About this blog

This blog – is a personal blog but hopefully will evolve towards a more public space where people with an interest in learning-based change towards a world that is more sustainable than the one currently in prospect can share ideas, resources and inspiration. Transformative (and, more recently, transgressive) learning is highlighted to emphasize learning that extends beyond learning for knowing (head; knowledge creation and engagement in multiple ways of knowing) and even learning for doing (hands; action-taking) to include learning for being (heart, including values, passion, engagement) and learning for transformation (agency, empowerment,disruption,  reflexivity, collectives, leadership etc) which requires all these forms of learning simultaneously.

9 thoughts on “About this blog”

  1. Hi Arjen,
    My name is Barry Carozzi. I am an Australian teacher. I’ve been a teacher since 1965. In 2007/8 I was involved at Latrobe UNiversity – where Bernie Neville (‘Educating Psyche’) was an Associate Professor. I worked with Dr Peta Haywood teaching a course in Holistic Education.
    I am very interested in Transformative Education. I’m currently reading Parker Palmer’s ‘The Courage to Teach’.
    I will follow your blog. I spent today with a group of colleagues at Warrandyte High School, in Melbourne, planning a Year 9 program that aims at the kind of transformative learning you are referring to. I am also a writer and songs for children- mainly of books for children.
    A small editing point (I have also taught Professional Writing and Editing for 15 years). Your opening sentence includes the phrase: ‘in it’s very early stages’. There is no need for the apostrophe; it should read ‘ in its very early stages’.
    I look forward to hearing from you.
    Your sincerley
    Barry Carozzi

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    • Thanks Barry – in the coming months I will add some examples from my own teaching – e.g. deconstructing a cell phone and deconstructing a Happy Meal but also some community transformation examples. I have removed the apostrophe – thanks!

      Reply ↓

  2. Hi:

    Just learned about your blog. As a reminder, we met at NAAEE and I’m currently at the Earth Institute, likely to be there for another 20 months (at least). I just returned from Uganda and Kenya where I set up partnerships with Kampala University and University of Nairobi on education for environmental sustainability and health. My book, co-authored with Camille Martina, on Teaching Environmental Health to Children: An Interdisciplinary Approach, was just recently published by Springer Press.

    I am very interested in contacting like minded individuals in Uganda and Kenya and will contact your colleague Paul K, at Makerere University.

    David Hursh
    Columbia University and University of Rochester

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  3. Dear Arjen,
    Your short narrative – about this blog – describing the multiple ways of transformative learning i.e. the head, the hands, the heart, all simultaneously, reminds of transferring indigenous knowledge (IK) in traditional societies in sub-Saharan Africa through a rites-de- passage process whereby young people receive lessons-of-life through a 3-4 weeks long initiation process. Even until today such rites of passage as described by Mead, Levi-Strausss and many others still take place here in local communities in Kenya, Uganda, Sudan and other places where I have worked.

    I am working on the ideas of Living Cities, Living Architecture, Living Schools, etc stressing an holistic approach in planning, designing, developing environments for people i.e. from the home environment to the public environment to the learning, office, production, or leisure environment – and all integrated with the natural, human, and built environments of the urban realm. The concept of Living Knowledge connects well to this.

    I am also working on article titled: Children Building Cities: children’s participation in post-disaster, sustainable, and child-friendly – urban programming and planning of Landscapes for Learning in the City of Bam, Iran. Its a narrative of the micro-urban planning sessions I conducted with a group of school children following the earth-quake in Bam December 2003. and describes the process of planning and programming their own house, school, park, playground, neighborhood, and city. I am still looking for a suitable journal to publish it.

    I look forward hearing from you – and success with this blog.

    Rene John Dierkx
    Nairobi, Kenya

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  4. Pingback: Honors education as transformative learning | Honors College at WKU Advising

  5. Hi Arjen. This is a very valuable blog about crucial issues and I have enjoyed reading it. Regarding your suggestion to make it more public and share ideas and resources, I can share the following article which investigates the question of how long does social take? It is based on a longitudinal study which shows that a better understanding of complex sustainability challenges can be achieved in less than one year, but it takes much longer to develop new responses to address those challenges through a social learning process. Open access article in Society and Natural Resources.
    available here http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/08941920.2013.799726
    best regards, Tom

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  6. Hi Arjen
    I listened to your speech about Iphones – Earth calling. It was great. I would like to use the slides about Iphone contents etc for educational purposes. Can I access the slide deck anywhere? Thanks Marianne

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