Learning through Covid-19: Re-thinking embodied learning and education practice

Covid-19 offered us little choice when it came to shifting learning and teaching online and overnight we went from rooms full of students to digital grids of faces and blank rectangles. With the move to screen-based interaction, embodied experiences that engage the whole-self have become increasingly important yet challenging to factor for in education design. At the same time, the crisis has compelled many teachers to question and engage differently with their own teaching practice. 

This second session in the trilogy on embodied learning is an opportunity to engage with your own practice as we explore what embodied cognition and learning can look like in seemingly dis-embodied contexts. This experiential session will focus on embodied strategies to help students grapple with moments of ‘stuck’ and how creative constraints lead us to unique outputs. Please note that you don’t need to have attended the previou sessions in the series to join.

Presenter

Lucy is a driven creative and educator within the Faculty of Transdisciplinary Innovation (FTDi) at The University of Technology Sydney (UTS). Inspired by her own eclectic education, she is passionate about engaging the whole learner and specialises in experiential and transdisciplinary learning. At UTS, Lucy is involved in the development and teaching of subjects within the Bachelor of Creative Intelligence and Innovation and Bachelor of Technology and Innovation where students tackle the worlds ‘wicked problems’, becoming lifeline learners, innovators and change-makers.

With a background in the creative arts and innovation, Lucy’s work engages playful, critical and embodied meaning-making to inspire action. Lucy has been involved and led a range of collaborative projects and grants in the areas of student transition, inclusion and diversity and re-imagining the future of education. A creative thinker by nature, Lucy has previously worked in design and strategy, co-founded a start-up in the chronic illness support sphere and is currently undertaking her Master in Transdisciplinary Research at UTS.

Suggested pre-readings 

• Watch this short video of Karl Frisson explaining the scientific and theoretical nature of Embodied Cognition
• Read this blog post by Ricardo Dutra on Social Reality Contemplation and the use of the Stuck Exercise

Register for the first session on Wednesday 29 July
‘Why we need our body to learn and work in the times of Covid-19’ by Dr Barbara Doran