Thank you for this post. It is so interesting to read your perspectives based to the experiences you were exposed to. I like the idea that easy should not be goal, but it shouldn’t be hard either. I believe that promoting inclusiveness will definitely make the learning process more encouraging.
Author: Vanessa Guerra
Comment on Empathy is the new black by Vanessa Guerra
Thank you for this post. Including empathy in educational systems is such an interesting concept. I like the idea of promoting collectivistic values, but I struggle to find a strategy to apply in in a class whit diverse values and political beliefs. Have you applied this concept in any of your previous classes?
Comment on Personal vs Professional by Vanessa Guerra
Thank you for this post Diana. I really like your way of addressing this challenge. Sometimes we look at our personal and professional life as two different things, when she should rather look at two aspects that should intersect. Although it is hard to find a balance, I really like the insight you provide in this post.
Comment on Won’t We Need to be Able of Critical Thinking Ourselves? by Vanessa Guerra
I agree, when we realize that teaching is about becoming a learning facilitator, rather than an expert that teaches information, we start creating learning communities within our classrooms, a community that emphasizes collaboration between classmates. I wonder what would have be the case if in the Armani example the professor would have not only adequate learning strategies to all the needs of the students, but also if how would have re-directed help to the class, calling on students to create an environment of mutual collaboration.
Comment on The unnoticed assumption by Vanessa Guerra
This post reminds me of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s video about “the danger of the single story”. Assumptions are pre-conceived ideas that are created because of our exposure to single stories. It is only when we recognize that there is never a single story that we will understand that assumptions such as stereotypes are build because of the lack of information regarding a particular culture or country. And this is a barrier we can overcome with education.
Comment on Why Fit in If We Were Born to Stand Out?* by Vanessa Guerra
Thank you for raising such insightful questions. I agree, the debate should not focus on acknowledging diversity only, but it should mainly focus on how are we benefiting from that diversity. Recognizing that diversity in the classroom is an advantage in higher education is the first step on promoting it.
Comment on Teaching Empathy for Inclusive Education by Vanessa Guerra
Thanks for this post. I agree, it is essential to consider students as the center of higher education, and emphaty for inclusive education is great way to do so. However, I consider important to reflect on the reasons why students are not considered the center anymore and why is it that the educational system have shifted the attention to alternative objectives.
Comment on Learning with Blogs: Easy but not Sweet by Vanessa Guerra
Hi Qichao, interesting point of view. I agree with your concern about content quality in the digital web. We should be aware, not only as writers but also as users, the reliability of the used sources, is a critical component that although it determinates the validity of the used information, is often ignored in the digital world. Since digital anonymity -and the tensions it brings to the table- is not the only dimension that is often avoided in emerging technological and communication modes, it is important to reflect on how does the reliability of information has been validated in the past and why is it that it is easier to avoid it now.
Some questions that come to my mind are: Is it that the current digital revolution has convinced us that what happens behind scenes when information is digitally produced is not worth of our analysis? Or is it that in an attempt to avoid our own commitment -often exhausting- to seek reliable information we have chosen not to? Seems to me, that as far as citizens’ commitment to seek deeper remain a discretionary choice, our current and future understanding of the world will very often be based in unreliable and biased information.
Comment on Teach to learn & Learn to teach by Vanessa Guerra
What an interesting point of view that you bring up. As future faculty members, I think it is important to include both sides of education into our Teaching Philosophy: teaching and learning. I think both are useful to develop a career in a world in which knowledge grows quickly and also the communications technology changes so much so fast! Learning to adapt to the new forms of communications technology will help us avoid a current trend nowadays, where truths are no longer truths. I run into this article that states “The constructive conflict of classroom debate was replaced by safe spaces and trigger warnings, and with it went the courage to confront the mediocrity of second-rate ideas. Ironically, this has left us without the ability to rightly judge fact from fiction. Bloom predicted that there would come a day when many Americans saw the truth as relative. That day is here” (https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/americans-now-see-truth-relative-what-comes-next-jeff-degraff). Teaching and learning as a dependent activity can help us avoid the risk that represent having a poll of information available, from which just little bit is reliable.
Comment on I DO NOT WANT TO BLOG by Vanessa Guerra
Your title and your picture definitely caught my attention! I think that time and practice will help you with blogging; after all experiential learning is about experiencing to learn, right? As an architect, we are used to built and develop models to receive public critique, which can be consider as experiential learning: putting your ideas in a model, expression them in a different way than by talking, and receiving feedback about it. Even thought I have this background, writing this blog was also a challenge, having to perform a task with little instructions give us a lot of freedom, which can be challenging
