‘Learning to Fly’: Exploring the intersections of multilingual and interdisciplinary pedagogies to cultivate

hospitable, dynamic, and inclusive learning spaces
Monday 11 May 2020

 

Developed by colleagues from across the Faculties of Arts and Social Sciences, led jointly by WIHEA Fellows Dr Bryan Brazeau (Liberal Arts) and Todd Olive (Global Sustainable Development), ‘Learning to Fly’ explored an uncharted frontier in learning spaces: one in which the insights of multilingual and interdisciplinary teaching combine to create new, exciting learning environments. These spaces aim to support students to venture and communicate beyond their intellectual “comfort zones,” exploring hitherto-undiscovered perspectives and expertise. This workshop, delivered in three parts to guide the participant in understanding how these pedagogies connect, sought to cultivate a new appreciation for the way in which a combined approach can help to break down barriers and encourage collaboration. It explored the barriers built by languages of all kinds—whether spoken, disciplinary, or conceptual and ways in which they can be overcome.

The workshop catered for staff and students from all disciplines and backgrounds: whether monolingual or multicultural, transdisciplinarian or field specialist and helped to provide an understanding of how traditional classroom approaches can be transformed into more inclusive, diverse spaces. Whilst the approach of this workshop was more directly targeted at staff involved in teaching, the presenters were keen to explore ways to develop and research this type of pedagogy further through welcoming participation from any potentially interested collaborators.

The workshop leaders would like to thank the rest of their team for their diligent work in supporting delivery of this project despite global circumstances: Emily Rowbotham (Liberal Arts), Simon Blake (Economics), and Charlotte Spear (English).

If you would like to make an enquiry about this workshop, please contact the workshop leaders at b dot brazeau at warwick dot ac dot uk and t dot olive at warwick dot ac dot uk.