Associate Professor Ali Arya is interested in feelings because, “We are emotional beings.”
- When facing personal problems, we find it very taxing to engage in intellectual challenges.
- We feel overwhelmed with our growing to-do list.
- We lose motivation when we don’t get the support and recognition we deserve.
- We get bored during meetings, complain about unrealistic expectations and ineffective plans, and hope for work-life balance.
Ali understands that students have the same emotions and reactions and wonders how can we see them not as learning machines but as human beings with emotional and social issues that affect their learning process and that need understanding? And, how do we incorporate that understanding into our academic plans?
In his presentation Feeling good, learning better: The role of emotions in students’ learning experience, Ali will review the body of research on the subject, talk about some personal experiences and practices, and consider strategies to provide a more emotionally balanced education.