Learning ecology

Is a way of engaging in a variety of urban and rural spaces that is conducive to learning i.e. a learning eco-system. These are not typical ‘learning environments’ found in an institutional context. These spaces and places of learning are identified based on interests gathered through a variety of processes investigated and observed in areas of ecological concern for example a bus stand, a park or a market place etc. In this context ‘other learning spaces…’ is valued by how connected a community, group of individuals or an individual in a particular site is found engaged and interactive in an atmosphere that is ‘open’ to new and dynamic ways of exploring and being conscientious to the local environment. Understanding and exploring prospects of a multiplicity of modalities in learning is key. In this sense a learning environment is thought of as a place where people are immersed in the act of openly being aware of their experiential self however it comes and wherever it is situated, hence the ‘openness’ and indeed the ‘ecology’.

In this I hope to engage children and adults to be creative and engaged in public spaces as catalysts for individuals (and other animals) to explore different ways of experiencing environments. Learning is thought of as a multiplicity of experiences and expressions explored in a multi-faceted way. I would like to encourage children to find interesting areas of learning that are as it were invisible and hidden from the usual view of a person interested in pedagogy or ecology, who often identifies a learning environment by a set criteria of known pedagogical frameworks and factors that make up a ‘learning environment’. I would like to explore with children those other facets of pedagogy and ecology that make up a tacit and intuitive knowledge system that exists in our day to day life. Learning in this sense is seen as an open awareness, playfulness, mindfulness - as an experience of being embodied in life; as becoming. Learning is thought as developing an aptitude to perceive reality in a multiplicity of ways; this can be rational, critical, imaginative, fantasy and playful and also of valuing other forms of life and being sustainable in this.

In this context art and craft is thought of as a creative way of exploring the self- mind/body and environment. The arts and crafts tradition in all cultures and periods of our past and present has played and plays an important role in the subject of pedagogy as well as ecology. What is revealing through the arts is a culture of inquiry, a culture of curiosity and imagination. The arts and crafts tradition has often remained in a peripheral region in the institution of learning by its very constitution of not being rigid or dogmatic. Often art and craft have been forgotten as one of the core elements of pedagogy because of the nature of the creative artisan and artist who immerses her or himself into the very dilemma of ‘not knowing’ and yet being in the world. For a learning institution the dilemma of ‘not understanding’ can be seen as an anti-thesis to the very foundations of the purpose of its existence.

In such a dilemma I find myself as an artist sympathetic to those areas of our learning awareness where we are engaged and immersed as learners to trudge through the deeper mysteries of not knowing and to find meanings and insight in our consciousness that exceeds a definition or an articulation of that which we have learnt and experienced in the process of our exploration and findings.

The arts and crafts tradition in this context I feel comes to life in this interstitial space of the known and the unknown both public and private. Living folk traditions both in urban and in rural areas in India and indeed elsewhere, are of immense value both materialistically and intellectually for the growth and exposures of different modalities of learning and living holistically in the world. I find my research work and interventions in the field of pedagogy in public spaces as trying to explore how different children and adults within living folk (urban and rural) traditions survive and transform their environments. Through interacting with children and adults of diverse public-social settings that are unique because of its particular ecology and cultural milieu I hope to foster a creative temperament. I consider the complexity and opportunities found in these given learning environments such as a bus-stand, park or market, at home, in school etc. unfolds a different scope and prospect offered within the setting of material and/or its creative human capital towards the future creativity of children. Children are given the right to be adventurers, explorers, creators, ecologists and innovators, inventors in relation to their world views, cultures, and exploring ways of expression, extension and integration of knowledge and living systems.

Process:

In the initial part of this project I have visited a variety of local public space contexts within Bangalore urban and rural areas and explored the diversity of learning environments found in these areas. I consider this exploration and experiment as a way to engage and share in a deeper insight into the multiplicity and diversity of modalities in learning. I want to explore those areas of learning that are layered and possibly at times made redundant by environments and its people who choose not to see the potentials of their existing places to be a learning space in their immediate vicinity i.e. wastelands and wilderness.