A very rich and active session today. The topic, affective pedagogy, really resonates with everyone. I suppose this is because we are a caring bunch.

A great deal of discussion centred around one of our readings by Allan Patience. This was an essay on Affective Pedagogy. There were a number of points which provided great stimulus for discussion.

A number of us found that we all had a technical teaching role at UAL and we discussed the modes in which we interacted with students in reference to Paul Oakenshott’s terms of Technical and Practical knowledge. We agreed that we aspired to providing practical knowledge to students (technique informed by experience and choices) as opposed to the rote factual collection of techniques which Technical Knowledge refers to.

A PLAN FOR INTEGRATING CARING INTO MY PRACTICE

Caring relationships I have with students are few and far between. They rely on the rare circumstance when a student is assigned to work in my area and has a particular drive to succeed. There are many students who simply pass by without the real opportunity to benefit from a more meaningful relationship. With my colleague Roshni we came to the conclusion that this was due to a combination of lack of continuity and lack of exposure. In short, not enough “face time” with students. If I could get to spend more time interacting with students then I could better facilitate a caring relationship with them. Because we would know each other.

THE PLAN:

to create opportunities for face-to-face interaction in a more low pressure setting. In other words not a production meeting, not a large group tutorial, not a skills tutorial. I want to create informal social drop-in surgeries to discuss technical queries and concerns. My first impulse is to create “Dr. Mike’s Making Surgery” an opportunity for students to show up and ask questions or test their ideas in a low key environment.