We teach WHO we are (Professor Jim Plueddemann)

Their eyes shined and smiles lite up their faces. Finally, after years of hearing about him, reading his articles, and striving to live out his philosophy of education, they were able to meet Dr. Jim Plueddemann face to face and sit for a week under his tutorage.

Alfredo served as his translator all week.

To the CCI/LA instructors Dr. Jim Plueddemann is a famous person.

So, all the emotions and excitement was evident on their faces as they interacted with him, observed him, took copious notes both on the content of what he taught but perhaps more importantly on HOW he taught. We teach WHO we are as much or more than what we teach and Jim did not disappoint us.
 

I watched our professors observe Jim and see with their own eyes his masterful way of teaching and I was filled with such joy to be able to share him with them. It is a gift of experiential understanding since I have described him for years, but now they understand from their own experience.

When they are back in their countries teaching, I pray the image of the gracious, kind, and humble way he accompanies his students and teaches them will come to mind to inspire and guide them.

Norma said: "His gracious manner of teaching made the hours fly by. He is noble, accessible, simply profound and personable. What I noticed was how enriched he is by others cultures such that he respected ours and did not attempt to impose his culture on us. I felt respected."

Jim would explain a complex idea like power distance (definition of power distance) and then invite the class to share personal examples related to this theory. But then Jim doesn’t just smile, nod his head and say: Thank you for sharing. He prompts us to critically reflect on our own experience and on God’s word by intently listening to us, then deepening the dialogue with questions like:

• Why do you ask that question?
• What problems are you facing related to your question? 

When Evelyn was asked how this time with Jim fortified her as a professor? She responded:  Just like I study the content, I will study the student. We all observed how well Jim knew us because he had studied our biographies and he took that into account as he taught us.

What do you remember about your favorite teacher doing in class that really impacted you?

My first article published in a professional journal!

This article comes as fruit of a class I took from Jim Plueddemann on Education and Culture. He challenged the entire class to try and get our final paper published and thanks to his exhortation I submitted my article to the Common Ground Journal: Perspectives on the Church in the 21st Century.

As part of Christian Camping International/ Latin America, I have belonged to a number of multicultural teams but until this class, I never gave much thought to any of the cultural dynamics that might be at play as we worked together. This class with Jim opened my eyes to see how we may be misjudging some areas of conflict as "immaturity" or "difficult personalities" when in reality there was a strong cultural component. This article describes a bit of my journey as it explains the name of that cultural component (high and low power distance cultures or vertical / horizontal cultures) and provides some understanding as to how to maintain team harmony. I invite you to read the article below (or follow this link: http://www.commongroundjournal.org/volnum/v08n01.pdf to read it)

The abstract of the article reads:
Threats to multicultural team harmony may come from a variety of sources such as immaturity, lack of shared vision, or from a compelling task to unify everyone; but one aspect that tends to slip under the radar screen is difference in power distance. This article shows how characteristics of both high and low power distance in cultures influences team members’ concepts of what team harmony is and how it is created. The creation of a third culture, a counter-cultural temporary Christian community, can offer a multicultural team a way to suspend cultural expectations and work together.

Differences in power distances may make harmony on a multicultural team more challenging lisa anderson-umana

View more documents from Lisa Anderson-Umana.

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