October 2020

Learning by Refraction: A Practitioner’s Guide to 21st-Century Ignatian Pedagogy has been translated into Thai and is being used by Catholic schools all over Thailand through the efforts of the Catholic Education Council of Thailand.

The book was written by Fr. Johnny Go SJ and Rita J. Atienza and was published by the Ateneo de Manila University Press and the Jesuit Basic Education Commission on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the publication of Ignatian Pedagogy: A Practical Approach. Neither author expected that the book would be used outside the Philippines.

Note: On 12 October 2020, Saint Ignatius’ College (Riverview Sydney, Australia) held an online Staff Development Staff Day to discuss how they cna further improve their practice of Ignatian Pedagogy. This article was authored by Sharon McLean.

In February this year a group of teachers from Saint Ignatius’ College, Riverview attended a workshop “Learning by Refraction” led by Fr. Johnny Go in Sydney.  We were all thoroughly engaged and enthusiastic in aiming towards bringing this re-imagined Ignatian Pedagogy to our staff. However, Covid 19 meant staff were immersed in a new range of professional learning activities to provide online learning for our students and our plans were delayed. At the commencement of this term we were able to focus on embracing “Learning by Refraction” during a Staff Development day developed by our Head of Professional Learning, Jennifer Jackson. Zoom webinar, smaller face-to-face workshop groups and Faculty discussions were held during the day.