Blog Post 1: Reflection on Willcocks and Mahon’s Paper and Lecture
Willcocks and Mahon’s (2023) explore online object-based learning to teach intersectional environmentalism in art and design. This was a thought-provoking read. It made me wonder why I hadn’t encountered this paper earlier, but then I recalled how little time we have for research amid our busy schedules.
Teaching on the MA Design for Social Innovation and Sustainable Futures, the article’s title immediately caught my attention. Having taught sustainable design for over 15 years, I resonate with their emphasis on the thoughtful integration of object-based learning in online education. During our own online teaching experiences, we devised creative ways to incorporate these practices, even though our field relies heavily on embodied practices.
We employed a range of tactics inspired by Michel de Certeau’s concept of tactics versus strategies. Tools like the window project, role-play, storytelling, and platforms such as Miro were essential in creating engaging online learning environments. We referred to these as “tiny mechanisms of care”—ways to humanize and bring warmth to the online learning experience.
Reflecting on the objects and tools we utilized during that period, I frequently think back to our situation during lockdown and the material reality of our confined environment. Willcocks and Mahon’s insights made me question whether the ecological imperative tends toward being object-based. Their emphasis on careful planning of online learning activities to address issues of distance, relationship building, content delivery, and the potential of online objects resonated deeply with me and are elements I had not taken into consideration so deeply. Reading other teachers works makes me feel part of a larger team.
Online learning poses numerous challenges, but this article made me reflect on how we’ve all developed tactics to make the distance learning environment more engaging. One of the tactics I’m most proud of, which I’ll expand on in the next blog post, is creating spaces for object-based learning in virtual environments such as Miro.
Willcocks, Judy & Mahon, Kieran. (2023). The potential of online object-based learning activities to support the teaching of intersectional environmentalism in art and design higher education. Art, Design & Communication in Higher Education. 22. 187-207. 10.1386/adch_00074_1.
Blog Post 2: Object-Based Learning and Environmental Work
Reflecting on object-based learning, I am always intrigued by how fellow educators use Miro and Padlet. These tools offer potential in online learning and also importantly serve as bridges to crush language barriers that often challenge our cohorts.
During our sessions, I realized how much object-based learning is embedded in our courses, using everyday objects to question design choices within an environmental context. My favorite task involves students bringing in objects they are emotionally attached to and presenting them to the class. This exercise is not only fascinating, as it explores emotional attachments to objects (Chapman, 2015) while fostering exchange.
Another object-based activity involves examining how the world around us is designed—analyzing design choices based on affordances and disaffordances. We ask students to map objects in the classroom and think about the social production of space, how things and objects are designed, how they design our behavior. This exercise often results in a heightened awareness of design’s role in our lives. I hope students understand that these design choices can be questioned and changed.
Writing about object-based learning feels natural yet reflective. The activity discussed in the online lecture made me think critically about questioning objects and the awareness it brings to students.
Chapman, J. (2015). Emotionally Durable Design: Objects, Experiences and Empathy (2nd ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315738802
Blog Post 3: Challenges and Care in the Classroom
The past few weeks have been tough, illness and anxiety have been making me doubt myslef alot. I faced a challenging situation with a group of students I am caring for during their collaborative unit. Two students approached me one morning to report harassment within the group.Work been deleted from a Miro board without consent, and one team member was posting abusive messages about another student on a foreign social media network.
I reported the issue to my line manager, which initiated weeks of waiting for resolution through formal channels (Disciplinary Procedure). This process felt devoid of transformative power, breeding mistrust and leaving everyone in limbo:
- The accused student was suspended for three weeks, unable to attend university, effectively cast aside.
- The student who was abused was left waiting, uncertain, and confused.
- We, the teaching staff, were left questioning whether we had done the right thing. Institutional care, it seems, can be an oxymoron.
Can uni procedures be more community-based? Can the space be a safe place for learning through mistakes? Could we have amake use of regenerative justice instead of punitive actions?
I do this job because I love teaching, workng with students, and helping them understand and question the world around them. I love enabling students to feel confdent in their inquiries, doubts, and critiques. Seeing a student realize the world can change because someone, somewhere, decided it should be different is a joy. This is a labor of love, and I care deeply about it.
Integrating literature on care and pedagogy, such as Green et al. (2021), underscores the importance of fostering environments where care, dignity, love, and respect are paramount. As educators, we must nurture these values to promote healing and justice within our classrooms.
Blog Post 4: Finding Peace and Power in Teaching
I love teaching, but this term has made me question so i want to try and find hope guided by the writings of Bell Hooks.
“This term has been a long year,” said my colleague just before the term ended. And yes, we are exhausted, so as a last blog post I want to try something a bit more experimental, something of a free writing exercise.
As Brooks (2017) states, “It becomes imperative for those of us teaching and educating that we perform love in ways that combats erasure and dehumanization of one’s self and historically marginalized populations that we serve” (p. 109). This love ethic, which bell hooks describes as “showing care, respect, knowledge, integrity, and the will to cooperate,” requires courage from us as educators (hooks, 2001, p. 101).
Recently we were put in the uncomfortable situation of safeguarding a student despite another student’s access to education. This felt like casting someone away, it felt like suddenly I was the police and I had the power. It reminded me in a very violent way that my voice has power within the classroom. It made me reflect on how much care and time I deliver to specific students and how caring for students with more complex needs comes naturally to me. I reflected on whether this instance, I had created distance within the cohort.
Despite a student saying horrible things, I dont want to give up hope! Hooks (2001) reminds us that “we maintain hope even when the harshness of reality may suggest the opposite” (p. v). This hope is essential in our role as educators, allowing us to believe in the transformative power of teaching and learning.
“The academy [or school] is not paradise. But learning is a place where paradise can be created. The classroom, with all its limitations, remains a location of possibility. In that field of possibility we have the opportunity to labor for freedom, to demand of ourselves and our comrades, an openness of mind and heart that allows us to face reality even as we collectively imagine ways to move beyond boundaries, to transgress” (Hooks 1994 p. 207).
“I think care is the ability to see humanity in others” (Nieto within Green, K. L., Coles, J. A., Lyiscott, J., & Ohito, E. O. (2021). This resonated with me in tht Care is contagious, if I care about all my students hopefully they will care for eachother. There is a limit to care, an economy of care and ability to care, and sometimes I literally couldnt care less.
As educators, our work involves more than sharing (is caring) knowledge; it’s about creating an environment where peace and power coexist, and where care and love are essential elements. It’s about inspiring students to engage with the world courageously and creatively. In embracing this love ethic and nurturing these values, we find peace and power in our teaching practice, knowing that through care and love, we can make a meaningful difference.
Brooks, D. N. (2017). (Re)conceptualizing love: Moving towards a critical theory of love in education for social justice. Journal of Critical Thought and Praxis, 6(3), 102–114. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.31274/jctp-180810-87
Hooks, B. (1994). Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom. New York, NY: Routledge.
Hooks, B., 2000. All about love: New visions.
Green, K. L., Coles, J. A., Lyiscott, J., & Ohito, E. O. (2021). Pedagogies of Care, Dignity, Love, and Respect: An Epistle to Our Future. Equity & Excellence in Education, 54(3), 211–219. https://doi.org/10.1080/10665684.2021.2023277
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