Principle 11. Use edges and Value the marginal
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| The edge of the Pacific Ocean |
To me, especially when teaching, I feel like my colleagues and I don't do enough of this. Too often we are trying to really focus on teaching the bulk of students and making the curriculum work. We don't often look towards the edges of our students. I also wonder how often we look to the edges of our teaching and learning. How often are we just looking towards accepted practice rather than trying to try something new?
I do realize that with students we need to make sure we are doing the best we can, and often parents have a memory of school that they want to see in the classroom. So, what does teaching on the margins and edges look like?
More than that I guess is what are we doing as teachers to have students look to the edges? I want students to be able to see the great things that are happening at the edges of our natural worlds and our tech worlds.
I guess more than anything this idea of looking towards the edges really gave me hope on mixing my two passions. Where two things meet is an opportunity to discover great diversity. Having people who can see two different worldviews (embracing permaculture principles as well design technology) is the way I want our world to exist. I think it is here where design will change the world.
Please message or post about how we can use the edges and margins to enhance education.
I remember the principles from my master's but haven't thought of them in a while! I always understood them to be taking use of what people normally do not think useful - the idea being that there can be use in anything if we think about it in a different way. This can be used as a principle for lateral thinking in general as educators. But I like the way you used edge to not mean limit but gateway to something new, maybe different, maybe unexpected, but possibly exciting, too.
ReplyDeleteYeah I like this idea of lateral thinking. I am really hoping for the unexpected and exciting things in the edges of my teaching and reality. I want to stay away from the normal spaces and push things a little further.
DeleteI want to explore this idea of using things in different ways too, I love that about the margins. Just going deeper into what we think things can be used for and repurpose them into something else.