Whose Knowledge Is It Anyway Dissemination of a practitioner action research project in east London'

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Whose Knowledge Is It Anyway? Dissemination
of a practitioner action research project in east
London.Warren Kidd
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• Action research is a form of collective
  self-reflective enquiry undertaken by
  participants in social situations in order to
  improve the rationality and justice of their own
  social or educational practices, as well as their
  understanding of those practices and the
  situations in which the practices are carried
  out

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• The approach is only action research when it is
  collaborative, though it is important to realise
  that action research of the group is achieved
  through the critically examined action of
  individual group members.
• (Kemmis, and McTaggart, 1988 5-6)
• Kemmis, S. and McTaggart, R. (1988) The Action
  Research Planner, Geelong, Victoria Deakin
  University Press.

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• Bassey (1998) defines action research as,
• an enquiry which is carried out in order to
  understand, evaluate and to then change, in order
  to improve practice. (Bassey, 1998 93)
• Bassey, M. (1998) Action research for improving
  practice in Halsall, R. (ed.), Teacher Research
  and School Improvement Opening Doors from the
  Inside. Buckingham Open University Press.

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• Whereas for Reason and Bradbury (2001),
• Action research is about working towards
  practical outcomes, and also about creating new
  forms of understanding, since action without
  understanding is blind, just as theory without
  action is meaningless.
• (Reason and Bradbury, 2001 2)
• Reason, P., and Bradbury, H. (2001) Handbook of
  Action Research Participative Enquiry and
  Practice. London Sage.

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What is our collective story?

• Large multi-cultural urban east London college
• Structural reformation and change pre-inspection
• Pockets of excellence post inspection
• SLCs
• CDI previous project

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By the end of the project

• 51 participants in year one, and 45 participants
  in year two.
• In classroom with peer - Over 200 hours
• Individual classroom sessions visited - 180
• Peer planning and resource development - Over
  350 hours
• Meetings/feedback sessions with participants -
  230 sessions

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• The role of the team is
• to help produce resources and learning materials
  to be used by colleagues in the classroom
• to observe colleagues classroom practice and to
  help engage colleagues in a critical dialogue
• to encourage reflection before, during and after
  practice, with a view to trying something new and
  being supported in risk-taking
• to encourage colleagues to try something new
  and to make something new in terms of resources.

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• Research through doing
• Research through involvement in practice
• Reflection
• Democratic
• Introspective
• Transformative
• Active theorizing

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Ways of classifying action research

• Carr and Kemmis (1986)
• Technical outsider researcher
• Practical collaboration lead by facilitator
• Emancipatory participants own the social
  construction of ideas
• Carr, W and Kemmis, S (1986) Becoming Critical
  Education, knowledge and action research. London
  Falmer Press.

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What was our location within the story of this
action research project?

• Naïve pragmatists
• Actively theorizing
• Inside
• Outside
• Inside and outside at the same time
• Ambiguous roles and relationships
• Authenticating and validating knowledge claims

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• Action research it is both knowing and doing

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•  
• There is nothing so practical as good theory
• (Kurt Lewin, 1951 p169).
• Lewin, K. (1951) Field theory in social science
  selected theoretical papers. D. Cartwright (ed.).
  New York, Harper Row.

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The story of the project
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What were our challenges?

• Can you identify possible challenges?
• Practical/logistical?
• Ethical?
• Pedagogic?
• Dissemination/research documenting?

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Problems for AR in FE

• Culham (2001)
• Lack of time
• Lack of funding
• No pre-existing/active research culture
• Research not seen as having value
• Few dissemination opportunities
• Culham, A (2001) Practitioner-based Research in
  FE realities and problems, College Research,
  Summer, 27-28

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What did we do? pre-support

• Series of team discussions on nature of teaching
  and learning individual and group
• Wrote adverts and contracts for/of support
• Built up a list of interested colleagues
• Interviewed each one and target-set/ negotiated
  support

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What did we do? during support

• Observation
• Further negotiation
• Ideas generation
• Team teaching
• Collegiate interference
• Mutual planning

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• The most exciting aspect of the researcher role
  has been being able to work alongside colleagues
  whom one would not ordinarily come into contact
  with. To discuss, share and team teach and peer
  observe with a much wider group of people from
  outside of the teams I currently work within.
• (Researcher reflection)

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• Participation in the project has provided me
  with open ended time to reflect on different
  approaches to old materials.  It has been very
  helpful to have a non-judgemental forum in which
  to do this.  It also helps to have another
  teachers perspective on how to approach delivery
  of certain materials. I am now enjoying the
  teaching of a specific unit, far more than in
  previous years.  In fact this unit has now become
  my favourite unit to teach.  Working with the
  team has enabled me to discuss ideas and take
  time out to create new materials.  It is very
  useful to have someone to bounce ideas with. 
  Many of the ideas and materials I have been able
  to translate into use in other aspects of my
  teaching. (Participant)

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• At the start of the Project we tried to
  interview and meet with all participants as
  quickly as possible to develop a relationship
  and to build rapport. It seems that this initial,
  early meeting was as welcome from the
  participants viewpoint as it was valuable from
  mine. It was good to establish a working
  relationship quickly, productively and to be able
  to reassure colleagues about the more sensitive
  and confidential aspects of the support on offer.
  More than this, quite simply it was interesting.
  We do not spend enough time as professionals
  talking about teaching about what we think
  about learning, what we see as the challenges,
  what we are trying to achieve in our own
  classrooms. It was also nice to have the
  opportunity to share, reflect and bounce ideas
  off others, in the same way as my role was to act
  as a point of reflection for them. (Researcher
  reflection)

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• The project has been very useful in moving my
  own practice of student centred learning forward
  and in trying new avenues of exploration in my
  teaching. One of the best aspects of the project
  has been trying new ideas and having another
  objective voice in the room to help me reflect
  upon the efficacy of the techniques used at the
  time meeting with another teaching professional
  from a different academic discipline has been a
  good way to reflect, share ideas and different
  approaches to teaching, and  most importantly to
  take my teaching practice forward.  Overall I
  feel the project has been a major success and I
  have enjoyed it. (Participant)