Creating a World of Educational
Quality through Living Educational Theories
Jack Whitehead, Department of Education, University of
Bath.
Paper presented at AERA 2007 in Chicago, 13 April, 2007 as a contribution to the
programme of the Self-Study of Teacher Education Practices Special Interest
Group in the session on Place, "Race," Culture, and Society:
Creating a World of Educational Quality
Submitted for consideration for
publication to Action Research Expeditions, 23 April 2007
Abstract
This presentation
uses visual narratives of living educational theories to show and explain the
contributions that individuals are making to the creation of a world of
educational quality. Living educational theories are the explanations that
individuals produce to explain their educational influences in their own
learning, in the learning of others and in the learning of the social
formations in which we live and work. At the heart of these theories are the
living logics, energies, values and standards that individuals use to give
meaning and purpose to their lives through their productive work. The
narratives are used to communicate the significance of including flows of
life-affirming energy with values, in explanations of educational influence in
enquiries of the kind, 'How do I improve what I am doing?'
Using a
process of action research the energy and values are formed into the living
standards that individuals use to account to themselves and others in creating
a world of educational quality. In creating this world it is argued that it is
vital to exercise educational imaginations in recognising and understanding the
logics and power relations that serve both reproductive and transformatory
interests in determining what counts as valid and legitimate educational
knowledge.
Introduction
What I am hoping to do in this
presentation is to captivate your imagination with the idea that visual
narratives are needed to bring both living logics and expressions of energy
with values into valid explanations of our educational influences in our own
learning. I am assuming that our living logics are the modes of thought that
are appropriate for comprehending the rationality (Marcuse, 1964, p. 105) of
what we are doing. I am also assuming that we cannot do anything, including
what is educational, without energy and values. However, explanations of
educational influences in learning have tended to ignore the issue of how to
represent and communicate flows of life-affirming energy with values, in what
we do.
Vasilyuk has drawn attention to
these poor conceptualizations of the links between energy and meaning, energy
and values and energy and motivation:
Conceptions involving energy are very current in psychology, but they have been very poorly worked out from the methodological standpoint. It is not clear to what extent these conceptions are merely models of our understanding and to what extent they can be given ontological status. Equally problematic are the conceptual links between energy and motivation, energy and meaning, energy and value, although it is obvious that in fact there are certain links: we know how 'energetically' a person can act when positively motivated, we know that the meaningfulness of a project lends additional strength to the people engaged in it, but we have very little idea of how to link up into one whole the physiological theory of activation, the psychology of motivation, and the ideas of energy which have been elaborated mainly in the field of physics. (Vasilyuk, 1991, pp. 63-64)
Because of the vital connections between energy and values
in living standards of judgment I want to be clear that I using Vasilyuk's
insights into the following relationship between energy and values.
Although a value as a content of consciousness does not initially possess any energy, as the inner development of the personality proceeds the value can borrow energy from motives operative in reality, so that eventually the value develops from a content of consciousness into a content of life, and itself acquires the force of a real motive...This transformation of a value from a primary motive into a real, perceptible motivational force is accompanied by an energy metamorphosis which is hard to explain. Having once become a real motive, a value suddenly proves to possess a mighty charge of energy, a potential, which cannot be accounted for by all the borrowings it may have made in the course of its evolution. One supposition that may be advanced to explain this is that when a value becomes truly part of life it is 'switched in' to the energies of the supra-individual entity to which that value links the individual. (p. 120)
To avoid repeating the terms
life-affirming and energy-flowing each time I use the words, values or
standards, I will assume these terms below when I use these words.
In organising this presentation
I like the headings that AERA required participants to use in the submission of
their proposals. These headings are:
Educational Significance;
Objectives; Theoretical Frameworks; Methods; Data Sources
In the main body of this
presentation I focus solely on the educational significance of one idea. This
is because I want to see if I can communicate the idea that I think has the
greatest educational significance. This idea is that visual narratives can
communicate meanings of energy with values in living logics and standards of
judgment. These meanings are expressed below in explanations of educational
influence in learning that are contributing to the creation of a world of
educational quality. I explain later my use of the term 'living logics'.
To communicate my meanings I
want to focus on the expression of embodied meanings of energy and values
through moving images. In the video-clip below an individual is responding to a
question about the values that give meaning and purpose to her life and to
which she holds herself accountable in her work in Children's Services in the
UK. The context was a meeting on Improving Practice I attend in our Local
Authority to support the development of action research in improving practice.
I asked if each individual would say something about the values at the heart of
what they are doing.
The following sentence taken from a book is used to express the values she hopes to live in her work in Children's Services as she engages with children who need support in benefiting from the educational opportunities in the schools in the Authority:
"He seemed a man who gazed on all he saw with approval
and affection who began every interchange with deep and abiding regard for the
person in front of him."
As I watch the clip I feel the
authentic expression of values that matter to the individual and to which she
is saying she holds herself accountable to. I am claiming that the visual
images communicate much more that a transcript of what is said could do or a
prose description could offer. The
images enable a better connection to be made than text alone, with the
expressions of energy flowing values. It is such flows of life-affirming energy
with values of approval, affection and deep and abiding regard for children
that I am claiming can be communicated through visual narratives with greater
validity than they can through text alone. My belief that these narratives are
providing the living standards of judgment for a new epistemology for
educational knowledge is open to your questioning.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDcggqIb7J4
In communicating the one idea
with what I hope is simplicity, I also want to acknowledge the complexities in
my own learning as I have come to understand the significance of multi-media
accounts in explanations of educational influence. Hence I acknowledge this
complexity in the four Appendices in which I describe in more detail the
objectives, theoretical frameworks, methods and data sources that support the
case I make for the educational significance of the idea. I also use a collage
of video-clips in the following section to emphasise the importance of
connecting and working with the values and understandings of others through the
boundaries and interconnecting and branching channels of communication of
widely different geographical and cultural contexts.
I think that the
comprehensibility of much that I want to communicate rests in understanding the
relationships between the living logics of inclusionality and propositional and
dialectical logics. The living logics are connected with, and distinguishable
from, the propositional and dialectical logics that are also used in the
generation of living educational theories.
The idea of logic as the mode of thought that is appropriate for comprehending the real as rational (Marcuse, 1964, p. 105) appeals to me. If someone says of my writings that they aren't logical I take this as a fundamental criticism of the validity of my ideas. I want my ideas about the nature of educational theory to be logical in the sense that they are comprehensible to a rational mind. Yet even as I use the words 'rational mind' I am aware of at least three logics that can distinguish very different forms of rationality. Here are the distinguishing characteristics of three logics I use in my educational enquiries into the nature of educational knowledge and theory.
The first logic I learnt to use in my studies of educational theory was logic with a 2,500 history in the Western Academy. It is the Aristotelian logic that eliminates through the Law of Contradiction, the possibility that two mutually exclusive statements like, I am free/I am not free, can be true simultaneously. In my engagement with theories in the philosophy, psychology, sociology, history, economics, theology, politics, management and leadership of education they all abide by this Law of Contradiction in eliminating such contradictions between statements (Popper, 1963, pp. 313-317).
The second logic I learnt to use was a dialectical logic, again with a 2,500 year history. This logic, from the ideas of Socrates, was expressed through the writings of Plato. In the Phaedrus, a dialogue on love, Socrates explains the art of the dialectician in holding both the One and the Many together. Socrates explains to Phaedrus that human beings have two ways of coming to know, they can break things down into separate components as nature directs (and not after the manner of a bungling carver!) and we can hold things together in a general idea. Today, I follow Ilyenkov's (1977) text on dialectical logic in my own understandings, with its nucleus of contradiction.
The third logic I am learning to use is a living logic of inclusionality (Rayner, 2005). Living logic emerges in the course of the evolution of one's own form of life, with responses to the possibilities that life itself permits. These possibilities exist in particular environmental, global, social and cultural contexts. Inclusionality is a relationally dynamic awareness of space and boundaries as connective, reflexive and co-creative. Living logics of inclusionality, in the sense of a mode of thought that is appropriate for comprehending the real as rational, evolve in the process of giving form to life itself.
I now want to focus on the one
idea that I hope will stimulate and captivate your educational imaginations.
The educational significance
of visual narratives in communicating the meanings of energy with values in
explanations of educational influence that are contributing to the creation of
a world of educational quality.
The main purpose
of this presentation is to see if an idea about educational qualities makes
sense to you. As well as making sense to you I also want to check if you
believe what I say about the educational significance of the idea, in creating
a world of educational quality. I am claiming that educational qualities are
distinguished by their energy and values in standards of judgments as well as
their living logics in explanations of educational influences in learning.
I want to begin by showing you a collage of video-clips that connects me through relational spaces and boundaries to the energy and values of other educators and practitioner-researchers. You can also access the collage with the addition of a visual narrative at http://www.jackwhitehead.com/jack/jwyoutubeimages3.htm . You can stream the video-clips to your browser by clicking on any of the clips below. Most of the clips are some 5 minutes long. Because of their number I am not expecting you to access them all for this presentation. What I believe is that any one of the clips will serve to communicate the importance of a flow of energy with values in explaining both what the individuals are doing and their educational influences in learning in contexts that are widely separated (the UK, Africa, Canada, Japan, Ireland and China)
The energy I have in mind is life affirming. I am assuming that for something to be educational it must involve some learning that flows with a life-affirming energy. The values I have in mind are those that give meaning and purpose to our lives and that we feel as a dynamic presence as we express what really matters to us.
I want to focus on the expression of such energies with values from within and between the individuals shown on the video-clips below. Probably because I know the majority of individuals in the clips I feel a strong resonance with the values and understandings being expressed in each other's living space and through the relational boundaries of each clip. I am suggesting that such flows of energy, values and understandings within and between our boundaries are both vital and necessary in explanations of educational influences in learning. I am also suggesting that there is much work to be done in developing and legitimating appropriate living logics and standards of judgment for evaluating the validity of these explanations.
Rayner describes the connection I feel between the
flow of energy and values within and through the boundaries of the video-clips
in terms of receptive responsiveness. He has re-framed, within a 'living theory'
context, the meaning of 'educational leadership' from the prescriptive
imposition of authority to the evolutionary navigation of transformation with
the humility of including oneself as a learner in this evolution:
Only
the latter can provide the basis for true 'learning' and 'creative exploration'
by 'showing' what's possible, not
'telling' what's done. Could anyone 'tell' me how to ride a bicycle? Just
imagine the instruction manual -
let alone the lecturer with PowerPoint - informing me how to calculate dynamic
balances in ten dimensions simultaneously! But someone who through her own
learning shows me what's possible and supports and encourages me as I gain the
'feel' of the flow the bike and I are inclusions of - now there's a form of
leadership I can recognise without defining exactly how it's done. This is the
form of leadership which I think may, in all humility - because it involves the
humility of including oneself as a learner - be recognised as 'world leading' -
but according to very different standards of judgment from those conventionally
prescribed. I think this is what Jack may have been feeling for. (Rayner's
contribution to BERA e-seminar 26
Feb 2007 14:06)
While this is not the place for an analysis of educational leadership, I do recognise my own belief that I am offering the idea of new living logics and standards of judgment for educational knowledge in the hope that they are contributing to world leading educational practices, knowledges and theories, and that they also carry the humility of including oneself as a learner.
As each person below
offers their story as their living educational theory (McNiff, 2007), the
practitioner-researcher is expressing such humility and educational leadership,
through including themselves as learners in the creation of their living
educational theory. Each researcher works with a relationally dynamic
understanding of living standards of judgment and includes analyses of the
socio-cultural influences (Appendix 2) in their work and understandings.
As I have said, the educational significance of this presentation is the idea that visual narratives can communicate both living logics and living standards that include energy and values in explanations of educational influences in learning. Each living theory, flowing through web-space, is grounded in the expression of the energy, values and explanations of the practitioner researcher. The researchers ground their enquiries in their being in and towards the world, that is, their ontology. Bullough and Pinnegar (2004) have highlighted the significance of this ontological grounding in their analysis of educational qualities. Each unique living theory shows how the meanings of the values, that give meaning and purpose to life, are contributing to the creation of a world of educational quality.
The following self-study researchers have engaged with professional, academic, cultural and political relationships in the creation of their unique living theories. They have sustained their enquiries over many years, including the legitimating of their knowledge-creation in doctoral theses of at least five year's duration. They are continuing their post-doctoral enquiries in Chinese, Canadian, South African, Irish and UK contexts.
Each practitioner-researcher (McNiff, 1989; Laidlaw, 1996; Whitehead, 1999 Delong, 2002; Farren, 2005;) has used action and reflection cycles that are consistent with ideas of scientific enquiry (Medawar, 1969) in clarify the meanings of the values as these emerge through practice. I am thinking here of Medawar's point that a scientific enquiry begins with a story about a possible world that we invent and criticise as we live so that it becomes a story of real life. The educational significance of the use of this action research methodology is that it can demonstrate how the values of the self-study researcher can form, in the course of their emergence and clarification in practice, the explanatory principles and living standards of judgment for evaluating the validity of the educational knowledge being created.
The action-reflection cycles include the expression of concern as values are experienced as not being lived as fully as desired. This tension and experience of living contradictions stimulates the imagination to form action plans to improve matters. The cycles include acting on these plans and gathering data with which to make a judgment on the influences of the actions in improving matters. They include evaluating the influences in terms of values, skills and understandings. They include modifying the concerns, ideas and actions in the light of the evaluations. They include the production of an explanation of the learning through the enquiry into improving practice that is offered to a validation group for advice on strengthening the comprehensibility, normative judgments, evidence-base and authenticity (Habermas, 1976) and rigour (Winter, 1989) of the account. The explanatory principles in the accounts are formed from the energy flowing values of the researcher and clarified in the course of their emergence in practice as living standards of judgment.
The evidence-based claims of
educational significance for these living standards can be accessed in their
flow through web-space from the urls below. Each of the video-clips shows an
expression of the energy, values and understandings of the researcher that
characterise both their uniqueness and common humanity. The clips can be
accessed from a streamed server from the url immediately below each picture and
the doctoral thesis of each practitioner-researcher can be accessed from the
given location.
Jean McNiff
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGyuQ1uTrzM
McNiff,
J. (1989) An explanation for an individual's educational development through
the dialectic of action research. Ph.D. thesis, University of Bath. This thesis is in the Library
of the University of Bath. You can access details of McNiff's publications and
other work at
http://www.jeanmcniff.com
In the video-clip, McNiff is explaining to colleagues
in St. Mary's University College the contexts of her present research and her
future plans. Her outstanding contributions to the development and
communication of a new epistemology for educational knowledge as well as her
global educational influence is largely due to the responses to presentations
such as that above in different international contexts and to the clarity of
her writings and their capacity to captivate the imaginations of her readers
about her generative and transformation approach to self-study in action
research.
Moira Laidlaw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1jEOhxDGno
Laidlaw,
M. (1996) How can I
create my own living educational theory as I offer you an account of my
educational development?
Ph.D. thesis, University of Bath. Retrieved 28 February 2007 from http://www.actionresearch.net/moira2.shmtl
This video-clip was taken at the end of a lesson with
students in Guyuan Teachers College (Now Ningxia Teachers University). I had
switched the camera off and then turned it on again as Laidlaw moved to the
door of the classroom. This is one of the most significant clips I have made in
showing the responsive receptiveness of an educator with students as she
communicates a recognition and valuing the other in expressing her own
life-affirming, energy flowing values in loving what she is doing.
The international excellence of Laidlaw's
practitioner-research can be appreciated in the action research accounts she
has been influential in stimulating in China's Experimental Centre for
Educational Action Research in Foreign Language Teaching. The centre is now
hosted by Ningxia Teachers University. Some of these accounts can be accessed
from
http://people.bath.ac.uk/edsajw/moira.shtml
Jack Whitehead
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBTLfyjkFh0
Whitehead,
J. (1999) How do I improve my practice? Creating a
discipline of education through educational enquiry. Ph.D. University of Bath.
Retrieved 28 February 2007 from http://www.actionresearch.net/jack.shtml
The above video-clip is from a performance text in which
I am reconstructing my response to a draft report of a Senate Working Party
that was established in 1990 to investigate a matter of academic freedom
following a Board of Studies decision that there was prima facie evidence of a
breach of my academic freedom. The draft report produced by the Working Party claimed,
rightly, that my academic freedom had not been breached. In the clip I am
expressing my values of academic freedom, justice and responsibility in
claiming that the Working Party would be shirking their responsibilities as
academics if they did not acknowledge the pressure to which I had been
subjected. The final report to Senate stated that while my academic freedom had
not been breached this was because of my persistence in the face of pressure. A
less determined individual might well have been discouraged and therefore
constrained. It is such
life-affirming, energy-flowing values of academic freedom, justice and
responsibility that this presentation is claiming can help to form into the
living standards of judgment of a new epistemology for educational knowledge.
Jacqueline
Delong
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4R1ilkWB9Dc
Delong, J.
(2002) How Can I Improve My Practice As
A Superintendent of Schools and Create My Own Living Educational Theory? Ph.D. University of Bath. Retrieved 28
February 2007 from http://www.actionresearch.net/delong.shtml
In
this clip, Jacqueline Delong and I are discussing the Abstract for her thesis
and the importance of communicating Delong's system's influence as a living
standard of practice and judgment.
In a clip in Appendix 1
(First Objective) Delong is responding to a question about the system's
supports she has helped to create for teacher-researchers. Her flow of pleasure
as she describes the responses of the S.W.A.T. team is the quality of energised
and energising expression that I am claiming can form the new living standards
of judgment for the new epistemology of educational knowledge.
Margaret Farren
http://www.dcu.ie/~farrenm/chrisvalidatear.ra
Farren, M. (2005) How can I
create a pedagogy of the unique through a web of betweenness? Ph.D. University of Bath. Retrieved 28 February 2007 from http://www.bath.ac.uk/~edsajw/farren.shtml
Margaret Farren's practitioner-research is to my mind
world leading. This is because of the way it shows how an individual researcher
can produce her own educational knowledge in her living theory, while
demonstrating how the social formation of a university can be moved, in its
curriculum and assessment procedures, to integrate support for the creation and
legitimating of the living educational theories by other
practitioner-researchers. The University of Limerick has also shown this
quality of leadership in relation to educational knowledge with its
legitimating of the three living theory thesis of Sullivan (2006) Glenn (2006)
and McDonagh (2007) supervised by McNiff (2007). In expressing her pedagogy of the unique within a web of
betweenness Farren shows the energy and values that constitute her explanatory
principles in the explanations of her educational influence in her own learning
and the learning of her students. In her living theory doctorate Farren also
explains her educational influence in the curriculum and assessment procedures
of a university in a way that is consistent with her energy and values in a web
of betweenness.
The creation of a world
of educational quality through living educational theories also requires a
global approach to the development of cultures of enquiry (Delong, 2002). If
there is one thing that is certain in the creation of a world of educational
quality it is that human beings have much to learn in how to contribute to this
creation. Learning is one of the characteristics of being
human. I do like and agree with Habermas' conjecture about learning:
It
is my conjecture that the fundamental mechanism for social evolution in general
is to be found in an automatic inability not to learn. Not learning, but
not-learning is the phenomenon that calls for explanation at the socio-cultural
stage of development. Therein lies, if you will, the rationality of man. Only
against this background does the over-powering irrationality of the history of
the species become visible. (Habermas, 1975, p. 15)
Human beings
learn many things, some of which are not educational in the sense that the
learning does not carry hope for the future of humanity. In creating a world of
educational quality it is important to ensure that the learning is educational.
The recognition of learning, as educational, requires an educational
imagination in distinguishing learning and contributions to knowledge that are
educational and distinguishable from other forms of learning and
knowledge.
The quality of the educational imaginations of those in the Academy who influence what counts as educational knowledge has been critical in legitimating living educational theories. It will continue to be so. I say this with A. N. Whitehead's (1962) point of view in mind that a University should be concerned primarily with the imaginative acquisition of knowledge. For White head, Universities are schools of education and schools of research. He believes that the justification for a university is that it preserves the connection between knowledge and the zest for life, by uniting the young and the old in the imaginative consideration of learning. This learning, according to Whitehead, enables human beings to construct an intellectual vision of a new world, and it preserves the zest for life by the suggestion of satisfying purposes (p. 139). For Whitehead the proper function of a university is the imaginative acquisition of knowledge. As he says, a university is imaginative or it is nothing – a least nothing useful. (p. 145)
The validation
and legitimating of living educational theories requires the quality of
educational imagination shown by the examiners of the living theories at http://people.bath.ac.uk/edsajw/living.shtml.
However, I would not want you to believe that the legitimating of living
educational theories at the University of Bath has been easy! It has involved
an engagement with the power relations in the institution that continue to be
resistant to recognising new living standards of judgment. Schšn (1995)
recognised this resistance in his understanding that the new epistemology would
present a challenge to the epistemology of the modern research university
(p.27). He also recognised that introducing the new
scholarship into institutions of higher education means becoming involved in an
epistemological battle. He says that it is a battle of snails, proceeding so
slowly that you have to look very carefully in order to see it going on. But it
is happening nonetheless (p. 32).
The evidence of
the knowledge-base of living educational theories that, for me, make an
outstanding contribution to educational knowledge is in the Library of the
University of Bath and other Universities, like Kingston University, Limerick
University and the University of the West of England. It is flowing through
web-space through other publications and work in other Universities from http://www.actionresearch.net . What I
am hopeful about, in continuing to contribute to a world of educational
quality, is that these living theories will serve to stimulate the educational
imaginations of others to generate and disseminate their own. In saying this I
am aware of the battle of snails referred to by Schšn taken place in
universities around the world.
Universities can
be places of paradox and living contradictions. They can provide living spaces
of economic security for creativity to flourish in the generation of living
educational theories. At the same time colleagues can provide evidence of their
responses to the knowledge generated by that question and deny its
significance. Hence, bearing MacIntyre's insight in mind, universities are
likely to continue to provide forums for constrained disagreement for the
exercise of educational imaginations in recognising what counts as outstanding
contributions to educational knowledge:
The
rival claims to truth of contending traditions of enquiry depend for their
vindication upon the adequacy and explanatory power of the histories which the
resources of each of those traditions in conflict enable their adherents to
write. (MacIntyre, 1988, p. 403)
In engaging with
the workings of the power relations that continue to support the truth of power
I seek to stimulate educational imaginations that support the power of
truth. I see the truth of power
being exercised in a judgment such as:
"We only
recognise outstanding contributions to educational knowledge that can be seen
in established and renowned international refereed journals."
When such a
claim was made in my own University in 2006, no e-journals existed, to my
knowledge, that could both present the multi-media explanations of living
educational theories and had the time to become established and renowned
international refereed journals. So, no matter whether or not an educational
researcher has made an outstanding contribution to educational knowledge, this
cannot be recognised by those whose educational imaginations are constrained by
the requirement that the knowledge has to be disseminated through established
and renowned international refereed journals. The catch 22 of educational research up to 2006! Hope rests in e-journals such as Action
Research Expeditions, Ontario Action Researcher and Teaching Today for Tomorrow
in developing their reputations so that they are recognised as established and
renowned international refereed journals. Until then, the battle of snails is
likely to continue!
Conclusion and
Moving on
What I hope that this presentation has accomplished is to captivate your educational imagination in a way that resonates with the logics you use in making sense of yourself, in making sense of others and in making sense of the world in which we live. I hope it has connected with your live-affirming energy and values of humanity in your recognition of the need for new living standards of judgment in a new epistemology for educational knowledge. There is much work to be done in legitimating these living logics, standards and epistemology throughout the Academy.
I am hopeful that many of us will be working together to contribute to the creation of a world of educational quality through generating this new epistemology for educational knowledge. I am thinking particularly of working together in educating the social formations of universities and the wider society about the educational significance of creating one's own living educational theory (McNiff, 2007) and of legitimating the living standards of judgment in the Academy.
I am also thinking of the significance for each individual and for the future of humanity of generating our own living educational theories with the life-affirming and energy-flowing values that sustain a connection with, and carry hope for, humanity and our own. I know it isn't easy to hold oneself accountable to the dynamic presencing of one's values in explanations of our educational influences in learning. I have explained why I think it is necessary in creating a world of educational quality.
What counts as educational knowledge in universities around the world has both reproductive and transformatory influences in individual and social formations. Because of this I am advocating the exercise of our educational imaginations in the academic legitimating of new living logics and standards of judgment that are grounded in the energy-flowing values of our educational practices and educational knowledge-creating activities.
I conclude with the expression of hope, faith and belief that it is through the exercise of our educational imaginations in the creation and sharing of our living educational theories that the expression of our life-affirming energies, values and understandings will influence the creation of our world of educational quality.
Appendix 1
Three Objectives
My first
objective is to
present the meanings of the values that constitute the relationally dynamic
standards of judgment used by self-study researchers in enquiries of the kind,
'How do I improve what I am doing?' The presentation is informed by an
expression of inclusionality.
Inclusionality is a relationally dynamic awareness of space and
boundaries as connective, reflexive and co-creative (Rayner, 2005).
As I am
contributing to a session on Place, "Race," Culture, and Society: Creating a World of
Educational Quality,
I particularly want to acknowledge the influence of Yaakub Murray in bringing
into my awareness an understanding of a postcolonial critical consciousness.
Yaakub also raised my awareness of the importance of racialising my discourses
with understandings from different racial and ethnic groups and cultures.
Because of Yaakub's educational influence I want to focus your attention on a
video-clip, made by Yaakub's wife Asma, as we talk about Yaakub's doctoral
research and express pleasure in being together through our laughter. Yaakub is
talking about some of my educational influences. What I think the video-clip
communicates is a flow of life-affirming energy with our shared passion and
love for what we are doing in our educational enquiries.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3TjLxEiyPk
The main
point that I am making is that an explanation of my educational influence, in
my own learning, in the learning of others and in the learning of social
formations, requires life-affirming, energy-flowing values as explanatory
principles. I am also claiming that
your explanation for your educational influences in learning in
enquiries of the kind, 'How do I improve what I am doing?', will also require
your life-affirming, energy-flowing values as explanatory principles. For example, in explaining Jacqueline
Delong's educational influence in helping to form and sustain a culture of
inquiry in the Grand Erie District School Board (Delong and Whitehead, 2007) we
have drawn on the life-affirming energy-flowing value of the pleasure and love
in what Jacqueline is doing as she responds to a question about the support
provided for teacher researchers with her influence as a Superintendent of
Schools in the District School Board.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsECy86hzxA
We have also
used the following clip from a doctoral supervision session to communicate the
meanings of the expression of a life-affirming, energy-flowing value of
pleasure in what we are doing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2kdOfRKFYs
The fourth
illustration of life-affirming, energy flowing values is provided by Eden
Charles in his doctoral research where he is describing his responses to
working with a group of women in Sierra Leone who experienced great pain during
the civil war.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcfZE_z-C_w
In his
doctoral submission Eden explains his educational influences in his own
learning and in the learning of others in terms of an African Cosmology with
ubuntu and he develops the ideas of societal re-identification and guiltless
recognition in making his own contributions to the creation of a world of
educational quality. As I watch
the video of Eden I recall my experiences on the day in which I felt Eden's
receptive responsiveness to the humanity expressed by the women in Sierra Leone
in their life-affirming, energy-flowing humanising responses to their
experiences. I am wondering if I
have communicated the transformational potential of bringing life-affirming,
energy-flowing values in the living standards of judgment of a new epistemology
into the Academy?
The second
and third objectives below flow from the above, in responding to Snow's point
about the need to systematize the knowledge of practitioner-researchers in
education. The methods section below is also relevant to Snow's point:
The knowledge resources of excellent teachers constitute
a rich resource, but one that is largely untapped because we have no procedures
for systematizing it. Systematizing would require procedures for accumulating
such knowledge and making it public, for connecting it to bodies of knowledge
established through other methods, and for vetting it for correctness and
consistency. If we had agreed-upon procedures for transforming knowledge based
on personal experiences of practice into 'public' knowledge, analogous to the
way a researcher's private knowledge is made public through peer-review and
publication, the advantages would be great.
(Snow, 2001, p.9)
My second objective is to present a form and content of educational theorizing that engages with
workplace, life-long learning, in a way that recognises and resists colonizing
methodologies while supporting an emancipatory interest.
I am thinking of educational theorizing as something
that we do throughout our lives as we reflect on what we have been doing with
our lives, what we have learnt about others and ourselves and about the
cultural and other social influences in what we do. Reflection is necessary to
educational theorizing but not sufficient to distinguish it. It is the
explanations of our educational influences in learning that are necessary and
sufficient to distinguish educational theorizing. This theorizing is not
restricted to our workplaces, although much of our reflections on what we are
doing may be connected to what we see as our work. It is certainly not
restricted to schools, colleges and universities. For example, the living
theories flowing through web-space from http://people.bath.ac.uk/edsajw/living.shtml
include the explanations of educational influences in learning of police,
health, management, teachers and other education workers.
What each living educational theory has in common is
the recognition and engagement with power relations that serve a colonizing
influence through the exertion of pressure that denies the validity of the
voice, values and understandings of the practitioner researcher. I am using
colonizing in the sense of seeking to replace indigenous
understandings with other forms of understanding without respecting the vital
part the indigenous understandings play in the identity of the other.
I first became aware of such a colonising tendency of propositional theories in my early studies of educational theory at the Institute of Education of the University of London (1968-1972). The dominant view of educational theory of the time was known as the 'disciplines' approach because it held that educational theory was constituted by the philosophy, psychology, sociology and history of education. The colonising tendency in this approach was its view that the explanations I generated from my practical experience were at best pragmatic maxims that 'should' be replaced by principles with more fundamental, theoretical justification. This mistake has been acknowledged and clearly expressed by Paul Hirst, one of the early proponents of the 'disciplines' approach when he said that much understanding of educational theory will be developed:
"... in the context of immediate practical experience
and will be co-terminous with everyday understanding. In particular, many of
its operational principles, both explicit and implicit, will be of their nature
generalisations from practical experience and have as their justification the
results of individual activities and practices.
In many characterisations of educational theory, my own included, principles justified in this way have until recently been regarded as at best pragmatic maxims having a first crude and superficial justification in practice that in any rationally developed theory would be replaced by principles with more fundamental, theoretical justification. That now seems to me to be a mistake. Rationally defensible practical principles, I suggest, must of their nature stand up to such practical tests and without that are necessarily inadequate." (Hirst, 1983, p. 18)
Kierkegaard
pointed to this damaging colonising tendency of replacing the understandings
generated from practical experience with conceptual frameworks from traditional
propositional theories when he warned of the danger of creating unities in our
imaginations that become detached from practical living.
Hence I want
to hold firmly to my focus on the creation of living educational theories in
supporting an emancipatory interest in enhancing the flow of values and
understandings that are contributing to the creation of a world of educational
quality. This is why I emphasise the importance of questions of the kind, 'How do
I improve what I am doing?' in retaining a connection with one's practical
life. This emancipatory interest
includes an understanding of critical theories. I am thinking here of critical
social theories that explain how economic and other interests work, in
supporting reproductive and transformatory power relations, in social,
historical and cultural formations. These power relations reproduce existing
inequalities and violations of the values that carry hope for the future of
humanity (Fromm, 1947, 1960; Marcuse, 1964; Adorno, 1963; Shroyer, 1963;
Habermas, 1975, 1976, 1987, 2002).
I owe much,
in the growth of my educational knowledge, to these critical theorists. Erich Fromm in particular was
influential in developing my understanding of a Marxist analysis of capitalist
social formations in the development of marketing personalities. I understood
the importance of the ethics in his humanistic psychology in sustaining a
productive orientation to human existence in the face of market pressures to
succumb to the marketing orientation. I followed and agreed with his points
about the need to retain the art of loving in one's own existence, and of the
significance of hope and of small face to face groups engaging in productive
conversations for enhancing well-being in social formations.
Marcuse's
(1964) idea of a one-dimensional existence served to re-inforce Fromm's points
about the importance of a productive orientation. I continue to use Marcuse's
idea of logic as the mode of thought that is appropriate for comprehending the
real as rational. With Adorno (1963) and Schroyer (1963) I focused on the
critique of Heidegger that claimed the 'I' in Heidegger's thought remained
formal while pretending to contain content in itself. This insight continues to
focus my attention on ensuring that the 'I' within my writings is authentic and
contains content in itself. The
words of Martin Buber help me sustain a connection with this 'I' while being
aware of the importance of avoiding the domination of the 'I' of ego:
"How
much of a person a man is depends on how strong the I of the basic word I-You
is in the human duality of his I.
The
way he says I - what he means when he says I - decides where a man belongs and
where he goes. The word "I" is the true shibboleth of humanity.
Listen
to it!
How
dissonant the I of the ego sounds! When it issues from tragic lips, tense with
some self-contradiction that they try to hold back, it can move us to great
pity. When it issues from chaotic lips that savagely, heedlessly, unconsciously
represent contradiction, it can make us shudder. When the lips are vain and
smooth, it sounds embarrassing or disgusting.
Those
who pronounce the severed I, wallowing in the capital letter, uncover the shame
of the world spirit that has been debased to mere spirituality.
But
how beautiful and legitimate the vivid and emphatic I of Socrates sounds! It is
the I of infinite conversation, and the air of conversation is present on all
its ways, even before his judges, even in the final hour in prison. This I
lived in that relation to man which is embodied in conversation. It believed in
the actuality of men and went out toward them. Thus it stood together with them
in actuality and is never severed from it. Even solitude cannot spell
forsakenness, and when the human world falls silent for him, he hears his
daimonion say You.
How
beautiful and legitimate the full I of Goethe sounds! It is the I of pure
intercourse with nature. Nature yields to it and speaks ceaselessly with it;
she reveals here mysteries to it and yet does not betray her mystery. It
believes in her and says to the rose: "So it is You" - and at once
shares the same actuality with the rose. Hence, when it returns to itself, the
spirit of actuality stays with it; the vision of the sun clings to the blessed
eye that recalls its own likeness to the sun, and the friendship of the
elements accompanies man into the calm of dying and rebirth.
Thus
the "adequate, true, and pure" I-saying of the representatives of
association, the Socratic and the Goethean persons, resounds through the ages." (Buber, 1970, p.117)
With
Habermas (1975, 1987) I have kept my focus on learning with my own distinct
emphasis on explaining educational influences in learning. I continue to use
Habermas's (1976) four criteria of social validity from his work on
communication and the evolution of society, to strengthen the validity of
explanations of educational influence in learning.
Ideas of
each of these theorists have helped me to understand the colonizing influences
of the social formations in which I live and work. They have served to keep my
enquiries grounded in serving the emancipatory interests that are enhancing the
flow of values, skills and understandings that carry hope for the future of
humanity. The work of Michel Foucault (Gordon, 1980), on how power relations
are connected with knowledge, has also helped me to sustain my well-being when
working alongside disciplinary power relations in my institution that either
denied recognition to my contributions to educational knowledge or were
mobilised to terminate my employment (Whitehead, 1993). Foucault's work, more
than any other, helped me to understand and respond creatively to the exercise
of these disciplinary power relations.
My third
objective is to
focus attention on values of humanity grounded in the African cosmology of
ubuntu (Benghu, 1996) that emphasise the significance of the recognition of the
humanity of the others in educational relationships.
In focusing
attention on the values of humanity I value Gaita's (2002) insights into love,
truth and justice as values of common humanity, especially his focus on love:
To speak, as I do, of fully acknowledging another's humanity will, I know, sound like rhetoric to many people who would prefer to speak of recognising someone fully as a person, or even as a rational agent, at least when, in philosophical mode, they try to make perspicuous what really is the bearer of moral status. My endorsements of Weil's remark - that love sees what is invisible - will sound even worse to them. In this preface I can only plead that I mean both and soberly. Later I argue that improbable though it may seem at first, placing the weight that I do on our humanity and on love rather than on, say, the obligated acknowledgement of rights, is more hardheaded than the longing to make secure to reason what reason cannot secure, all the while whistling in the dark. "(pp. xx-xxi)
I am
identifying the creation of a world of educational qualities with such values
of common humanity in living educational theories.
I have a
particular political and ethical intent in asking that we engage with ubuntu
ways of being from Africa in the language we use for stressing the relational
values of our humanity. The political and ethical intent that moves me to do
this is that I want to acknowledge a relational understanding of humanity from
Africa that could contribute to the creation of a world of educational
quality. I understand something of
the violations of humanity under the Apartheid regime and the embrace of ubuntu
in the South African constitution after 1994. Living near Bristol I am near a significant place of the
part played by British Colonial Interests in the Slave Trade with its
devastating consequences for several African countries as well as for its
dehumanising influence in the perpetrators. In supervising the doctoral
research programmes of Yaakub Murray and Eden Charles in particular, with their
foci on postcolonial critical consciousness and ubuntu respectively, I have
developed my own understandings of ways of being that emphasise the
significance of recognising our own humanity in the humanity of others.
In my
learning through supervising Simon Riding's research programme, with his idea
of 'Living Myself Through Others' (Riding, 2003), I have also developed my
understandings of relational ways of being and knowing in one of the English
translations of ubuntu of 'I am because we are?'
Through
conversations and her multi-media doctoral research programme, Marian Naidoo
has shown me how such qualities of relationship can help in the emergence of a
living theory of inclusional and responsive practice:
I am because we are (a never ending story). The
emergence of a living theory of inclusional and responsive practice.
(Naidoo, 2005, Retrieved 28 February 2007 from http://people.bath.ac.uk/edsajw/naidoo.shtml
)
I cannot overstate the significance of
Marian Naidoo's multi-media communication of the meanings of a passion for
compassion in her emerging living theory of inclusional and responsive
practice. The University of Bath amended its regulations in July 2004 to allow
the submission of e-media in research degrees. Naidoo's use of e-media shows
her relationally dynamic awareness of space and boundaries in generating living
standards of judgment for
a new epistemology of educational
knowledge.
I trust that the above section
has served to focus your attention on the possibility of engaging with the
significance of ubuntu as a relational way of being and relational standard of
judgment in the development of living educational theories. I am thinking of
living theories that serve the interests of creating a world of educational
quality as I now move on in Appendix 2 to consider the theoretical frameworks
that have been significant in the evolution of my own living educational
theories. I want to stress the importance of understanding that each living
theory is unique and will draw on the different constellations of values,
skills and understandings from theoretical frameworks such as those below that
influence the individual in their own socio-cultural and socio-historical
contexts.
Appendix 2
Theoretical Frameworks
Insights from the following
theoretical frameworks, amongst many others, can be used in the generation of
the living theories. They can be used in the explication of the meanings of the
embodied values and the living standards of judgment that constitute a world of
educational quality. What I have done below is to bring together some of the
most influential ideas from a range of theories that are continuing to evolve
my unique living theory. I think
it is worth repeating that each individual will have their own unique constellation
of values, theoretical and emotional insights that are helping in the evolution
of their own living theory.
i)
Living Educational Theory
I distinguish living educational
theories as the explanations that individuals produce for their educational
influences in their own learning, in the learning of others and in the learning
of social formations.
The explanations use, as
explanatory principles, the life-affirming, energy-flowing values that
individuals generate to give meaning and purpose to their lives (Whitehead,
1989). The recognition of the
possibility that individuals could generate their own living theories emerged
with the idea that this personal knowledge required a decision to understand
the world from one's own point of view as an individual claiming originality
and exercising judgment, responsibly with universal intent (Polanyi, 1958). It
also emerged with Erich Fromm's (1960, p.18) idea from The Fear of Freedom,
that if individuals can face the truth without panic they will realise that
there is no purpose to life other than the one they give to their own lives
through their loving relationships and productive work. It emerged with Fromm's
(1947) idea from Man for Himself that as individuals we are faced with a choice
in living and working within capitalist social formations. We can develop
marketing personalities that conform to the pressures of becoming human capital
defined by the priorities of capitalist market places and we can choose to
develop productive personalities that unite with the world in the spontaneity
of love and productive work in realising more fully the ethical values of
humanity. For an appreciation of the significance of Fromm's ideas for another
that is very similar to my own, see http://www.humanistsofutah.org/2000/genmay00.html.
The idea of life-affirming,
energy-flowing values, emerged in relation to Paul Tillich's (1962, p. 168)
expression of the state of being grasped by the power of being itself, but
without Tillich's theistic commitment.
ii)
Inclusionality
In the first video-clip of the
above collage, Alan Rayner is talking about the way living boundaries of
inclusionality have become severed in western views of rationality. The idea of
Rayer (2005) expresses meanings of inclusionality as a relationally dynamic
awareness of space and boundaries as connective, reflexive and co-creative.
My present focus on communicating
meanings of life-affirming,
energy-flowing values as explanatory principles in explanations of educational
influences in learning, is informed by this perspective of inclusionality.
Inclusionality also informs the inclusion of energy-space in the relationally
dynamic standards of judgment for the new epistemology for educational
knowledge. Rayner's ideas
challenge the dominance of Darwin's evolutionary theory of natural selection.
In this presentation I use Rayners expression of inclusionality to emphasise
the significance of an evolutionary open process that enables a creatively
respective response in a living space that is fundamentally fluid, rather than
fixed:
Biological
evolution has been depicted in much the same way, as a process of progressive
adaptation involving the preferential selection of those forms that have a
competitive advantage in a defined set of circumstances or 'niche'. Here I show
how the rigid selectivity of this approach, whilst approximating to one aspect
of natural evolutionary processes disregards another, and so is profoundly
inadequate when attuning with an ever-changing context such as that currently
referred to as 'climate change'. For such attunement, a natural, evolutionarily
open, process is necessary to enable a creatively receptive response in a
space-including geometry that is fundamentally fluid, not fixed. This process
of 'natural inclusion' involves the non-linear integration, differentiation and
complementation of both radially
symmetrical (all round) and polarized (channelled) non-local and local spatial
information. Here, the latter is a dynamic inclusion - necessarily both
including and included in the former, like a weathervane signifying airflow or
fish attuning with streambed. It cannot operate as an independent executive
object, isolated from what includes itself. (Rayner, 2007)
iii) Communication and Learning
The idea that communication is
vital for social evolution and that in reaching understanding with each other
we are making four validity claims related to the comprehensibility, rightness,
truth and authenticity of what we are saying (Habermas, 1976). I continue to use these four criteria
of social validity to enhance the validity of living theories, by asking
validation groups of peers that read and respond to living theory accounts, to
use these criteria in responding to the explanation of educational influence.
The ideas of Habermas (1975) about the significance of legitimation in what
counts as valid educational knowledge continue to focus my attention on
legitimating life-affirming, energy flowing values in living standards of
judgment in the Academy. Habermas' ideas on learning (1975, 1987) also serve to
reinforce the focus of my attention on the importance of explaining educational
influences in learning.
'It
is my conjecture that the fundamental mechanism for social evolution in general
is to be found in an automatic inability not to learn. Not learning, but
not-learning is the phenomenon that calls for explanation at the socio-cultural
stage of development. Therein lies, if you will, the rationality of man. Only
against this background does the over-powering irrationality of the history of
the species become visible.' (Habermas, 1975, p. 15)
"... I have attempted to free historical materialism from
its philosophical ballast. Two abstractions are required for this: I)
abstracting the development of the cognitive structures from the historical
dynamic of events, and ii) abstracting the evolution of society from the
historical concretion of forms of life. Both help in getting beyond the
confusion of basic categories to which the philosophy of history owes its
existence.
A theory developed in this way can no longer start by
examining concrete ideals immanent in traditional forms of life. It must orient itself to the range of learning
processes that is opened up at a given time by a historically attained level of
learning (My emphasis on learning). It must refrain from
critically evaluating and normatively ordering totalities, forms of life and
cultures, and life-contexts and epochs as a whole. And yet it can take up some
of the intentions for which the interdisciplinary research program of earlier
critical theory remains instructive.
Coming at the end of a complicated study of the main
features of a theory of communicative action, this suggestion cannot count even
as a "promissory note." It is less a promise than a conjecture." (Habermas, 1987, p. 383)
iii)
Ubuntu and a Web of Betweenness
The African idea of ubuntu
(Benghu, 1996) is loosely translated into English as 'I am because we
are'. I see its relevance to this
presentation in the assumption that a world of educational quality requires the
recognition by individuals of the humanity of the other.
In my thinking I see ubuntu as
being linked to the idea of the web of betweenness from Celtic spirituality in
Farren's thesis on 'How can I create a pedagogy of the unique through a web of
between ness?' (O' Donohue, 2003; Farren 2005 – see http://people.bath.ac.uk/edsajw/farren.shtml
). In Farren's thesis the 'web of betweenness' refers to how we learn in relation to one another and also
how e-media can enable us to get closer to communicating the meanings of our
embodied values (Farren, 2005). In Farren's thesis the
theoretical framework of a pedagogy of the unique is presented as a dialogic
process that reflects a growing openness to learning and relearning with
others, in a democratic process that gives adequate space to each participant
to contribute to the development of new knowledge, to develop their own voice,
to make their own insightful offerings and to engage in their own action, as
well as to create their own products, in an age of supercomplexity (Barnett,
2000). My political and ethical intent in including ubuntu as an African
concept in living standards of judgment for a new epistemology of educational
knowledge is because it serves the purpose of internationalising the standards
in a way that focuses on the humanising qualities of relationships in a world
of educational quality.
iv)
Socio-cultural and socio-historical Theory
Ideas from socio-cultural theory (Said, 1993; Lantoff, 2000) are used to provide insights about the use of living theories as cultural artefacts flowing through web-space that can influence the creation of cultures of inquiry (Delong, 2002) in generating a world of educational quality. This influence is being expressed in a range of cultural contexts that are connected through the globalising interconnecting and branching channels of communication of web-space. This flow of living theories as cultural artefacts can be accessed from http://www.actionresearch.net .
I am using the word culture in the sense expressed by Said:
As I use the word, 'culture' means two things in particular. First of all it means all those practices, like the arts of description, communication, and representation, that have relative autonomy from the economic, social, and political realms and that often exist in aesthetic forms, one of whose principal aims is pleasure. Included, of course, are both the popular stock of lore about distant parts of the world and specialized knowledge available in such learned disciplines as ethnography, historiography, philology, sociology, and literary history... Second, and almost imperceptible, culture is a concept that includes a refining and elevating element, each society's reservoir of the best that has been known and thought. (Said, pp. xii-xiv, 1993)
My emphasis on the significance of living educational theories for the
creation of a world of educational quality owes much to the idea of the power
of cultural influences in the education of individuals and social formations.
Said's analysis of novels as influential in the reproduction of imperial social
formations serves to focus my emancipatory interest in enhancing the flow of
living educational theories that serve this interest in helping to transform
the world into a world of educational quality. I have also found Foucault's
(1980) ideas on the role of the specific and universal intellectual and his
emphasis on the individual speaking on their own behalf in confronting the
truth of power with the power of truth, influential in the growth of my own
educational knowledge. The socio-historical theories of Fromm (1947), Marcuse
(1964), Adorno (1963) and Habermas (1975, 1976, 1987) serve to focus attention
on the power of the interest groups that are sustaining globalising capitalist
formations and I do agree with Habermas' (2002) insight about the importance of
engaging with both individual and social influences in enhancing civic rights and
responsibilities:
"The dispute between the two received paradigms - whether the autonomy of legal persons is better secured through individual liberties for private competition or through publicly guaranteed entitlements for clients of welfare bureaucracies - is superseded by a proceduralist concept of law. According to this conception, the democratic process mush secure private and public autonomy at the same time: the individual rights that are meant to guarantee to women the autonomy to pursue their lives in the private sphere cannot even be adequately formulated unless the affected persons themselves first articulate and justify in public debate those aspects that are relevant to equal or unequal treatment in typical cases. The private autonomy of equally entitled citizens can only be secured only insofar as citizens actively exercise their civic autonomy." (Habermas, 2002, p.264)
In seeking to use insights from the most advanced social theories of the
day I have been drawn to Sen's economic theory of human capability and the
distinction he makes between this theory and an economic theory of human
capital. I recognise that much of what I have been able to do in my productive
life and what has yet to emerge, rests in the economic security of a contract
of employment at the University of Bath from 1973-2009.
v)
An economic theory of human capability
Ideas from an economic theory of
human capability are used to connect the educational influences of economic
globalisation to the values that carry hope for the future of humanity and
hence to a world of educational quality (Sen, 1999). What I like about Sen's
theory is that it emphasises the freedom of individuals to lead the lives they
have reason to value. The theory stresses the importance of valuations that
both enrich one's well being in being free, well-nourished and being healthy as
well as expressing human qualities that can be employed as 'capital' in
production. Through stressing the importance of freedom it can serve an
emancipatory interest in moving beyond cultural and other pressures to live
lives that conform to an economic theory of human capital:
" ... what, we may ask, is the connection between "human
capital" orientation and the emphasis on "human capability" with
which this study has been much concerned? Both seem to place humanity at the
center of attention, but do they have differences as well as some congruence?
At the risk of some oversimplification, it can be said that the literature
on human capital tends to concentrate on the agency of human beings in
augmenting production possibilities. The perspective of human capability
focuses, on the other hand, on the ability‑the substantive freedom‑of
people to lead the lives they have reason to value and to enhance the real
choices they have. The two perspectives cannot but be related, since both are
concerned with the role of human beings, and in particular with the actual
abilities that they achieve and acquire. But the yardstick of assessment
concentrates on different achievements.
Given her personal characteristics, social background, economic
circumstances and so on, a person has the ability to do (or be) certain things
that she has reason to value. The reason for valuation can be direct (the functioning
involved may directly enrich her life, such as being well‑nourished or
being healthy), or indirect (the functioning
involved may contribute to further production, or command a price in the
market). The human capital perspective can‑in principle‑be defined
very broadly to cover both types of valuation, but it is typically defined‑by
convention‑primarily in terms of indirect value: human qualities that can
be employed as "capital" in production (in the way physical
capital is). In this sense, the narrower view of the human capital approach fits
into the more inclusive perspective of human capability, which can cover both
direct and indirect consequences of human abilities." (Sen,
1999, p.293)
I find that economic theories of human capital have helped me to
understand the power relations of capitalist social formations that serve a
reproductive interest. The
economic theory of human capability, that stresses the importance of living
values such as freedom reinforces my commitment to enhance the flow of values,
skills and understandings, serve my transformatory interest of creating a world
of educational quality.
Appendix 3
Methods
When conducting any form of
research, especially in relation to data gathering and theory generation and
testing, the appropriateness of the methods we use is highly significant. In
living theory educational research, the methods need to be appropriate for the
generation and evaluation of living theories of educational influence in
learning in enquiries of the kind, 'How do I improve what I am doing?'
The use of
multi-media in explanations of educational influences in learning
Eisner's
(1993) Presidential Address to the American Educational Research Association
served to reinforce my belief in the value of multi-media in explanations of
educational influences in learning.
Naidoo (2005), Farren
(2005) and Farren and Whitehead (2006) have demonstrated how digital, multi-media visual narratives can help
to clarify the meanings of the values of self-study researchers. They show how
the meanings of these embodied values can be formed and expressed in the living
standards of judgment that can characterize a world of educational
quality. Farren's (2005)
multi-media approach, using a Moodle environment for e-learning, demonstrates
how a pedagogy of the unique can emerge from a web of betweenness.
An action
research approach to educational enquiry that includes methodological
inventiveness
An action
research approach to educational enquiry can demonstrate how the embodied
values can be transformed into living critical standards of judgment for
testing the validity of contributions to knowledge of self-study researchers.
As the practitioner-researcher expresses concern that the values that give
meaning and purpose to their lives are not being lived as fully as possible,
the imagination responds with possibilities that if realised in practice would
improve matters in terms of the the realisation of values. With the actions,
data gathering and evaluations, the individual, often with the help of others
in validation meetings, clarifies the meanings of their ontological values as
these emerge in practice. In this clarification the expressions of embodied
values are formed into communicable living standards of judgment that can be
used to evaluate the validity of the educational knowledge. The significance of
the use of the action reflection cycles is that the expression of embodied
ontological values can be formed into living epistemological standards of
judgment. This inclusion of ontological values into living epistemological
standards is of vital significance in the creation of a new epistemology for
educational knowledge and for a living theory approach to the creation of a
world of educational quality.
A process of
methodological inventiveness
(Dadds and Hart, 2001) can be used in explaining the self-study
researcher's responsiveness to the continuously evolving present of the
educational enquiry:
" The importance of methodological inventiveness
Perhaps the most important new insight for both of us has been awareness that, for some practitioner researchers, creating their own unique way through their research may be as important as their self-chosen research focus. We had understood for many years that substantive choice was fundamental to the motivation and effectiveness of practitioner research (Dadds 1995); that what practitioners chose to research was important to their sense of engagement and purpose. But we had understood far less well that how practitioners chose to research, and their sense of control over this, could be equally important to their motivation, their sense of identity within the research and their research outcomes." (p. 166)
"If our aim is to create conditions that facilitate methodological inventiveness, we need to ensure as far as possible that our pedagogical approaches match the message that we seek to communicate. More important than adhering to any specific methodological approach, be it that of traditional social science or traditional action research, may be the willingness and courage or practitioners – and those who support them – to create enquiry approaches that enable new, valid understandings to develop; understandings that empower practitioners to improve their work for the beneficiaries in their care. Practitioner research methodologies are with us to serve professional practices. So what genuinely matters are the purposes of practice which the research seeks to serve, and the integrity with which the practitioner researcher makes methodological choices about ways of achieving those purposes. No methodology is, or should, cast in stone, if we accept that professional intention should be informing research processes, not pre-set ideas about methods of techniques..."(p. 169)
Enhancing
Validity
The methods
used to enhance validity draw on Habermas' (1976) four criteria of social
validity of comprehensibility, truth, rightness and authenticity. In a research programme lasting several
years (the living theory doctorates have been created from at least five years
part-time study in a workplace) the validity of explanations of educational
influences in learning can be enhanced through a form of creative and critical
educational conversation in a validating meeting in which questions are focused
on the comprehensibility of the account; on the quality of the evidence
presented to justify assertions and claims to knowledge; on the awareness of
the normative assumptions that are being used to structure the report; on the
authenticity of the researcher in the sense that over time, through interaction,
the researcher is showing that they are truly committed to the values and
understandings they claim to espouse.
Enhancing Rigor
The methods used to enhance the rigor of the enquiry draw on
Winter's (1989) six criteria of rigor of reflexive critique, dialectical
critique, risk, plural structure, multiple resource and theory practice
transformation. Peggy Leong's (nee
Kok) (1991) was the first living theory action research thesis to fully
integrate this approach, to enhancing rigor, into her explanation of
educational influences in learning. I continue to find Winters' six criteria
helpful in enhancing rigor (See the Appendix of Whitehead 2006 - http://www.nipissingu.ca/oar/new_issue-V821E.htm)
Appendix 4
Data
The processes of enhancing validity and
rigor do depend on the quality of the data that are being used as evidence in
relation to a claim to know. Here are the data sources that are being used in
the claim to have generated a new epistemology for educational knowledge that
can be used in the creation of a world of educational quality through living
educational theories. The Data sources are all flowing through web-space and
open to your scrutiny.
The following data sources are used below in the evidence-based claims
of educational significance. These claims include the validation and
legitimating of the living standards of judgment from self-study researchers
that can be used to distinguish a world of educational quality.
Accounts of educational influences in learning of higher education
educators. For an exemplar of this data see Hartog (2004). The data include:
i)
Action research accounts with Chinese characteristics
generated by action researchers in China's Experimental Centre for Educational
Action Research in Foreign Languages Teaching at Ningxia Teachers University (http://people.bath.ac.uk/edsajw/moira.shtml
)
ii)
Accounts of educational influences in learning of 20
self-study researchers from a range of professional contexts who have been
awarded their doctoral degrees. (Whitehead, 2007 - http://people.bath.ac.uk/edsajw/living.shtml)
iii)
Accounts of educators learning from
their self study research with Delong (2001), Delong & Black (2002),
Delong, Black & Knill-Griesser (2003, 2004, 2005), Delong, Black & Wideman (2005). The
data includes an account of the significance of the flow of an educational leader's
passion for professional practice that is focused on democratic processes of
accountability (Delong, 2002) into the educational provision of a District
School Board. (http://www.actionresearch.ca/)
iv)
Accounts
of educators learning from their self-study research with Farren (2005) at
Dublin City University. (http://webpages.dcu.ie/~farrenm/)
v)
Accounts of
educators learning from their self-study research with McNiff (McNiff, 2006;
McNiff & Whitehead, 2006; Whitehead & McNiff, 2006) through her work as
Professor of Educational Research and as an International Consultant in
Education. (http://www.jeanmcniff.com/reports.html).
See in particular the doctoral theses of
Sullivan, 2006; Glenn, 2006 and McDonagh, 2007.
The validity,
rigor and legitimacy of these data, in the masters and doctoral degrees, as
well as being subjected to the processes described above for enhancing these
qualities, have been subjected to the quality controls of the internal and
external examining procedures of the Universities that have accredited the work
for the higher degree. These are the
data used above in supporting the evidence-based claims of educational
significance.
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