectiveness of this incentive-driven role-play approach in the engagement of students with International Relations and Security Studies seminars. We assess its usefulness on multiple fronts. We propose that incentive-driven role-play is an effective method of teaching that caters for students’ different learning styles, particularly in theory topics. Its interactive component makes theory tangible for students, allowing them to grasp why certain actions are taken and the consequences of these actions. The use of incentives was found to be important in ensuring motivation, participation and providing easily understandable outcomes that can be transferred to the theory they were studying. This article also highlights the practicalities involved in incentive-driven role-play exercises, noting the importance of clear instructions and precursor lectures on the subject matter.

The adoption of active learning pedagogy and, later, the institution of the employability agenda in Higher Education have resulted in a severe loss of agency for academics and students in the Social Sciences. In this article, we reflect on our experiences of applying active learning methods. We argue that we have been part of a change that has occasioned a loss of key skills development, especially those associated with traditional learning and academic thinking. An overly headlong rush to implement the “new” over the “old” saw the discarding of certain skills central to the active learning agenda. Further, the emphasis on student satisfaction, professionalisation and quality assurance pushed the academic to the sidelines, to the detriment of Higher Education. We, therefore, first critique the skills debate and identify shortcomings in the active learning application that emerged from that debate. We focus on the skills emphasised in practice, how they are portrayed in opposition (instead of complementarity) to academic skills, and how they undermine the agency academics and students really require. Next, we propose a reconsideration of necessary but undervalued skills like reading, listening and note-taking.

The use of simulations in higher education teaching is burgeoning in political science curricula, particularly in international relations and European Union studies. This article contends that most simulations suffer from complexity bias and put too much emphasis on substantive knowledge. Drawing on the author’s experience, two ideal types of simulations are developed. ‘Complex’ simulations focusing on negotiating content and ‘simple’ simulations focusing on negotiating dynamics. It is argued that the transmission of transferable skills is facilitated by multiple repetitions of similar negotiating contexts within the same module. This suggests that instructors face a trade-off between teaching transferable skills and substantive knowledge and should locate their simulations at either end of this continuum. Where students are not native speakers, not yet familiar with specialised terminology or simply unversed in negotiating dynamics, there is a particularly strong argument to make for carrying out simple simulations first, followed by complex simulations later in the curriculum. Finally, opportunities for collaborative research are highlighted. Gathering and pooling data from simple simulations bridges pedagogy and research at minimal additional cost.

This study explores the implementation of critical thinking via metacognition in linguistics courses. It employs surveys to examine strategies used by students in two courses, Morphosyntax and Field Methods, devoted to the development of analytical skills in linguistics. We hypothesized that the application of metacognition surveys would enhance students' awareness of techniques that promote critical thinking and active learning. Two surveys built in as core components in each course were deployed at different points during the semester. Students' responses indicate that metacognition surveys can help students and instructors gain greater awareness of learning concerns and capabilities and identify areas for intervention.

Political science in European universities is often seen as having traditional signature pedagogy but pockets of innovation have become increasingly common. This article will outline and reflect upon two projects at University College Cork, which were designed to increase student engagement and create an active learning environment. The projects brought students directly into contact with the national political arena and, in particular, with contemporary debates on political reform, which have dominated political discourse in Ireland since the economic crash of late 2008. The projects presented students with (1) the opportunity to make an oral and/or written submission to a committee of the national parliament, which held a public session at the University and (2) publish a peer-reviewed article in an online undergraduate research journal and participate in an academic conference. The projects were designed with active and participatory learning at their core and feedback from participating students and staff indicated that these goals were achieved. The level of student engagement, however, in terms of the participating numbers was lower than expected, which brings some caution about students’ perceived enthusiasm for active forms of learning.

The inverted classroom model (ICM) is an active learning approach that reserves class meetings for hands-on exercises while shifting content learning to the preparatory stage. The ICM offers possibilities for pursuing higher-order learning objectives even in large classes. However, there are contradicting reports about students’ reactions to this kind of teaching innovation. With the ICM making inroads in political science teaching, this paper discusses how students evaluate this method. We report results from an application of the ICM to an introductory international relations course. In our course, students’ reactions to the ICM varied greatly. Using a regression analysis of student evaluation scores, we find that students’ preference for collaborative learning best predicted their preference for the ICM over the traditional lecture format.

In this symposium, we invite political science instructors to consider reflection as a useful pedagogic resource for achieving complex long-term educational goals. The authors of this collection have found reflection to be a suitable response to different teaching challenges, such as helping students achieve a nuanced understanding of social processes and decision-making, transfer knowledge between courses and gain self-awareness as active participants in learning. The three papers composing this symposium focus on different formats of reflection: a learning diary; reflection accompanying board games used as a teaching exercise; and short reflective assignments about connections between courses in a study programme. We present and discuss the design and implementation of reflective activities in the undergraduate political science curriculum, expose the strengths and weaknesses of using reflection and provide advice to instructors interested in using this teaching tool.

The introduction of the symposium sets out a possible research agenda on producing systematic empirical evidence of the effect of active learning tools to the discipline of political science, inspired by and drawing from educational research. It discusses the core research questions of such an agenda. Do active learning environments enhance political science students’ learning outcomes? Does the introduction of active learning in political science curricula make a difference for cognitive, affective, and/or regulative learning outcomes? In addition, it draws attention upon which conditions make active learning tools more or less effective? What are the inhibiting and stimulating factors? Are there differential effects according to specific student attributes such as gender, prior knowledge, prior education, or prior results? In short, it discusses the dependent variables (effects on what learning outcomes exactly), the independent variables (such as student dispositions), the intervening variable (types of active learning environments), methods and data, and the teaching context (such as level of education and intra- and extra-curricular contexts). Finally, we introduce the papers of the symposium, which are illustrations of how this agenda can be implemented in the field, covering a variety of effects, learning environments, methods, data, and contexts.

How do active learning environments—by means of simulations—enhance political science students’ learning outcomes regarding different levels of knowledge? This paper examines different UN simulations in political science courses to demonstrate their pedagogical value and provide empirical evidence for their effectiveness regarding three levels of knowledge (factual, procedural and soft skills). Despite comprehensive theoretical claims about the positive effects of active learning environments on learning outcomes, substantial empirical evidence is limited. Here, we focus on simulations to systematically test previous claims and demonstrate their pedagogical value. Model United Nations (MUNs) have been a popular teaching device in political science. To gain comprehensive data about the active learning effects of MUNs, we collect data and evaluate three simulations covering the whole range of simulation characteristics: a short in-class simulation of the UN Security Council, a regional MUN with different committees being simulated, and two delegations to the National Model United Nations, for which the students prepare for 1 year. Comparative results prove that simulations need to address certain characteristics in order to produce extensive learning outcomes. Only comprehensive simulations are able to achieve all envisioned learning outcomes regarding factual and procedural knowledge about the UN and soft skills.

The article analyses how the setting of EU simulations influences negotiation outcomes, that is, the content of the simulated directives. We have played the same simulation of the chocolate directive – the same roles and the same Commission proposal – in various settings (with different kinds of participants, various group sizes, for one or two days, with instructors or participants playing the European Parliament (EP)). A quantitative analysis elucidates relations between settings and outcomes we would not see when considering only one simulation at a time. First, the simulation scales well. Simulation duration, number and kind of participants have little impact on the range of outcomes. Second, the directive is more liberal if participants play the EP, indicating that our instructors play the EP too tough. Third, Swiss participants negotiate stricter and more consensual directives. These results can inform the further evolution of the simulation based on hard data.

This article examines the ‘lessons’ from the most recent Scholarship of Teaching and Learning research in political science that appears in three North American academic journals. The article focuses on the literature that examines the effectiveness of ‘active learning’ classroom techniques. Although the most commonly used technique to promote active learning is the in-class simulation, the evidence on the effectiveness of simulations is decidedly mixed. The article continues by exploring other available, but often ignored, active learning classroom techniques.

While typical academic skills such as research and writing are commonly monitored in Higher Education, generic skills such as teamwork, critical thinking or communication receive less attention. This is problematic in light of discussions on students’ further career development. It is often said that active learning environments facilitate the training of such skills. Having a tool to monitor skills progression is an important prerequisite to properly test such claims. At Maastricht University, we developed a self-assessment tool to raise awareness about skills required to take full advantage of the active learning environment, and to initiate self-reflection on the side of students. While the current tool achieves these objectives, it is less suited as an instrument for measuring skills development. In this article, we propose a re-developed self-assessment tool and test its merits through a quasi-experimental study. A group of sixty-two students was asked to complete both the old and new version of the tool. Students and mentors were subsequently asked to evaluate which score represents students’ skills level best. We evaluate if the new self-assessment tool provides a better insight into students’ generic skills development in an active learning environment.

The phenomenon known as emergency eLearning saw many institutions of higher education switch from face-to-face learning to virtual or online course delivery in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The transition posed a unique suite of challenges to instructors and students alike, especially in the case of active learning pedagogy. This article reflects on the experiences of a multi-institutional, multi-term pedagogical project that implemented peer review assignments as opportunities for asynchronous but nevertheless active learning. We shared instructor experiences through the course design and application stages of courses in International Relations and political economy, discuss the ability of peer review assignments to create active learning opportunities in online courses, and reflect on our own pedagogical development benefited from the community of practice.

In recent years, a growing body of literature has widely investigated the impact of role-playing simulations in teaching politics and international relations. While scholars agree that participating in simulations is helpful for the students in developing their skills, the evidence about benefits is more mixed. Moreover, the question whether all students—regardless of their demographic or academic background—benefit similarly from simulations remains largely unanswered. This article, based on a cross-national survey submitted to students from Italy and the Netherlands who have participated in the Model United Nations (MUN), provides an innovative contribution to the current literature by looking at views and opinions of students coming from different educational contexts. Our empirical results suggest that students perceive that MUN increases their skills regardless of their academic and socio-demographic background. The quantitative analysis, based on OLS regression models, reveals that the individual students’ background does not influence their perceived benefit, nor their enjoyment of the experience. MUNs appear to be educational as well as fun for all students, regardless of their age, gender, field of study, seniority, and academic homeland.

Simulations, understood as complex role plays, are nowadays widely used in (university) teaching to actively engage students and promote content-specific interactive learning, understanding, and communication. There is a growing debate about the functions and benefits of simulations in the university teaching context. Simulating the EU is not yet as common as simulating the UN, but the use of EU simulations gradually increases. In this paper, we discuss several aspects of EU simulations. First, we briefly review the importance of the EU in current European politics, and to its growing complexity, which represents a challenge for teaching and studying European integration. Second, we indicate that simulations address new didactical demands that arose in the context of the Bologna Process and the so-called ‘shift from teaching to learning’. And third, we move beyond the debate of EU simulations as merely an active learning tool, and discuss the (underestimated) role they may play as quasi-experiments, which may constitute a valuable resource both for didactical and European integration research. Together, these three aspects make EU simulations a promising multi-dimensional tool.

Active learning techniques tend to emphasize simulations, research projects, and the use of popular media to the relative neglect of problem-based approaches. This paper introduces a new problem-based exercise specifically for teaching international relations (IR) theories that builds on existing problem-based approaches by incorporating analogies and an exemplar-based approach to concept learning. Teaching complex IR theories to students, who are often early in their academic careers, can be a challenge for many academic staff. Our approach uses a carefully structured analogy, based on a dating scenario, to challenge students to explain and theorize the behaviour of the key actors in a way that is transferable to an IR analysis of state behaviour. The exercise yields an intuitive understanding of core theories that facilitates subsequent learning and application.

We argue that local languages, coupled with modern pedagogy and technology, are necessary, though not sufficient, ingredients for universal access to quality education. Our case study is Haiti, where French is the primary language of school instruction, though it is spoken by only a small percentage of the population, while Haitian Creole (aka ‘Kreyòl’), the language fluently spoken by all Haitians in Haiti, is mostly excluded from the formal discourse and written documents that create and transmit knowledge (and power) in schools, courts, state offices, and so forth. We first describe the historical, political, linguistic, and sociocultural backgrounds to such impediments to quality education in Haiti. Then we present and analyze data that begin to answer these two questions: (i) What does change look like in complex postcolonial contexts, especially change in educators’ attitudes toward the use of stigmatized languages (such as Kreyòl) in formal education? (ii) How can local languages such as Kreyòl serve to enhance the promotion and dissemination of modern pedagogy and technology for STEM education, and vice versa—namely, how can STEM education, in turn, serve to enhance the promotion of stigmatized languages such as Kreyòl?

Simulations have become popular teaching tools in political science and EU studies curricula. Proponents point out that simulations match with constructivist theories of learning. They argue that students will better understand EU decision making when they combine theoretical knowledge about negotiation theory with knowledge about how the EU works and with the experience of negotiating as if they were EU actors. This article aims to validate the pedagogical claims by constructivists regarding simulations in two ways. It assesses the organisation of EuroSim, a four day comprehensive simulation of EU decision making organised by the Trans-Atlantic Consortium for European Union Studies & Simulations (TACEUSS) as an active learning environment. In addition, using data from pre- and post-simulation surveys among participants, the authors show that through participation in simulations students gained in the areas of affective learning, such as the ability for self-assessment, as suggested by the constructivist literature.

Future horizons, shaped by unpredictable ecosystems and exponential automation, require discipline-specific as well as transdisciplinary skills to navigate. In the context of political science education, negotiation simulations, for example in the form of board games, can aid in developing both. As a plausibility probe for wider investigations, we set out to research whether an International Relations course concept utilizing the classical board game Diplomacy with pedagogically altered rules and gaming conditions enhances students’ (n = 23) understanding of discipline-specific knowledge and future skills. We utilized a conceptual pre-post measure as well as free-form learning diaries to investigate development in participants’ conceptual understanding and future skills along the course. The results tentatively suggest quantifiable and qualitatively observable changes in the discipline-specific conceptual, as well as more broad-based competence level. The gamified learning environment provided students with an activating and engaging learning environment that better acquainted them not only with discipline-specific theory, but more importantly, also with skills regarded important for their future.

The benefits of simulation exercises easily outweigh potential weaknesses, and most of these weaknesses can be addressed by careful preparation. This article seeks to encourage instructors in higher education to embrace simulations as a means of encouraging active learning and greater retention as well as improving student and teacher satisfaction. However, there is not to date much helpful guidance, for first-time appliers, as to how to set up simulations. This contribution seeks to contribute to closing that gap by reflecting on the experience of two EU Council simulations that the author has organised. The aim is to openly review things that worked well and things that did not so as to allow colleagues interested in engaging in simulations in the future to see the reasons behind certain choices and perhaps avoid weaknesses of simulations set up by ‘freshers’. In this context, articles are all too often presented as success stories, hiding errors or adaptations in the process, whereas in fact much can be learned from publically exposing and reflecting upon shortcomings and weaknesses of research and teaching design and processes. To finish up, some tips for ‘freshers’ have been compiled.