Photo by Rosie Kerr on Unsplash

In her chapter Sitting on rocks, human knots and other lessons I learned in partnership, Anna Bruder leads us, invitingly, into her story of partnership. Authorship and Agency are probably the key characters in this story which has, I’m pleased to tell you, a happy ending. Let’s delve into why these are powerful ways to explore partnership.

Learning

The story Bruder told of her early experiences as a teacher sounded familiar – you can tell that she cares for her students and has always wanted to involve them in the learning process. However, she describes her frustration with the fleeting nature of those high moments, the buzz of the class that remained a ‘transient glimmer of clarity. A flash in the pan.’ Bruder’s desire to extend this feeling and take it beyond the classroom ensured she was ready for a new way of engaging with her students. This desire is arguably universal, if only we could sustain the learning, make the learning transferable. Yes! I thought reading her story. I want some of this too.

Control

It is interesting to note that at the beginning of this chapter, the words ‘control’ and ‘performance’ appear several times in relation to teaching, suggesting that teaching was indeed initially for Bruder something with which she was trying out new personas to maintain her own authority. I’m sure this is again something that resonates with many of us. Indeed, I often find myself saying in my PG Cert class with new lecturers that they should ‘let go of content to focus on learning’. We explore questions of knowledge and ownership as well as the idea of the teacher as ‘gatekeeper’. However, as the chapter progresses, these words fade, control is in fact ‘ceded’ to be replaced with risk taking and trust. Tracing this evolution in the chapter made me wonder if in fact I do this enough in my own teaching. I think I would like to revisit this notion of ‘control’ with my own learners and will definitely borrow the silent ‘conversation’ to draw out explicitly power and resistance in my own context.

The human knot

The desire articulated above prompted Bruder to begin a partnership and she was encouraged to change the culture of her classroom by creating, quite literally, a human knot in the classroom with her students. Her knowing tone anticipates my initial baulking. Really? A human knot with your students?? I try – and fail – to imagine this working in my Scottish context. And yet Bruder’s powerful assertion that this physical human knot ‘works because it makes learning an embodied practice’ makes me want to silence my inner cynical (fearful?) voice and try it with my learners. Perhaps part of its appeal for me now lies in the impossibility of creating a human knot. As we sit in our own homes connecting through digital spaces, the very notion of connecting physically with the bodies of others in a classroom space feels profoundly shocking. Instead this learning can only be imaginary and anticipatory.

Bruder ends her story with an invitation to respond to questions, all of which have helped shape my response to this chapter. I would like to end my own post with a question to you.

• In our current COVID-19 world, what do you miss most about embodied practices of learning?