Innovation and interdisciplinary dialogue
The main idea grew out of our first podcast on Remote Teaching Podcast (Part 1 and Part 2) when we discussed what were the most important aspects to keep and maintain for contact time with students and what were aspects that we could do in different ways. The series was further inspired by the format of Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs, and has been developed into the format as it is today. The podcast is a recorded discussion between 3-4 university educators who all share their lightbulb moment (when they felt their students were ‘getting it’), a teaching prop and one luxury item. Guest are also asked to see if they could barter with each other.
Treasure Island Pedagogies is an interdisciplinary discussion between educators from different subject backgrounds, institutional or cultural contexts. The reason for this is that evidence shows that innovation spreads at the intersection of disciplinary boundaries (Warren, 2011). Colleagues from the same background working together will share numerous pedagogical approaches and strategies. In a network of educators, they are represented as nodes with close ties. However, for the spread of information or innovation, it is the links between more distant nodes that can be effective, which is what Granovetter calls “the strength of weak ties” (1973). One aspiration of facilitating this podcast series is exactly this: to act as a “Connector” (Gladwell, 2000; Barabási, 2014) and create new network links between our guests which had not existed before, thereby facilitating innovation spread. Finally, these conversations are hugely rewarding and powerful, allowing us agency to conjure up Treasure Islands as our own educational utopias.
Fancy taking part?
If you are interested in becoming a guest on Treasure Island Pedagogies or would like to nominate someone to be one, please complete this expression of interest form. Taking part is a great opportunity to increase your educational impact and reach beyond your immediate field, as well as being a fun discussion. Both external and internal (University of Liverpool) guests are welcome and very much encouraged!
Feedback on the podcast series
If you have listened to one of the episodes, we would love to hear from you. Are you doing something similar as one of our guests? Have you adopted or adapted someone’s lightbulb moment? Or have you any other comment or suggestion? Do let us know via the feedback form.
References
Barabási, A.-L. (2014). Linked: How everything is connected to everything else and what it means for business, science, and everyday life. Basic Books.
Gladwell, M. (2000). The tipping point: How little things can make a big difference (1st ed). Little, Brown.
Granovetter, M. S. (1973). The Strength of Weak Ties. American Journal of Sociology, 78(6), 1360–1380.
Warren, L. (2011). Chapter 12. Digital skills for digital disruption and value creation. Global Knowledge Work: Diversity and Relational Perspectives, 230-239.