Educational Philosophy

Education begins not with curriculum, but with wonder. As a child, I explored the world with an innate curiosity, building imaginary characters and finding stories in the simplest details of nature. Today, walking into an international classroom, my commitment remains unchanged: to protect that capacity for wonder, honoring the natural wisdom that each young person carries. I see language not as a set of grammar rules to be memorized, but as a biological necessity—the living mechanism through which we organically weave, repair, and transform our shared human reality.

1. The Seed of Wonder

The decision to work with young people was shaped early. I loved being at school, and connecting with classmates came naturally. In fourth grade, I felt a deep sense of fulfillment guiding a classmate through an English lesson. After exploring different corporate environments—from IT and archive rooms to warehouse duties and oil fields—I realized I needed a path rooted in the humanities.

Walking into a classroom confirmed my calling. Childhood is a precious period deeply connected to nature, and it must be protected. Taking care of children is a way of accepting my own inner child, learning from them how to be present, playful, and joyful.

2. Reframing the Classroom

In Guainía, Colombia, teaching Piapoco, Sikuani, and Puinave bilingual indigenous communities, I was confronted by the limitations of traditional academic metrics. When students struggled with an English activity and called themselves “brutos” (stupid), I stopped the lesson. I told them: “If you place me in the jungle, I would get lost. I cannot climb palm trees to gather fruit, and I do not know this land. In the jungle, I am the ignorant one. Our skills are simply different, both are precious, and the world needs both. You will be my teachers.”

When we shifted to their stories—like how they transported a classmate bitten by a snake to a hospital five hours away by boat—their bodies relaxed, and their voices came alive. Language is a vehicle for connection, not a passive retrieval of vocabulary. True learning is a bidirectional dialogue where the teacher is often the student, and the student is the guide.

3. Enaction and the Body

Learning lives in the body. My Master’s thesis (University of Seville) focused on 4E Cognition: the understanding that the mind is Embodied, Enacted, Embedded, and Extended. Drawing from Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela’s work on autopoiesis and enaction, I developed a sensory-immersive methodology and the SENSUM scaffolding.

Instead of memorizing vocabulary at a desk, students acquire language through somatic and sensory pathways. Each word enters within a narrative scene, tied to physical gesture, visual imagery, and emotional context. If a child imagining a physical action like grasping can process the abstract metaphor of “grasping an idea” faster, then the forest, the weather, and the soil are direct cognitive extensions of the learning process.

This approach resolves the struggle I faced at Tarsus American College in Turkey. Secondary students accustomed to memorization demanded worksheets because critical inquiry felt exposing. By gradually introducing reflective questions into familiar formats, I scaffolded their agency, moving them from passive worksheet completion to active, embodied participation.

4. Grounding in Community

A classroom is a conscious, living organism. Grounded in Ubuntu thinking—“I am because we are”—I believe learning cannot happen without relational safety. When conflict arises, I do not use punitive rewards or isolation. We gather in a restorative circle. I ask: “What did you feel in your body when that happened? Where did you feel it?” We move the focus from logical blame to somatic regulation. By teaching children to speak from the “I” and co-create boundaries, conflict becomes an invitation to empathy.

Outside the classroom, I practice the same “beginner’s mind.” Whether cycling 1,200 kilometers support-less across Colombia to Ecuador, playing the guitar, or spending an hour observing ants carry bread crumbs (moronas) on the floor, I seek presence. Arriving without rigid assumptions is the discipline that keeps my teaching honest. It is how we step back, so that the children can step forward.