Session Information
20 SES 07 B, Innovative Pedagogies and HE
Paper Session
Contribution
The experience of a continuing (2007-2010) ERASMUS Intensive Programme (Educational contributions to social cohesion and well being in European social and institutional life) shared by 8 Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) from 8 different European countries has provided opportunity to explore the power of intercultural settings to support personal / professional learning about a world that is characterised by risk, unpredictability and the certainty of continuous change. The themes of ‘social cohesion’ and ‘well being’ were chosen to ensure that the diverse group of students (student teachers, social pedagogues and human resource managers) engaged with the social, cultural and economic dynamics / consequences of people’s migrations across the enlarging and reforming European region that is widely represented by the particpating HEIs.
The report is set in the context of an identified lack of pedagogy for HE combined with the drive within the HE sector to develop students’ flexible thinking and capacity as global citizens for ethcial social interaction and problem solving. While pedagogical uncertainty might appear to pose a threat to this aspiration, it is noted within the developing argument of the paper that tutor and student ‘mobililties’ within the 2 week programme provide a pedagogical framework for trialling innovative and interactive approaches that encourage critical thinking and critical engagement with social and economic challenges.
A particular example is that the programme induction process includes student-led enquiries about responses to the challenges to social cohesion and well being. These are initially conducted independently and collaboratively by the students in their own local communities and are presented to and evaluated by students and staff during the first days of the two week programme in the host HEI. They are subequently reworked and synthesisied by the newly formed cross national / cross disciplinary groups of students and ‘presented again’ using different media to communicate the students’ most recently formed understandings that have derived from their interactions. This example illustrates ways in which the diversity of the student group enriches and facilitates a pedagogy of active listening of the kind advocated for use within early years settings (Moss, Petrie, Rinaldi, Dahlberg), re-utilised here with young adult learners. The transference of this form of active listening into an HE context is supported through the tutors’ prior commitments to Friereian forms of participatory pedagogy. This fusion of approaches provides opportunity to discuss the challenge of engaging a culturally diverse group of young adult learners within a liberal and liberating pedagogy with defined social aims.
The analysis and evaluation are supported by the products and accounts developed by the students as they engaged collaboratively in the dialogic / reflective processes of this ERASMUS programme. Thus the report builds on students’ recorded evaluations of their learning that were integral to the pedagogy. These data are used as a basis for an evaluation of the appropriateness of a participatory pedagogy for active listening for engaging HE students in exploring their responsibilities for social cohesion and well being and in developing themselves as critical / flexible thinkers and problem solvers.
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Clark, A. & Moss, P. (2005) Spaces to Play: More listening to young children using the Mosaic approach, London: National Children’s Bureau Chappell, C., Rhodes, C., Solomon, N., Tennant, M. & Yates, L. (2003). Reconstructing the lifelong learner: Pedagogy and identity in individual, organisational and social change. London: Routledge Falmer. Dahlberg, G. & Moss, P. (2005) Ethics and politics in early childhood education, London: Routledge Elliott, J. (1998) The Curriculum Experiment: Meeting the Challenge of Social Change, Buckingham: Open University Press Fink, L. (2003). Creating Significant Learning Experiences: An Integrated Approach to Designing College Courses (Jossey Bass Higher and Adult Education Series). S. Francisco, MA: Jossey-Bass Foley, G. (Ed.) (2004) , Dimensions of adult learning: Adult education and training in a global era, (pp. 137-152). Buckingham, England: Open University Press. Freire, P. (1998). Pedagogy of Freedom: Ethics, Democracy, and Civic Courage (Clarke, P., trans.). Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield. Halpern, D. (2009) The Hidden Wealth of Nations, London; Polity Petrie, P. et al (2009) Pedagogy: a holistic, personal approach to working with children and young people across services, Thomas Coram Research Unit: Insititue of Education, London Pryor, J. and Ampiah, J. G. (2004) Listening to Voices in the Village: Collaborating through Data Chains, IN Mutua K and Swadener B , Declonising Research in Cross-Cultural Research: Critical Personal Narratives, Albany: State University of New York Press Rinaldi, C. (2005) In dialogue with Reggio Emilia, London: Routledge Shor, I. (1996). When Students have Power. Chicago: University of Chicago Press Smith, J. H., (2008) Europe's Universities in the European Research Area, European Educational Research Journal, 7(4), 433-437. Wildemeersch, D., Finger, M. & Jansen, T. (Eds.) (2000). Adult education and social responsibility. Frankfurt: Peter Lang. Wood, P. and Landry, C. (2008) The Intercultural City; planning for diversity advantage, London: Earthscan
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