Given the numbers of presentations, keynotes, panels etc I attend each year, I thought it might be useful (for me and maybe others?) to post the stimulating ideas I hear about, or people I have met. There is so much EE and ESD practice but it is hard sometimes for people to connect!
For example I went to a seminar last night at the Institute of Education about ‘Pedagogies for Development Education’ presented by Doug Bourn. It was very interesting especially as SEEd develops its own pedagogy project.
Doug presented a diagram from a German conference showing 3 overlapping circles named Self, Others and World(s). In the centre was placed Development Education. It reminded me of the huge number of times I have seen this sort of diagram - always with 3 overlapping circles. Apart from the power and seductiveness of the number 3 (where does that come from?) I also wonder about the seductiveness of this type of diagram. Maybe putting more than 2 ideas shows your inclusiveness and a move away from oppositional thinking of only having 2 things (the ‘either or’ syndrome). Or maybe we can blame it on maths teaching in the sixties and seventies on sets and Venn diagrams.
On a positive note though it is good to see holistic thinking - my worry is the tyranny of the centre overlapped spot. What to put there? Well usually its the thing you are proposing. I have yet to see anyone put their area of work or idea on the other segments. Is it about showing importance or influences?
I often wonder how I ended up giving so many speeches - never a life plan, ambition, need. However I am at times almost becoming evangelical about not using Powerpoint. Why? Well 2 reasons - both again about the tyranny of diagrams or software to control how and what you say and eventually the unintended impressions you may give.
I find bullets (and long lists of them even more so) come across as very definitive, complete, ‘here are my conclusions, ‘this is the comprehensive list’ etc. And definitely not participatory. If you are not confident as a speaker I can see how alluring this is. However when 12 presenters do this in a whole day conference I begin to feel extremely sorry for the participants! This did happen to me - I was the 12th.
There are good examples - e.g. An Inconvenient Truth was structured by experts on how to motivate, entertain and keep an audience with you as well as ensure they get the main points.
But I wonder more about the appropriate presentation techniques that model or show either the thinking about ESD or the actual practice. I have got as far as using participatory approaches, encouraging reflection and doing some critical thinking. But am wondering if this is enough? How do we show the evolving nature and learning journey we are all on with ESD?
Thoughts and suggestions on this blog would be most welcome! Name checks are guaranteed!
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Thanks for setting this up and will follow with interest. I was at a seminar recently where the speaker made a point of not using PP for many of the reasons you state above, many for the prescriptive nature that it has and for being potentially stifling of creative thought and consequent discussion. As a lecturer in ITE however I find it difficult not to use - students like the format, knowing they will get all the notes and that what needs to be covered will be covered - but I am now thinking that certainly at times, I need to wean myself away from this, especially in the realms of EE and ESD and also futures thinking where there should be no prescription and ideas and concepts should be allowed to flow...
ReplyDeleteTo be looked into!
Many thanks for launching this blog, Ann. I have listened to you only once, as an MSc student in Education for Sustainability, at the launch of the London Regional Centre of Expertise (RCE) on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) at South Bank University in June 2009. Being impressed, I talked with you briefly after the event on the significance of the local, ancient/non-Western wisdom and non-science (i.e. culture/spirituality) on an endeavour towards human sustainability.
ReplyDeleteI wish to put forward my version of the ‘circles’. Drawing from my Education for Sustainability course (I graduated in July!), I prefer nested systems. Still there are three circles but nested. The largest circle (biosphere or the planet Earth) houses the medium-sized circle (society or the ‘human system’, which includes economy, politics, culture, etc), which in turn accommodates the smallest one (the individual). So, in simple terms, it’s like this: the individual lives in society (or community), which depends for its survival on the (natural) environment. This version illustrates an individual’s dependence on groups and also a group’s dependence on its (natural) environment.
This falls in line with what I used in my dissertation, ‘Science-culture framework for human sustainability: an evaluative case study in Buddhism’. There I related human sustainability to ‘lasting happiness enjoyed by most, if not all, members of the human society without threatening its long-term survival’. That is, a human sustainability endeavour should concern three things (corresponding to the three circles): ecological health at biosphere level, economic/social equity at society level, and happiness/well-being at an individual level.
The nested version is useful to illustrate, for example, that happiness at an individual level will be meaningless in the absence of ecological health at biosphere level. And a quote Dr Jenneth Parker shared with the workshop participants of the Higher Education group of the London RCE on the same day (i.e. at its launch) is relevant here: ‘No social justice on a dead planet.’ In other words fulfilment in life, economic growth, social justice, human rights.... all these will be useless on a dead Earth!
Great to get responses! Very exciting!
ReplyDeleteI have had a couple 'offline' as well.
Yes I think I prefer nested circles as well - more ecological.
I agree that there are times when there is information you need to get across and power point can be great for that - but then I see the Hans Rosling slide shows and am green with envy - check them out on TED Talks!
Hi Ann,
ReplyDeleteGreat to see this blog - I'll follow it with interest.
On the powerpoint - having seen Hans Rosling's slideshows, as well as those of the Global Poverty Project, I've come to a conclusion that's its less about the medium and more about how people use it. Powerpoint or Keynote can be enthralling, but it takes a lot of time, effort and creativity to make them so.
Hi Ann, is not the puzzle your trying to solve too hard because you are trying to engage students in something that fails to address their need for a self-reflected reality in learning? Until educators embrace both the idea that the world presents itself as a personalised, multifaced problem and as such needs to be addressed that way - and that, however good the PP or any other presentation tool is - it is always once removed and cannot hope to compete with that learning that stems from and returns to the life of the learner. How can a PP (however entertaining) create sustainable behaviour change when it is divorced from the need to act?
ReplyDelete