Pedagogy of Love: Teaching for Humanity

Pedagogy of Love: Teaching for Humanity

an image of a woman representing love and social justice

All Rights Reserved, Jose Ramirez, La Maestra, 2004. Image used with permission. ramirezart.com

Love is Essential

Valentine’s Day celebrates love.  Whether it’s romantic, fraternal, familial or personal, many recognize the power of love. No matter how you splice it, love is essential in building humanity.  And building humanity takes work.

Musicians, activists, academics, to name a few, invoke their perspective on the power of love in their work.  John Lennon simply sang, “All you need is love.” Argentinian revolutionary and political activist, Ernesto Che Guevara, explained love as a personal philosophy when he stated, “At the risk of seeming ridiculous, let me say that the true revolutionary is guided by a great feeling of love. It is impossible to think of a genuine revolutionary lacking this quality.”  Now, of course, Che Guevara did believe in armed revolution, but I’d like to think he was conveying a balance between compassion and making hard decisions without flinching.  Feminist writer bell hooks stated in Teaching Community: A Pedagogy of Hope, “When teachers teach with love, combining care, commitment, knowledge, responsibility, respect, and trust, we are often able to enter the classroom and go straight to the heart of the matter, which is knowing what to do on any given day to create the best climate for learning.” And then there is the work of Paolo Freire, which deserves a deeper consideration.

Love as a Learning Theory

Paolo Freire’s learning theory invokes a profound position on the efficacy of love. His theory is grounded in educators teaching with love. It promoted love as a necessary component for humanization and liberation.  In his book Pedagogy of the Oppressed, love is essential when students are introduced to oppression through problem-posing education.  When faced with the truth of oppression, love is the act of courage that enables students to find their freedom to dialogue about humanization and love.  Freire states, “Only by abolishing the situations of oppression is it possible to restore the love which that situation made impossible. If I do not love the world—if I do not love life—if I do not love—I cannot enter into dialogue.” His theory of education incorporates love as a conscious act in the pursuit of humanity through dialogue in the classroom.

Many of our students arrive in our classes with some form of internalized oppression.  If we, as educators, ignore this variable, our students may not recognize their potential to contribute to the world.  In Mike Martin’s self-help book,  Love's Virtues, he states, “Internalized oppression violates the procedures that promote mutual autonomy through subtle forms of inner coercion, both from negative attitudes toward oneself and ignorance about one’s possibilities.”  Yet according to Freire, education can be an act of love because educators themselves can intentionally choose to value and present love onto their students and into the pedagogical process.  The pedagogy of love humanizes learning by engaging students in an ongoing process of self-exploration. When love is embedded in our pedagogical practices, we enable students to recognize that their needs, their desires, their wants, or whatever it is that motivates them, matter. And when a human recognizes that those things matter, life is forever changed.

Strategies for a Pedagogy of Love

How does this translates to our lesson design?  How can the heart and the brain be encouraged to connect? Zaretta Hammond focuses on culturally responsive teaching and brain-based learning strategies from neuroscience in her book, Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain.  She provides six core design principles for learning:

  1. The brain seeks to minimize social threats and maximize opportunities to connect with others in community.
  2. Positive relationships keep our safety-threat detection system in check.
  3. Culture guides how we process information.
  4. Attention drives learning.
  5. All new information must be coupled with existing funds of knowledge in order to be learned.
  6. The brain physically grows through challenge and stretch, expanding its ability to do more complex thinking and learning.

Although culturally responsive teaching is about empowering systematically disenfranchised students through challenging our teaching practices, Zarettta Hammond states, “We have to create the right instructional conditions that stimulate neuron growth… by giving students work that is relevant and focused on problem solving.”  Only then can we build brain power while affirming and validating our students’ ongoing pursuit of full humanity. That is what makes us human and enables Freire’s vision to create “a world in which it will be easier to love.”

This year, fall in love all over again with teaching by reading these books. Do it for yourself, for your students, and for humanity.

 

Get Ready for CCC Digital Learning Day

CCC Digital Learning Day, February 22, 2018

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Get Ready for CCC Digital Learning Day

Digital learning is anchored in connection and sharing. That's why @ONE (Online Network of Educators) is hosting  CCC Digital Learning Day on February 22, 2018. The day will be a statewide, untethered professional development experience that will explore the various ways the digital era is reshaping teaching and learning, as well as how we communicate and share with one another and our students. Our CCC event will be part of the 7th annual national Digital Learning Day, comprised mostly of K12 schools conducting face-to-face events. We invite you to join in!

Free registration for the online events will be available on February 14th. Until then, here are a few ways you can get ready!

Make #CCCDLDay Your Own

CCC Digital Learning Day is a new event for @ONE, and we are very excited about it. Our primary goal is always to support your needs and that is one of the reasons CCC Digital Learning Day is unique. @ONE will host a series of online sessions --  from national thought leaders, your CCC peers, and our students -- that will be enhanced by your local campus events. Currently, we have 18 campuses signed up to host group viewing rooms for the sessions, experimentation labs, and more. View our campus activity list to see what's happening on your campus, contact with your campus coordinator to learn more, or sign up if you don't see your campus on the list (the doc is editable so just click and type!).  We even have flyers and other promotional resources available to support your efforts.

Share Your Story in our Video Contest

When you reflect on how your formal and informal learning have changed as a result of our digital era, what stories come to mind? Share them with us! Our CCC Digital Learning Day Video Contest is open through February 12th. We've got some great prizes lined up for students and faculty/staff. Learn more and help us spread the word!

Attend our Webinar this Thursday to Get Ready

Register for the free webinar, Get Ready for CCC Digital Learning Day, on Thursday February 8th at 1pm PT to connect with @ONE and your peers about what's happening on February 22nd.

Tweet Your Love!

Share your enthusiasm, questions, or ideas about CCC Digital Learning Day with the hashtag #CCCDLDay. We are listening.

 

Tweeting Your Way to Professional Growth

Tweeting Your Way to Professional Growth

This post is the third in a series about principles in teaching and learning with contributions by Jim Julius and Lene Whitley-Putz.

passion led us hereSocial media is a topic that stirs a mixed bag of reactions with college educators. Some shake their heads and speak of a generation of souls lost on screen-time, superficial Snapchat stories, and fake news. While each of those topics are worthy of a critical discussion, social media means something very different to other educators, like myself. To me, the topic sparks a reflection about lifelong professional growth and development.

I have had a very non-traditional career path for a college educator. And through the ups and downs of my journey, I have benefited tremendously from my participation in social media. As I look back on roughly ten years of blogging and tweeting, I identify countless virtual connections that have grown into meaningful professional relationships, I’ve become a more well-rounded, reflective practitioner from the resources shared by peers, and I even received an offer to write a book along the way.

And now, in my new role with @ONE, my team and I are shepherding educators into the networked era by designing professional development opportunities fueled by social media to improve their digital literacy and prepare students for professional and personal success after college. Through the use of our new hashtag, #CCCLearn, we are helping educators to demystify hashtags by lurking in our feed or by sending a Tweet with the hashtag #CCCLearn that describes what they’re learning/trying/reflecting on. We also just kicked off our first @ONE Reflective Writing Club, a 6-week community-based blogging experience designed to support educators in examining the unique opportunities and challenges of public, digital writing (peek into our journey by searching for the hashtag #CCCWrite on Twitter or viewing this RSS feed of our blog posts).

Along the way, I realized that educators embarking upon their first experiences with social media as a form of professional growth may need advice and some guidance. As I looked back on my own journey, I asked myself, “What do you know now that you wish you had known then?” To answer this question, I searched the web for existing resources, but did not find what I had in mind. I located many institutional policies about social media, most written through the lens of public relations or marketing. But I did not find a concise and focused resource supporting professional learning. So I wrote my own and, in the process, reached out to a few of my peers, Jim Julius, Katie Palacios, and Lene Whitley-Putz, for some feedback. The five finished principles are provided below. They draw upon my own practices and experiences with social media and I hope they will serve many of you as you embark on their own journeys.

5 Social Media Principles for Professional Growth

Beginning a journey to become a lifelong digital learner can be a daunting task, especially for educators who are used to having all the answers. The principles below are offered to help you get started, guide you, and motivate you through the twists and turns ahead. Enjoy your journey!

Experimentation

As you look down the path in front of you, you may feel uncertain about where you are headed and how you will get there. Keep wondering about what’s ahead; curiosity will keep you moving forward. You’ll need to make choices that you may feel uncertain about at times. That’s why becoming a digital learner is, in many ways, like a long-term experiment. As you try new things, remember to look back and recognize what you would like to do differently next time. Trial-and-error is a way of life in digital culture.

Kindness

As you start your journey, you may question the value that you have to contribute to the public web. Self-doubt is common when engaging in an open digital community. Remember that you are surrounded by individuals who feel the same way. When you participate, you are taking a leap of faith and you will recognize and appreciate those who are kind to you. When others take the time to comment on your work, make it a priority to listen and respond.

Community

Know that you are not alone in this endeavor. Being a digital learner means you are part of a community. Lean on others for support and, in return, encourage your peers. Give to your community by sharing your ideas, your resources, and engaging in dialogue. Over time, you will begin to see your generosity come back to you in unexpected and beautiful ways.

Mindful Participation

Developing a professional learning network is a fulfilling experience, but it is a practice that involves care and attention. Because the lines between our digital and physical networks may blur, it is important to be clear about setting and maintaining boundaries.  As you engage, take care to set priorities, be present when in the company of your family, friends, and co-workers, and allow yourself to take a break. In digital culture, all of your actions matter. Develop a practice that involves pausing to consider your words before you publish/tweet/post. Sometimes choosing not to comment can be the wisest choice to make.

Curation

As you grow and change, your professional learning network should too. Developing your PLN is a continuous process of refinement that involves filtering out the noise. At the same time, making a conscious choice to seek out and include diverse perspectives in your network can open your eyes to new ways of seeing things.

If using Twitter and blogs for professional growth is new to you, are these principles helpful? If you are an experienced user of social media, do they resonate with your experiences?  Leave us a comment below and let us know!

Social Media Principles for Professional Growth by Michelle Pacansky-Brock is shared with a Creative Commons-Attribution CC-BY 4.0 International License.