Navigating a Journey of Pedagogy
The journey of an educator is an adventure. Some days, the path is concrete, clear, and firm. Other days, the path is indiscernible, a walk through a thicket of brambles with no end in sight. Today, risk as an educator feels inevitable. A pedagogy of play within the postsecondary environment, presents an unexpected adventure playground. Play contributes to the value of leadership and creativity yet remains undervalued as pedagogy for adult learners (Leather, Harper & Obee, 2020).
What are the implications and benefits for implementing a pedagogy of play within a postsecondary early childhood program? The educational journey of students becomes aligned with the cycle of inquiry (Dietze, 2021). The cycle of inquiry and subsequent response to play promotes critically reflective practice and a movement away from reliance on developmental theory to a social constructivist theory. Students are viewed as competent co-constructors of knowledge and make meaning through personal engagement with the environment, relationships, and collaboration (Taguchi, 2009). Play provides positive outcomes in academic performance, mental health, and builds effective relationships (Leather, Harper, & Obee, 2020). These values of relationships, well-being, community, and honoring Indigenous ways of knowing, are key values of the Child, Youth, and Family Studies Department at University of the Fraser Valley.
Teaching through play will require me to walk an unknown path. It will require letting go of control, relinquishing the role of educator as expert, and taking on the role of a learner, who walks alongside students as both a peer and a mentor. A pedagogy of experiential play will challenge traditional theories of education that tend to “privilege voices, knowledges, and understandings by suggesting universal ways of thinking about children, educators, and communities, while other perspectives are marginalized or silenced” (Pacini-Ketchabaw et. Al., 2015, p. 24).
The journey of education will be one of walking paths that are well-worn and navigating and creating new paths that may necessitate change and removing of obstacles. I look forward to continuing my walk, acknowledging the role of experiential learning, and being challenged to walk with uncertainty and vulnerability within a community ready to adventure together.
Monique Goerzen
References
Dietze, Beverlie (2021). Cycle of inquiry. Lawson Foundation Outdoor Pedagogy Project. April 12, 2021.
Leather, M., Harper, N., & Obee, P. (2020). A pedagogy of play: Reasons to be playful in postsecondary education. Journal of Experiential Education, 1 (19).
Pancini-Ketchabaw, V. Nxumalo, F., Kocher, L. Elliot, E., & Sanches, A. (2015). Journeys: econceptualizing early childhood practices through pedagogical narration. North York, Ontario: University of Toronto Press.
Taguchi, H.L. (2009). Going Beyond the Theory/Practice Divide in Early Childhood Education: Introducing an Intra-Active Pedagogy. Taylor & Francis Group. Retrieved April 15, 2021, from https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/ufvca/detail.action?docID=446938.
