In this blog post, Dr. Déana Scipio, IslandWood’s Director of Graduate and Higher Education Programming, shares about pedagogies of joy!
What are pedagogies of joy?
Pedagogies are approaches to teaching and learning. These are the practices that educators engage in when working directly with young people. Pedagogies of joy are approaches to teaching and learning that foreground joy. We lean into moments that bring joy to young people. We follow joy like a compass, letting it guide teaching and learning decisions.
Why is this idea important to you?
I am a joyful person. I think of joy as resistance in the tradition of Black feminist liberatory practice. I see joy in the wonder and relationships that we can cultivate with/in lands and waters, and in the communities that sustain us. I feel a deep commitment to relational practices and exploring what teaching for joy and justice looks like in teacher education. Joy in relational practice guides my work in scholarship, community work, design, and teaching. I focus on dignity affirming practices that leverage students’ prior knowledge and engage teachers and learners in science education with relationship, sensemaking, joy, and justice at the center of the work. I have engaged pedagogies of joy in my work since 2016, working with colleagues to drive this work forward through conference symposia, structured poster sessions, and finally culminating in a co-authored paper currently in press entitled Pedagogies of Joy: Pedagogies for moments of orienting and responding to joy. My model of science teacher education is firmly grounded in practices for joy and justice.
How does it show up in your leadership of our graduate program? Why do you think this idea is important for educators?
I believe that teaching for joy and justice has the power to make positive changes to the relationships between students and teachers. Joy is a big part of what motivates my approaches to teaching and learning. I believe that teaching for joy and justice is a liberatory act, freeing teachers and students to develop new relationships to one another and to the disciplinary content they are engaging with. I’ve begun this work in our weekly debrief with teachers who are attending our School Overnight Program with their students. IslandWood has always had a gratitude practice where students would thank each other for helping or supporting them during the teaching week. This was a fine practice but I noticed that while a gratitude process offered my students a chance to thank their peers it also began to feel like a popularity contest and certain people were not thanked—mostly left out were students from non-dominant backgrounds. It became an inequitable practice. I decided to address this by refocusing our time on joys and delights by connecting to the work of Ross Gay, Audre Lourde, and bell hooks. We now invite students to share something that brought them joy or delight. This reframe refocused my graduate students’ attention on their experiences with their own students. It refocused them on their own practices and the experiences of the young people they were teaching. This change facilitated a different type of community building, encouraged active participation, and created a brave humanizing space for learning.
Some of your work around pedagogies of joy is being published – tell us more about it!
My work with colleagues Drs. Teo Keifert [link to ], Day Greenberg & Sarah Jaewon Lee has been accepted to a special issue of Science Education co-edited by Drs. Lama Jaber and Tanner Vea entitled: Centering Affect and Emotion Toward Justice and Dignity in Science Education. Folks can hear more about this work at upcoming conferences in March and April at the National Science Teachers Association conference and the American Educational Research Association Annual Meeting.
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