Teaching Philosophy: Participatory, Inclusive and Creative
My aim as a teacher is to act as an enabler for students to become active inquirers of social processes and of the materialisation of contemporary transformations through ethnographic methods. Accordingly, one of my primary goals in teaching is to develop the analytical thinking and research skills of the students. As an educator, I try to help students to build evidence-based arguments and to consider viewpoints other than their own, and then communicate these ideas effectively. I encourage students to share their own experiences and learn from one another, cultivating observation and accessing perspectives beyond their own. Rather than simply handing down knowledge in a one-way channel, I facilitate multiple learning processes, encouraging students to be aware of contemporary issues. Also I strive to provide tools of analysis that students can employ outside of the classroom.
My classes tend to be horizontal, favouring dialogue and multi-modal participation. In my teaching, I connect class discussions with the world outside academia and the own living experience of students, trying to motivate them for engaging in independent work and for reconsidering the prevailing notions of relevance. Usually, my course starts by providing the students with a general framework of theoretical and research tools during the first meetings, challenging their understanding of the subject with specific problems, and increasingly transferring our focus from lectures to more of dialogue and collaborative tasks, which end with intensive independent work for a practical project.
As I teach, I continue to actively learn how to be a better lecturer and supervisor to my students. They also have different learning styles, and I seek to accommodate these various ways of learning by adapting the pedagogical tools during the process. I have experienced that new knowledge is built on previously acquired knowledge; thus, a lecturer has to adapt the pedagogical material to the experience of the audience and constantly exemplify knowledge. Also, the lecturer should be in charge of providing a context for thinking and to lead discussions about the issues raised, helping to formulate the problems, to choose the theoretical framework and methodology, to considering alternative perspectives and to push both the analytical and writing processes forward.
Teaching in higher education means being in contact with young, inspiring yet often challenging people. During the last thirteen years, I have acquired a considerable experience in teaching and supervision, being always open to collect feedback and use it in different ways to develop my teaching. For instance, I have found that hands-on exercises with objects or documents are effective in stimulating students to think creatively and examine information within various frames of reference. This is complemented with practical field exercises that allow the student to train what they have learnt and to feel the excitement of discovery. Likewise, the possibility of presenting the findings publicly (in the form of a workshop, a booklet, an exhibition), encouraged students to work independently in some of the courses I have taught (Material Culture, Ethnographic methods, Social Design…)
Lecturing in different countries and coordinating pedagogical activities in different institutions gave me the muscle needed to provide top-level research-based teaching as well as to supervise and review theses. For instance, I learnt that there are many aspects in supervision that do not directly have to do with the object of study or the research task at hand. Also that there are other correlated challenges, such as creating a supportive environment and strengthening self-confidence for making the students apt to disclose their doubts and expectations.
In 2019, I co-directed the MA programme in Art Museums and Gallery Studies at the University of Leicester, where one of my students defended her PhD. In 2022, I created the new MA programme in Social Design at the Estonian Academy of Arts, developing a curriculum at the intersection of design anthropology and design philosophy. Overall, I have taught a total of 21 different courses in various universities. Also, I have given dozens of public lectures and three keynotes.
Below I provide the description of some of courses I can teach: