Sean Legnini
@seanisdwelling.bsky.social
Cool dad (x4). Married guy. Hockey coach. Studying and writing a phenomenology of the classroom, thinking about dwelling in education.
https://seanisdwelling.substack.com // www.pexelab.org
https://seanisdwelling.substack.com // www.pexelab.org
New piece: Body schema and dwelling. The body isn't a tool for learning - it's the foundation of understanding.
#phenomenology #MerleauPonty #education
#phenomenology #MerleauPonty #education
The Body Schema as the Foundation of Understanding
Thinking about an education that begins with our being-in-the-world.
open.substack.com
November 20, 2025 at 3:34 PM
New piece: Body schema and dwelling. The body isn't a tool for learning - it's the foundation of understanding.
#phenomenology #MerleauPonty #education
#phenomenology #MerleauPonty #education
I did a philosophical essay of Trevor Zegras because I'm a real weirdo.
Trevor Zegras and the Phenomenology of Habit
Where I attempt to connect my reading of Merleau-Ponty with my complete awe at Trevor Zegras' stick handling skills.
open.substack.com
November 6, 2025 at 1:51 PM
I did a philosophical essay of Trevor Zegras because I'm a real weirdo.
I have had my academic life saved multiple times by ILL!
November 4, 2025 at 3:28 PM
I have had my academic life saved multiple times by ILL!
"Anti-pattern" sounds straight out of dystopian sci-fi. Also WebcamGate already happened in the school district next door to me in 2010... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robbins...
October 27, 2025 at 1:30 PM
"Anti-pattern" sounds straight out of dystopian sci-fi. Also WebcamGate already happened in the school district next door to me in 2010... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robbins...
While I am very excited to go on the farm field trip with my 5 year old's class today, my old man back is already yelling at me for agreeing to go on the bus with them.
October 24, 2025 at 12:00 PM
While I am very excited to go on the farm field trip with my 5 year old's class today, my old man back is already yelling at me for agreeing to go on the bus with them.
This summer I read Abram's Spell of the Sensuous and started Merleau-Ponty's Phenomenology of Perception. Both left me asking: When education is built on industrial efficiency, is learning through sensuous participation possible?
New essay on getting the order backwards: #education #phenomenology
New essay on getting the order backwards: #education #phenomenology
What David Abram's Spell of the Sensuous Might Teach Us About Education
How to think of education as a cultivation of sensuous attunement.
open.substack.com
October 23, 2025 at 2:36 PM
This summer I read Abram's Spell of the Sensuous and started Merleau-Ponty's Phenomenology of Perception. Both left me asking: When education is built on industrial efficiency, is learning through sensuous participation possible?
New essay on getting the order backwards: #education #phenomenology
New essay on getting the order backwards: #education #phenomenology
Good read! Appreciate the quote in the screenshot. It reminds me of this page from Kieran Egan's "The Future of Education." When we reduce knowledge down to quantified facts we miss the deeply human part of learning that only exists when we learn in relation to the world.
October 17, 2025 at 8:10 PM
Good read! Appreciate the quote in the screenshot. It reminds me of this page from Kieran Egan's "The Future of Education." When we reduce knowledge down to quantified facts we miss the deeply human part of learning that only exists when we learn in relation to the world.
While Matthew & I dream up what a phenomenological view of education looks like in practice, we continue to research and write about that tricky word "experience" and how we think of it in education and pedagogy. Yesterday, we released our orientation statement that sets up our research and writing:
static1.squarespace.com
October 17, 2025 at 3:09 PM
While Matthew & I dream up what a phenomenological view of education looks like in practice, we continue to research and write about that tricky word "experience" and how we think of it in education and pedagogy. Yesterday, we released our orientation statement that sets up our research and writing:
This weekend I watched a soft rain fall in my yard while the same storm brought floods, wind damage, and destruction to communities not too far away from mine. I wrote about the strange privilege of being on the edge of a storm - hope you'll check it out! #phenomenology #ecophenomenology
Soft Rain on the Edge of a Storm
A note from the comfortable edge
open.substack.com
October 15, 2025 at 3:24 PM
This weekend I watched a soft rain fall in my yard while the same storm brought floods, wind damage, and destruction to communities not too far away from mine. I wrote about the strange privilege of being on the edge of a storm - hope you'll check it out! #phenomenology #ecophenomenology
I read Stefan Bauschard’s piece “AI is the Cognitive Layer” last week and his mention of retaining the human core in the conversation of AI and education sparked this writing: #ArtificialIntelligence #AI #Education
Beyond the Human Core: AI and a Pedagogy of Dwelling
A response to Stefan Bauschard's "AI is the Cognitive Layer"
open.substack.com
September 5, 2025 at 8:00 PM
I read Stefan Bauschard’s piece “AI is the Cognitive Layer” last week and his mention of retaining the human core in the conversation of AI and education sparked this writing: #ArtificialIntelligence #AI #Education
@schooldaves.bsky.social brought me right back to 701! (This is from Prolegomena to Any Future Phenomenological Ecology by Llewelyn)… hope you’re doing well at Seton Hall!
August 26, 2025 at 8:22 PM
@schooldaves.bsky.social brought me right back to 701! (This is from Prolegomena to Any Future Phenomenological Ecology by Llewelyn)… hope you’re doing well at Seton Hall!
Over the past few weeks, Matthew and I have been writing back and forth about modes of experience, asking the question what does it mean to experience something firsthand, secondhand, and thirdhand? The process itself has been a fruitful experiment.
August 26, 2025 at 12:14 PM
Over the past few weeks, Matthew and I have been writing back and forth about modes of experience, asking the question what does it mean to experience something firsthand, secondhand, and thirdhand? The process itself has been a fruitful experiment.
Reposted by Sean Legnini
Reading this and trying to take in the full enormity of what is happening. The scale of it. open.substack.com/pub/christin...
Grand Designs: the loss of American freedom
Exactly seven months into Trump's second term, we have reached 1000 authoritarian actions. Here I lay out the enormity of what has happened.
open.substack.com
August 21, 2025 at 8:30 PM
Reading this and trying to take in the full enormity of what is happening. The scale of it. open.substack.com/pub/christin...
Went around with a lobsterman today and enjoyed how he talks about his craft. He sees it less like hunting or fishing and more like husbandry. I asked if the lobsters just treat the bait and traps as habitat at this point and he said he calls the traps “barn stalls” and the water “the farm.”
August 14, 2025 at 7:58 PM
Went around with a lobsterman today and enjoyed how he talks about his craft. He sees it less like hunting or fishing and more like husbandry. I asked if the lobsters just treat the bait and traps as habitat at this point and he said he calls the traps “barn stalls” and the water “the farm.”
My scholarship in #phenomenology so far has created a pretty strong relationship between Maurice Merleau-Ponty and I. That’s my guy. But reading Abram’s Spell of the Sensuous and now Deloria Jr & Wildcat’s Power and Place, the connection between phenomenology and indigenous metaphysics is so strong…
August 13, 2025 at 7:28 PM
My scholarship in #phenomenology so far has created a pretty strong relationship between Maurice Merleau-Ponty and I. That’s my guy. But reading Abram’s Spell of the Sensuous and now Deloria Jr & Wildcat’s Power and Place, the connection between phenomenology and indigenous metaphysics is so strong…
Here’s a short write up of one of the ways that I use phenomenology (and ecophenomenology specifically) as a way of thinking about how we educate. Consider it a preview of some of the larger scale and more academic research that I’m currently embarking on.
Toward a Pedagogy of Dwelling
A little preview of an ongoing project to create a framework that ontologically shifts our students toward being-with-the-world.
open.substack.com
August 13, 2025 at 11:42 AM
Here’s a short write up of one of the ways that I use phenomenology (and ecophenomenology specifically) as a way of thinking about how we educate. Consider it a preview of some of the larger scale and more academic research that I’m currently embarking on.
I like this take, and I think it reinforces the idea that AI can be a powerful tool *for the competent*. Less a learning tool, more a productivity and organization tool (as many of the teachers in the article are using it for). I still think fear of AI is going to really harm our students, though.
The challenge we face is that GenAI is (somewhat) useful for people who are already competent at doing something (e.g., refining text, summarizing) but it is harmful for people who are learning how to to do something. GenAI should be taught and used only after people reach competence.
The AI Takeover of Education Is Just Getting Started
Was your kid’s report card written by a chatbot?
www.theatlantic.com
August 13, 2025 at 11:23 AM
I like this take, and I think it reinforces the idea that AI can be a powerful tool *for the competent*. Less a learning tool, more a productivity and organization tool (as many of the teachers in the article are using it for). I still think fear of AI is going to really harm our students, though.
Uh oh...
“GPT-5 is the first time that it feels like talking to an expert in any topic — a Ph.D.-level expert,” OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said.
(real, one-shot :p )
August 7, 2025 at 11:31 PM
Uh oh...
I'm starting an informal writing practice - a space for more reflection, noticing, and thinking about place, the more-than-human world, and connections to education. First up: a meditation on what it means to host rather than harvest. #phenomenology #ecophenomenology #dwelling #education #pedagogy
Sharing the Garden
Notes from a garden where the harvest is not the point
seanisdwelling.substack.com
August 5, 2025 at 2:19 PM
I'm starting an informal writing practice - a space for more reflection, noticing, and thinking about place, the more-than-human world, and connections to education. First up: a meditation on what it means to host rather than harvest. #phenomenology #ecophenomenology #dwelling #education #pedagogy
New post from PEXE Lab! We're grappling with modes of experience, meaning we're thinking about different kinds of experiences in learning. It's less "here's a solution" and more "what is this thing..." Join us as we figure this one out: pexelab.org/brackets-fie... #Phenomenology #Education
Grappling with Modes of Experience — The PEXE Lab
Phenomenology offers experience as a means of analysis, a way of seeing and understanding the world through the body and its interactions. Phenomenology, or the study of lived experience as it is live...
pexelab.org
July 23, 2025 at 12:08 PM
New post from PEXE Lab! We're grappling with modes of experience, meaning we're thinking about different kinds of experiences in learning. It's less "here's a solution" and more "what is this thing..." Join us as we figure this one out: pexelab.org/brackets-fie... #Phenomenology #Education
My advisor, Matthew Kruger-Ross, and I launched the PEXE Lab—Phenomenology and Experiential Education Lab—at West Chester University!
Explore the work: pexelab.org
#ExperientialEducation #Phenomenology #EdTheory #MeaningMaking #EducationRes
Explore the work: pexelab.org
#ExperientialEducation #Phenomenology #EdTheory #MeaningMaking #EducationRes
The PEXE Lab
pexelab.org
July 11, 2025 at 10:09 PM
My advisor, Matthew Kruger-Ross, and I launched the PEXE Lab—Phenomenology and Experiential Education Lab—at West Chester University!
Explore the work: pexelab.org
#ExperientialEducation #Phenomenology #EdTheory #MeaningMaking #EducationRes
Explore the work: pexelab.org
#ExperientialEducation #Phenomenology #EdTheory #MeaningMaking #EducationRes
Went solar 2 years ago here in the Philadelphia suburbs. It's a beautiful thing, basically haven't paid for electricity in that time save for a few short/dark days. We used Exact Solar - highly recommend if you're looking for panels!
For anyone in the US who can afford to go solar, “now would be the time,” because House Republicans want to end federal tax credits that make it affordable. www.wired.com/story/if-you...
Want to Claim the Solar Tax Credit? Get Installing Now
For anyone in the US who can afford to go solar, “now would be the time,” because House Republicans want to end federal tax credits that make it affordable.
www.wired.com
May 24, 2025 at 11:42 AM
Went solar 2 years ago here in the Philadelphia suburbs. It's a beautiful thing, basically haven't paid for electricity in that time save for a few short/dark days. We used Exact Solar - highly recommend if you're looking for panels!
I'm not very nervous about AI in education. In fact I think it'll force us to really rethink our goals as teachers. Personally, I think it's time to teach with and about AI more intentionally with students.
I wrote some thoughts about it here:
#AI #AIinEducation #EdTech #Pedagogy #Teachers
I wrote some thoughts about it here:
#AI #AIinEducation #EdTech #Pedagogy #Teachers
Knowledge Exists in Living Human Tissue — Sean Legnini
I’m actually very excited about artificial intelligence and education, but I’ll be honest - based on conversations with colleagues, discourse on bluesky teaching communities, and elsewhere, it seems I...
www.seanlegnini.com
May 22, 2025 at 7:06 PM
I'm not very nervous about AI in education. In fact I think it'll force us to really rethink our goals as teachers. Personally, I think it's time to teach with and about AI more intentionally with students.
I wrote some thoughts about it here:
#AI #AIinEducation #EdTech #Pedagogy #Teachers
I wrote some thoughts about it here:
#AI #AIinEducation #EdTech #Pedagogy #Teachers