The education and culture festival, PAula is returning to Mallorca next month with a whole new format under the motto ‘Altres camins per alearn’, or ‘Other Ways to Learn’.
It's the first PAula event since November 2019 and this year it consists of 34 voices offering different ways of educating and 20 activities, most of which are formative.
The two main stages are Sala Rívoli and Es Baluard and there are online audio and video activities and an educational film series on the Filmin platform.
The festival is being promoted by Miguel Ángel Cayuela, Miquel Rullán and Josep Vicens, pedagogues and educational professionals who step outside the rigid limits of conventional congresses and conferences.
“PAula once again bursts in with the vocation of being the great educational event in Spain, an educational and cultural meeting point and cinema and theatre will have a notable presence in the programme,” said Miguel Ángel Cayuela and Miquel Rullán. “PAula is still a pedagogical event, but it includes much more culture and it also has a playful, leisure component that makes learning much more enjoyable. We are not an educational congress or a series of presentations, we are a festival with everything from digital and robotics to games and high abilities. There are no lectures, just conversations, interactions and contributions.”
“For the most part, PAula is a space to reflect, meet and share and that does not appear on the internet or at conventional congresses,” they added. “These activities are designed exclusively for PAula and may be projected and extended from there to educational centres, but everything in PAula is unique, nothing is copied or replicated.”
“The goal is for teachers venture into territories that they don’t normally visit, because of the demands of day-to-day life. PAula offers what can’t be found in conventional education and highlights new references for teachers. We show what a school should be,” they explained. “PAula is an event where teachers have to move as far away as possible from online content and leave the classroom.”
Passion
Although there is a lot of talk about pedagogical innovation, sometimes it is difficult for teachers to break new ground.
“Teachers are almost always in a repetitive, very technical environment, but we invite them to come to PAula where they’ll find something they won’t find anywhere else and if a teacher is passionate about what he or she does, PAula will interest them,” insist Cayuela and Rullán. “The recipient of PAula is the teacher, but students reap immediate benefits. We vindicate and enhance teachers and encourage them in their work, so that they feel appreciated. If society values them, it will also reap the benefits, because a good teacher can change lives for the better. Everything that PAula offers makes us think and reflect. We have new content, but we also have leisure and culture. PAula activates education from emotion and we invite teachers, and non-teachers to come and have fun breaking down barriers.
The PAula agenda also includes games, street mathematics, chess and emotions, digital transformation, robotics, high abilities, food, fantasy, fake news and emotional regulation.
"PAula is a programme designed with care and attention to recognise and value the work and the role of educational professionals and to promote a debate so that the pedagogical landscape takes one, or several steps forward to ensure in student development and a commitment to the well-being that every human being deserves.
PAula opens on Friday, November 12 and most events will take place on November 13 and November 20. 180 seats are available.