Origin
What can we all learn with and from the woods to develop a more embodied understanding of eco-social justice?
In this blog post I reflect on the personal origins of this research question
…..
This bench from where I am my world.
From where I notice time, and dream.
It is always early.
Sleepless, I mourn the dewy webs.
I read the note of love and grief engraved behind me.
I notice the injured worms.
I write of all the love and grief and give my words away
to strangers.
I feed him on my lap and try and keep his fingers warm.
Our bodies entwined.
The fragility.
And strength.
Of us both.
After a lot of time spent on the bench above looking after small dependant bodies (Jones, 24), I returned to work after two years paternity leave on Sept 2023. I made a promise to myself on this bench in Beckenham Place Park that I would bring my students into these woods our their first day together.
- I wrote a small case study here last January.
- I also wrote a short blog about my professional and personal identity on this PGCert
At London College of Communication (LCC) I work on the MA Design for Social Innovation and Sustainable Futures Course, and together with students from different creative backgrounds we try and understand the relationship between design practices and eco-social justice.
LCC is 26 minutes away by train from these trees.
Why I wanted to bring our students to these woods on their first day:
- To invite the new students to bring an authentic version of themselves to this course from the start, and place a critical lens against the behavioural conditioning acquired through years of being inside physical school and university structures (Freire, 1970).
- To explore the role of our senses, our bodies and our gut-instincts as we start thinking about the tools and methods for eco-social justice (Henry, Osborne, Salzberger-Wittenberg, 2003)
- To find ways in my teaching practice of understanding and possibly weaving connection across the gaps between my personal identity and my professional one (hooks, 1999)
- To share the support I gained from these trees in my own emotional life, and explore how this environment might support other people going through transitions and cyclical learning experiences (Kimmerer, 2013)
- To give the new students suggestions for how they can orientate themselves in the big city as a newly formed learning collective.
Here is some additional context to my research question:
- In Oct 2023 I took our first group of students into the woods on their first day at LCC (group 23)
- In Sept 2024 we took a second new group of students into the woods in their first week (group 24)
The Action Research proposal provided me a chance to:
- Design-in more reflection with the new students (group 24) to help me: understand the nuances of their experience; listen to their articulation of the learning; define any next steps and actions for the future of the course.
- Invite our graduating students (group 23) to become collaborative Action Researchers with me in enhancing and challenging all our different perspectives on the relationship of these woods to our course culture and curriculum.
What is learning?
Can it cost us less?
Can it take less from us?
Can it involve less stuff?
Why are these buildings so big and unhealthly?
Why do we need them?
Can we work in the cold?
What is the city as a distributed campus?
Can we have more enchantment, surprise and adventure?
Where are the playgrounds for people who’ve grown?
When we learn of the climate, can we feel it on our skin?
Who are we missing?
What languages are heard?
Who are we really in the wide open air?
References
- Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the Oppressed.
- Henry, G., Osborne, E., & Salzberger-Wittenberg, I. (2003). The Emotional Experience of Learning and Teaching. Routledge.
- hooks, bell (1999). All About Love: New Visions. New York: Harper Perennial.
- Jones, L. (2024). Matrescence. Pantheon.
- Robin Wall Kimmerer (2013). Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants. Milkweed Editions.