Transformative Learning

One of the really interesting aspects of this particular learning experience – two weeks of immersion in Calgary – is how quickly ideas that were entirely new to me not long ago suddenly seem commonplace. It’s actually pretty alarming and disorienting. At this stage in the program I’m having a hard time figuring out what I knew before; what I know now; what I should have known before but didn’t; and what I knew before and was already acting on but had failed to articulate. Some of my biggest discoveries seem suddenly foundational to my thinking, and I’m afraid that when I return to my home institution the discoveries that rocked my world in Calgary will seem commonsense to me and everyone around me and I’ll get some funny looks.

I can see that happening already around the program, StageStruck, mentioned in class yesterday by Dr. Friesen. Developed in Australia, the program puts into practice the theoretical work we have been learning about concerning authentic, collaborative learning environments and deep learning. In the little bit I have been able to glean from some Internet searches, I see that the program allows users to create their own productions online, and link to a forum at the National Institute of Dramatic Arts in Sydney (thus creating that lovely, authentic connection to real life practitioners). I was planning on writing my two papers for both courses around both sides of such a program, not knowing that it already existed.

In the paper for “Inquiry and Technology”, I was thinking of returning to my largely untapped body of MA research on how the wireless generation responds to live theatre, draw out some of those voices, and consider their position as learners with regard to Scardamalia’s ideas about the knowledge building community.  

In the paper for “Innovations in Teaching and Learning”, I was considering a program redesign for that English class, rethinking how theatre is presented and taught and suggesting that the use of the methods and philosophies we have been discussing could lead students to feel themselves part of Canada’s theatre knowledge-building community as audience members, thinkers, creators and innovators.

The two papers would be flip sides to the same coin; one could actually be an appendix to the other.

The program StageStruck, new to me yesterday, suddenly seems highly apropos, as does another Oxford University Press program mentioned by Pat, in which students can log in to immerse themselves in the dramatic possibilities of theatre. Not using these sorts of programs as an English/drama teacher suddenly seems inconceivable; I feel like I’ve known about them for years; I see how long they’ve been around and I’m amazed, and more than a little embarrassed.

I guess that’s the experience of transformative learning. Wow.