All posts by Maha Bali

Context Matters – views from around the world

clmooc, Contexts Matter, EdConteXts, pedagogy

By Maha Bali and Tanya Lau (EdContexts Facilitators)

As facilitators of EdConteXts, we tend to notice when others speak about context in sensitive and thoughtful ways, and we thought we would share some of our “picks” this month for posts we’ve come across on the web that showed sensitivity to context in education. This is like what CLMOOC call “Find 5 Friday” (#f5f) – so here are our five for this month.

Hybrid Pedagogy (open access journal)

We like the journal Hybrid Pedagogy for many reasons, including the fact that they published a couple of articles by two of our facilitators (Shyam and Maha) just before EdConteXts was launched. A recent article we liked on Hybrid Pedagogy by Janine deBaise debunks the myth of “best practice” in education. She poses the problems of using any best practice guidelines universally and regardless of context, without considering individual student needs, abilities and interests, and gives examples from her own teaching.

Continue reading Context Matters – views from around the world →

Reaching: Relating & Teaching

Contexts Matter, EdConteXts, Teaching

 By Joyce Rafla, Egypt

This semester was a tough one for me. I’m starting a new job, teaching a total of 45 students in two sections of the same class (Fundamentals of Teaching & Learning for Early Years Teachers) and working on side projects. It was crazy. Aside from that, I had some “issues” with one section of the class I’m teaching. Now that the class is over, I am happy to get the chance to reflect on this semester’s teaching experience.

Teaching is Relating
I would say that my main lesson from teaching this semester is that teaching is relating. I found myself facing situations with the students similar to the ones I would face with my friends, family members, or even boyfriends! I remember standing in the middle of a feedback session, after the students communicated what they were uncomfortable with, and thinking to myself “God! This is turning into a bad relationship!” I was surprised at my own thought. That inspired me to write this blog post. Teaching and relating. I began seeing the whole teaching experience from the relationships lens. Continue reading Reaching: Relating & Teaching →