We are delighted to share that our predoctoral researcher María Abizanda-Cardona has presented a conference poster at the XVIII Conference on Teaching Innovation and Educational Research organized by the University of Zaragoza. The presentation took place in the thematic panel “Rethinking Teaching Innovation in the New Regulatory Context”, a space devoted to reflecting on how higher education is adapting to new institutional and pedagogical frameworks.
The poster, entitled “Fostering Critical Thinking through Literature: Assessing the Literary Criticism Workshop as a Teaching Innovation Experience in English Studies,” was developed collaboratively by a group of PhD students in Literature from the Department of English and German Studies. Its aim was to present and analyze the outcomes of our three-year ongoing teaching innovation project, which has been exploring how literary studies can be used as a powerful tool to enhance students’ critical thinking, interpretive skills, and reflective engagement.
At the core of the project lies the Literary Criticism Workshop, an innovative teaching model that places students in an active role as critics and interpreters of literary texts. Rather than approaching literature as a set of fixed meanings, the workshop encourages students to debate, question, and construct arguments collectively, helping them to develop key transversal skills such as critical reasoning, analytical writing, and collaborative learning.
The poster session provided an excellent opportunity to share our results with colleagues from different disciplines and institutions, and to reflect on how teaching innovation projects like this one can respond to the evolving demands of higher education. The interest generated during the session confirmed the relevance of literature-based pedagogies for fostering deeper forms of learning in today’s university classroom.
