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Fig.: Teacher training program in the public education system. Los Angeles, USA, 2017.
Fig.: Crafting Pedagogies of Togetherness Residency. Aalto University, Helsinki, 2025.
Many societies today face growing polarization, democratic disengagement, digital acceleration, and fewer spaces for simply being together. Modern life has also distanced us from our connection to both inner and outer nature, turning sustainability into something understood intellectually rather than lived relationally. This separation erodes the social fabric that sustains communities. Yet while technical solutions dominate responses to these challenges, little attention is given to how people learn to live together amid difference and uncertainty. These complexities are particularly urgent for young people, who are learning to navigate identity, belonging, and participation in an increasingly fragmented social landscape.
“From what I observe, the challenge for young people is that they feel disconnected to themselves and to their bodies.”
— Bettina Aremu, Social Pedagogist, Switzerland
Crafting Pedagogies of Togetherness (PoT) responds to this condition by exploring how togetherness can be cultivated as a lived, relational experience: something that can be practiced, shaped, and learned collectively.
This work has been developed over the past ten years at the intersection of social arts, Social Presencing Theater, and awareness-based design. Through collaborations across schools, universities, and community contexts, these approaches have introduced embodied and co-creative practices that support relational awareness, collective sense-making, and new ways of learning together.
Fig.: Teacher training program in the public education system. Los Angeles, USA, 2017.
The project is currently crafting an open, evolving curriculum designed to foster togetherness in educational and social settings. Rather than a fixed framework, it is conceived as a living resource that invites educators, youth, and creative practitioners to explore, adapt, and contribute to pedagogies that strengthen the social fabric.
The curriculum currently includes 15 social arts and embodied practices that can be applied in classrooms and group learning environments. These practices cultivate embodied presence, relational awareness, and co-creative learning, supporting meaningful experiences of being together.
The practices are designed particularly for educators and facilitators working with young people aged 15–25 in schools, universities, and community contexts. At the same time, the invitation to engage, adapt and co-create the practices remains open to anyone interested in cultivating relational and embodied forms of learning.
Crafting Pedagogies of Togetherness is an ongoing collaborative effort. We invite educators, youth, and creative practitioners to engage with the curriculum, experiment with the practices, and help co-create pedagogies that respond to the complexities of our times.
