A living theory approach to educational policy
formation, implementation and evaluation:
forming and sustaining a culture of inquiry for teacher-researchers as
leaders of learning in a School Board.
For ICTR 2007 at National-Louis University, Chicago,
13 April 2007.
Jacqueline Delong, Grand Erie District School Board,
Canada.
Jack Whitehead, University of Bath. UK.
Abstract
A living theory
approach to educational policy formation, implementation and evaluation has
involved the creation of a new epistemology of the kind that Schon (1995)
called for with the recognition that this would challenge the epistemology in
the modern research university.
The living theory approach has involved the creation of new relationally
dynamic standards of judgment and a living logic of inclusionality. Both the
logic and standards are flowing with energy and to avoid repetition below, when
we refer to living logics and standards of judgment we are referring to
energy-flowing logics and values-based standards of judgment. We cannot
overemphasise the importance of understanding the meaning of energy-flowing
values in what we are seeking to communicate. To stress the importance of these meanings in our communication
we want to show you how Delong expressed these meanings while responding to a
question on supports for teacher-research at an international panel at ICTR in
Montreal in 1999.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsECy86hzxA
Towards the end of
this video-clip as Delong is describing the 'S.W.A.T.' team response to a
request by a teacher for help in developing her action research, Delong
expresses her life-affirming energy and the pleasure in loving what she does in
education. It is such expressions of energy and value that characterize the
explanatory principles in a living theory approach to enhancing professionalism
in education.
Our standards of
judgment also include forms of democratic evaluation in which we submit our
accounts to the power of better argument. In this form of democractic
evaluation we accept Bernstein's announcement of his two conditions of an
effective democracy:
First of all,
there are the conditions for an effective democracy. I am not going to derive
these from high-order principles, I am just going to announce them. They first
condition is that people must feel that they have a stake in society. Stake may
be a bad metaphor, because by stake I mean that not only are people concerned
to receive something but that they are also concerned to give something. This
notion of stake has two aspects to it, the receiving and the giving. People
must feel that they have a stake in both senses of the term.
Second, people
must have confidence that the political arrangements they create will realise
this stake, or give grounds if they do not. In a sense it does not matter too
much if this stake is not realised, or only partly realised, providing there
are good grounds for it not being realised or only partly realised. (Bernstein, 2000, p. xix)
In the following
video-clip from a supervision session on Delong's doctorate we are expressing
our commitment to democratic evaluation, to power with rather than power over,
with the flow of life-affirming energy in the pleasure and laughter that is
expressed after Delong's point about wisdom.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2kdOfRKFYs
We are claiming
that such energy-flowing values are necessary in the development of a living
theory approach to educational policy formation, implementation and evaluation.
What now follows is Delong's narrative of forming and
sustaining a culture of inquiry for teacher-researchers as leaders of learning
in a School Board. The analysis of leaders of learning includes Delong's
influence in supporting a Japanese researcher in developing her understanding
of how Delong has helped to form and sustain such a culture of inquiry. The culture of inquiry includes
engaging with the development of Provincial Wide Standards of Practice from the
Ontario College of Teachers. It includes developing an appropriate masters
curriculum in partnership with a University to support a living theory approach
to the professional learning of teachers. The narrative is consistent with
McNiff's advocacy of a living educational theory approach to cultural
transformation (McNiff, 2007a, 2007b). In relation to Schon's point about the
need for a new epistemology for educational research into teacher education we
are drawing on Whitehead's (2007) work on a living logic of inclusionality.
This follows Marcuse's (1964, p. 105) idea of logic as a mode of thought that
is appropriate for comprehending the real as rational and seeks to answer
Ilyenkov's (1977) question from his work on dialectical logic, If any object
is a living contradiction, what must the thought (statement about the object)
be that expresses it? Can and
should an objective contradiction find reflection in thought? And if so, in
what form? (p. 320).
We understand the 2,500 arguments between formal and
dialectical logicians in which each denies the rationality of the other,
particularly in relation to theory generation and testing (Popper, 1963, pp.
313-317). What we are suggesting is that a living logic of inclusionality,
expressed through narratives forms such as that used by Delong below, can be
used to appreciate the value of as logic that can integrate insights from both
propositional and dialectical logics without denying the rationality of either.
We are further suggesting that the public accessibility of the living theory
narrative is constituting a cultural artefact. Following Said (1993) we are
using the word culture to mean 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. We are also using the
word to include a refining and
elevating element in each society's reservoir of the best that has been known
and thought (p.ii).
The explanatory power of the expression of life-affirming
energy and values through a visual narrative includes its living logic and
standards of judgment. Through their accessibility through web-space we believe
that such artefacts are contributing to the realization of the potentials of
educational action research for renewable cultural transformation (McNiff, 2007b). Evidence to support this belief is the
acknowledgements of the value of a living theory approach to enhancing
professionalism in education in different contexts around the world (Farren
& Crotty, 2007, Laidlaw, 2007, Whitehead, 2007).
Jacqueline
Delong's Account of forming and sustaining a culture of inquiry for
teacher-researchers as leaders of learning in a School Board and extending this
culture through international relationships.
Over 12 years, I
have encouraged and supported pre-school, elementary and secondary teachers,
administrators and support staff to research their practice by asking the
question, " How Can I Improve My Practice?" (Delong, 2002; Whitehead, 1989,
2005). The evidence of the systemic influence is embodied in six volumes of Passion
In Professional Practice: Action Research In Grand Erie (Delong, Black And Knill-Griesser,
2001-2005) and annual conferences, Ontario Educational Research Council and Act
Reflect Revise, where researchers also share their findings. The support model
has been developed, refined and published in Action Research For Teaching
Excellence (Delong, Black & Wideman, 2005).
In this paper, I will share ways in which I
have contributed to educational policies that have influenced the development
of a culture of inquiry through action research in a school board. The policy
initiatives connect a number of programs and values. The programs like Roots of
Empathy, Tribes, Schools Attuned, Early Learning and Parenting Centres,
Mindshift and Action Research Inquiry Groups (Delong & Whitehead, 2006).The
values are embodied in Character Development, Special Education Guiding Principles,
Inclusive Cultures, Valuing the Other and Inquiry and Reflection. All of the
programs, focused on improving students' learning by building capacity in the
system, reinforce and connect to each other and embody the values and most
significantly have been researched by practitioners in the District School
Board (Delong, Black & Knill- Griesser, 2001-2006 and www.actionresearch.ca). One update I
might include is that all of these programs have grown annually. One example is
the Roots of Empathy Program which started in 3 classrooms in the Grand Erie
District School Board in 2004 and now is in 27 classrooms
within the system!
I think that I am living
systemic thinking as a focus for inquiry.
I set out to
learn more about, and develop, how systemic thinking informs my behaviour
and approaches
to inquiry. Thinking systemically, to me, includes:
Often holding
in mind ideas of connectedness, systemic properties and dynamics,
persistence of
patterns, and resilience;
Respecting
emergence and unfolding process;
Believing that
often "parts" cannot change unless there is some kind of shift in
systemic
pattern, but/and that sometimes "parts" can change and influence change
in the wider
"system";
Typically experiencing
myself as involved in any systemic relationships I am
seeking to
understand, not apart. (Marshall,
2004)
The professional
body for teachers in Ontario is the Ontario College of Teachers. The paper will
show how teachers researching their educational influences in their schools are
living the standards of practice and ethical standards of the OCT as well as
contributing their educational knowledge to the Academy.
The significance
of the presentation lies in its contribution to understanding the living
standards of judgment that can be used to assess the quality of practice-based
research and self-studies of teacher-education practice. The significance of
the importance of developing agreed-upon procedures for transforming knowledge
based on personal experiences of practice into 'public' knowledge has been
highlighted by Snow (2001). Such 'public' knowledge requires comprehensible
standards of judgment.
I
would like to bring a new understanding of explanatory principles - thinking of explanatory principles that
are flowing with the energy I've expressed and sustained through my
professional life. I think the video-clip at ICTR shows the flow of
life-affirming energy with pleasure (I can also be seen to be loving what I
do).
I also want to celebrate
the hundreds of teachers researching and theorizing about their practice in my
district. My work, much like the "Fellow Traveller" (Spiro, 2006) has been as a
"follower":
We carried on walking, and the Fellow Traveller
didn't seem to be showing me anything at all, but just following where I went
along the hillside.
"But
you aren't showing me. Shouldn't you be showing me the way?"
"No, quite the reverse. You choose which way you
want to go, and I'll come along with you."
"Are you sure?" I asked, nervously. It seemed a
strange way to lead, to be in fact a follower.
"Look, the end of the journey is over there." He
pointed beyond the wood where the narrow track disappeared. "You can get there
any way you like." http://www.jackwhitehead.com/spiro/jstraveller.htm
(2007)
I want to include as well an international
connection that has helped me to reflect on my own school system while helping
a friend conduct her research. I met Kazuko (Kei) Sawamoto, a professor at
Japan's Women's University in 1998 when Jack introduced us. Kei has visited me
every year since and produced a number of studies, one of which was
Collaborative Research For Teachers Development: a Comparative Study Between The
Reflective Method and Action Research
(Sawamoto, 2003) and on February 29, 2004 I gave a address to the
Japanese Association of Educators for Human Development conference in Tokyo. I
have been struck by the symbiotic nature of learning in our relationship when
often I have thought of my role as teaching Kei. In fact it is she who has
learned a new language, English, and I still know only the basic phrases in
Japanese. Kei's English had improved enormously when I chatted with her during
this visit but I've got to concentrate all the time to decipher her meanings.
In the taped interviews, you hear me interpreting the questions so that Kei's
intentions are clear. I was interested in her purpose:
I would like to explore the teacher development
process from the perspective of the meanings of "profession" in teachers' lives
through interviews with expert teachers. In doing so, I will elicit reasons why
teachers have been motivated to improve their skills and knowledge as a
teacher. In addition, I will clarify how they have built their professional
skills and knowledge. Furthermore,
I would like to explore the meanings of the professional development in
teachers' lives (Sawamoto, 2007 email).
and
her questions which included:
When are you satisfied with yourself as a teacher?
When do you build good relationships with students?
What is the meaning of being a teacher in your
life?
When do you think being a teacher is hard for you?
Please explain with your experiences. (Sawamoto, 2007 email).
I was, moreover, very moved by the responses of the
teachers to her questions. Barkev's (one of the teachers I work with) response
to her first question looked like this:
Barkev: O.K.
"Where are you most satisfied with yourself as a teacher? Please outline your
experiences"
I'm most satisfied with myself as a
teacher when I know that I made a difference in the lives of my students and
there are many ways that I see that I've made a difference. It's not always
just curriculum based. Quite often if I know that a student has decided they
want to come down and sit down to talk with me about something personal, about
what they're doing on the weekend; if they are part of a club; or they're part
of a dance team; or that kind of stuff and if they want to share their
experiences and talk about things, then I know right then and there that they
feel very comfortable with me and it's very important to have a comfort level
with you students. It's very important for them to be able to respect you and
for you to respect them and their opinions and their lives. There is a mutual
relationship that has to build in order for there to be a good solid foundation
for learning.
When I reflect on the nature of my influence, I
remind myself to address the issue of my hierarchical position as a
superintendent in supporting the action research process, a process full of
vulnerability. My colleagues and co-researchers tell me that I have a
relational way of being that takes the hierarchy out of the relationship.
Marion Kline, a teacher at the time, now a Vice-Principal said:
You always
had time for me. We talked on the phone so comfortably and openly that I
believe those conversations kept me in this [masters] program. You are such a
good listener and sincerely cared about me. You give me advice with dignity. If
we were really talking right now you would say, Marion, how do you know? What
did I do that made you feel that way? I know you sincerely cared because of
many little things you did. During one phone call you immediately said, "When
can we meet?" The reaction was so genuine and you so honestly wanted to help me
that I will never forget the tone of your voice and the speed of your reply.
(Kline in Delong, 2002, p.262).
When Kei asked Barkev if he felt uncomfortable with his
Superintendent sitting beside him, his response was, "No. I don't feel
uncomfortable. I don't feel uncomfortable because I feel like in our
profession, in order to grow, you have to be able to think and speak your mind
and be able to have conversations and sometimes you might disagree. And that's
O.K. to disagree as long as there is dialogue, as long as there is conversation
and it's through that, that you learn and that you grow (Sawamoto, 2007)." Now how is that for
evidence of an inquiring mind!
I found that as I was listening to Kei interview
the teachers, I was reflecting on nature of my influence and on living systems
thinking (Marshall). My influence was evident in the willingness of teachers
and principals to open their doors and hearts to Kei (something she was unable
to access in the Toronto District School Board) on very short notice. In her
usual manner, Kei gives me very short timelines, at times a couple of days, and
the fact that teachers and principals would agree to give their time in and out
of classrooms is remarkable. The opportunity to learn from another country as
well as to reflect on their values was part of my living systems thinking
(Marshall, ) when I invited different schools to be involved in Kei's research.
As Fullan, 2006) says, "The Ontario school system can be classified as good by
most world standards, but it is not great (p. xiii)".
While
I and the teachers are learning from Kei, I agree with Jack: I'm just hoping
she gets to understand just how you have developed your systemic influence in
supporting the teacher-research accounts with the focus on improving learning.
With Kei, if she understands what you do I think she would be very influential
as the Japan Women's University moves into its new location.
(Whitehead, Feb. 14, 2007 email). Kei is in a unique and challenging position in her university, her
country and her research, given that she is a female in a male-dominated
culture and working on an international study in a country that is very insular.
Many academics and
administrators here agree that Japan's insular higher-education system would
benefit enormously by opening up to the rest of the world. They cite such
problems as the sluggish adoption of new course-management technologies like
Blackboard's, the lack of creative thinking in departments and classrooms, and
a shortage of programs for older students. Critics add that most Japanese
universities are not competitive internationally: Just three Japanese
institutions made the top-100 list in the 2006 rankings of the Times Higher
Education Supplement, in London (McNeill, D. 2007).
Going back to Kei's visit, I can see in myself the
"conceptualisations of energy and values, energy and meaning and energy and
motivation (Vasilyuk, 1991, p. 63-64)." If you could have seen us on those two
days, you would have seen my commitment to helping Kei and expanding the
horizons of the teachers as well as maintaining the integrity of my own work in
schools, and you would recognize energy and values, energy and meaning and
energy and motivation (Vasilyuk, ibid ) as part of my ontology. What I didn't
mention that in addition to trying to be two places at once – one with
Kei and one at my school visits, I was very sick with a bronchial infection. I
submit that as evidence to confront Vasilyuk's opinion that "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 (Vasilyuk, p. 63).
Responding to a request from the University of
British Columbia for an interview on action research to be shown at the
Investigating Our Practices Conference on May 5, 2007 provided another
opportunity to reflect on my living systems thinking (Marshall, 2004) as well
as the issue that Vasilyuk points out concerning the poor conceptualisations of
energy and values, energy and meaning and energy and motivation.
I am wondering if this clip might demonstrate those
conceptualizations:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5J7Yr_LjFs
I think you will hear me talk about my values as
standards of judgment. The values as standards of judgment that I articulated
are valuing the other, building and sustaining a culture of inquiry, creating
the evidential knowledge-base of practitioner research to give voice to
teachers' knowledge, sustaining collaborative learning communities for
improving student learning and improving the social order. What I don't talk
about in the clip is the cycles of support and non-support, 'victory
narratives' and 'stories of ruin' (MacLure 1996), that I have experienced in
those 12 years of building a system culture of inquiry.
Politically and economically the support has gone
in cycles. In the years 1995-1998, I received encouragement both in finances
and in moral support from retired Director, Peter Moffatt, even though this
role did not appear in my job description until 1997. From 1998 to 2003, with the political and economic influences
of amalgamation of three schools boards into one, the momentum slowed but I did
not flag in my commitment to keep moving ahead. After his retirement in 2003,
support was withdrawn particularly in the form of budget.
In July 2007 during budget deliberations, the
trustees directed that monies from other budgets were not to be available for
action research facilitation costs. With my usual tenacity, I have worked
personally with an ever-growing small group of 10 action researchers during
2006-7 who have sought me out and who meet with me once a month in an
elementary school with no refreshments and a small amount of release time. At
these meetings we have some of the most thoughtful and rigorous discussions I
have ever experienced with a group of teachers.
During the years
of supporting teachers and school administrators to study their work in order
to improve their practice there was a gnawing concern that this work should be
recognized through accreditation. This led to the 1999-2001 partnership with
Brock University to offer a Masters cohort program. The struggle that Michael
Manley-Casimir and I experienced to get it approved by the Graduate Studies
department is described in my research:
I
was totally unprepared for the resistance and obstacles presented. They
included the fact that the staff was already stretched too thin, students would
be drawn away from another program, cohort groups are too insular, it was
contrary to policy to partner with one school board and concerns were expressed
about the rigour of qualitative/practitioner research.
I naively thought that
university personnel held loftier values and set students and program needs
above territoriality, loss of power and fear of change. These very human
responses to change reverberate across groups and organizations. A change is a
crisis. It is an important learning for me that I need to recognize that and
deliberately remind myself each time I am attempting to change something, no
matter how apparently small it seems to me. (Delong,
2002, p. 208).
The story of that program is in my thesis (Delong, 2002,
pp.204-221). One of my most uplifting memories is of the day that I sat with
the faculty to watch that group of 15 walk across the stage to receive their
degrees on October 20, 2001. I know that that cohort was very demanding for Michael
and Susan Drake as they supervised the whole group themselves and were
exhausted by the end of the program. It does not surprise me that it has taken
6 years to build up the courage to do it again. The good news is that the
partnership is being renewed. The course has been proposed and approved in a
process that appears to have been much smoother than the first time. The
guiding question that might serve as the heuristic theme being:
How can I better understand and improve my
professional practice as a curriculum leader?
The main themes
for the program will include reflective practice and the value of starting with
yourself, action research as one type of research, professional learning
communities (with consideration for personal, interpersonal, and organizational
capacity building). This emphasis can cut across multiple courses:
interpersonal capacity to be covered in the leadership and curriculum courses;
organizational capacity to be covered in the change course: personal capacity
to be considered in the reflective practitioner course and evidence and
data-based leadership (Manley-Casimir, 2007). The specific courses will be
determined in the spring of 2007.
At the
informational meeting on March 7, 2007, 25 interested educators attended and an
additional 20 asked for the information kit later. We need 15 students to
create the program and a maximum of 20. Here is evidence of my value of
building a culture of inquiry, reflection and scholarship as well as the
"conceptualisations of energy and values, energy and meaning and energy and
motivation (Vasilyuk, 1991, p. 63-64)." Heather
Knill-Griesser described her experience in the first 1999-2001 cohort as "the
best, most profound educational experience of my life. Every Saturday session
gave me a 'high' because of the relaxed feeling of the sessions, the
manageability of the workload, the relevance to daily life and the high level
of dialogue and discussion. It was like a family.'(McMaster, C., 2007).
In the development
of our living theory approach to educational policy formation, implementation
and evaluation in forming and
sustaining a culture of inquiry for teacher-researchers as leaders of learning
in a School Board, in the context of Ontario, we are very aware of the
importance to establishing a supportive consistency between accredited
programmes of continuing professional development and the Standards of Practice
of the Ontario College of Teachers.
The Ontario
College of Teachers is the professional body for teachers in Ontario. The teachers we are working with are
researching their educational influences in their schools in living the
standards of practice and ethical standards of the OCT as well as contributing
their educational knowledge to the Academy.
The
significance of the above presentation lies in its contribution to
understanding the living standards of judgment that can be used to assess the
quality of practice-based research and self-studies of teacher-education
practice. The significance of the importance of developing agreed-upon procedures
for transforming knowledge based on personal experiences of practice into
'public' knowledge has been highlighted by Snow (2001). Such 'public' knowledge
requires comprehensible standards of judgment. we find collective standards of
judgment problematic because we believe strongly that each individual has to
unwrap and live her own embodied
values through systematic investigation. Having said that, we believe that
there is great need for us as a profession of educators to articulate our
values as standards of judgment and thus support the ethical
standards and standards of practice advocated by OCT such as Care, Trust,
Respect and Integrity in the Ethical Standards. They include as well Commitment
to Students and Student Learning, Professional Knowledge, Professional
Practice, Leadership in Learning Communities and Ongoing Professional Learning
in the Standards of Practice.
While some
educators know that they exist, the new Ethical Standards and the Standards of
Practice of OCT are only now being disseminated. The new standards are backed
up with teachers' narratives to show their living meanings and exemplify a
transformation from checklists the one-dimensional understandings of
educational qualities that motivated our previous criticisms. We focused then
on the importance of supporting teachers in creating their own living
educational theories, "teachers would define their own professional standards of
practice while taking into account the standards of practice and
responsibilities of the Ontario College of Teachers" (Delong & Whitehead,
1998).
Several of the
action research group from the Grand Erie District School Board joined the OCT
Living The Standards Institute on November 22. 2007, lead by Jack (Jacqueline
was unable to attend because of family wedding). They informed Jacqueline that
they enjoyed the inquiry-based session and the recognition of teachers as
knowledge creators. Our concern
continues to be that while those at the OCT who are concerned with developing
the standards show a profound understanding of the ideas we are expressing in
this paper, there is a great need to bring the accreditation processes for
continuing professional development in both the OCT and in partnerships between
the Ministry, School Boards and Universities, to a similar depth of
understanding.
Conclusion
In developing a
living theory approach to educational policy formation, implementation and
evaluation in forming and sustaining a culture of inquiry for
teacher-researchers as leaders of learning in a School Board, we are both aware
of the uniqueness of the relational dynamics of the social contexts in which we
live and work. Understanding the systemic influences in what is possible in
particular contexts is vitally important in forming and sustaining a culture of
inquiry for teacher-researchers as leaders of learning in a School Board. The
educational influences we have had in the growth of each others educational
knowledge have evolved from connecting our different international contexts and
professional interests. Jack has focused on the validation and legitimation of
the living theories of practitioner-researchers with their living logics and
standards of judgment. He has also focused on enhancing their flow as cultural
artifacts through web-space from http://www.actionresearch.net.
Jacqueline has focused on the systemic influences for sustaining a culture of
inquiry of policy formation, implementation and evaluation in a School Board as
well as her own knowledge-creation as
practitioner-researcher. We
hope that we have stressed sufficiently the importance of the motivating values
that we use to give meaning and purpose to our lives, as explanatory principles
in our explanations of our educational influences in learning.
We have seen the
significance of the expression of such ontological values in the living
theories of the teacher-researchers we have worked with. We have also seen the
motivational significance of the recognition by colleagues of these values, as
well as the motivational significance of seeing the values recognized as valid
explanatory principles in the living theories accredited by universities as
being worthy of masters and doctoral degrees. As the heart of these motivational energies and values are
the life-affirming and creative responses of pupils and students to the
learning environments created by educators, administrators and policy makers.
We believe that the living educational theories of all educators, students and
pupils are connected to the future of humanity through the life-affirming and
creative responses in which individuals seek to be true to themselves in an
uncertain world (Walton, 2007).
Through the
development and sharing of insights from our individual and collaborative
enquiries we have documented the growth of our educational knowledge. As we
seek to enhance the educational influences of living educational theories in
contributing to the creation of a world of educational quality we are most
aware of the nature of the relationship between generating educational theories
of improving practice and generating cultures of inquiry that can help to form
and sustain a world of educational quality.
Ideas from
Whitehead's research concerning the generation of living educational theories,
living logics and living standards of judgment have been found useful in
exploring the implications of asking, researching and answering questions of
the kind, 'How do I improve my practice?'
Delong's expression of her leadership in learning in generating her own
living educational theory and working in policy arenas to form and sustain a
culture of inquiry have been recognized by others as being highly significant
in improving practice in education. Others are now studying these ideas with the
intention of enhancing their own effectiveness in educational policy formation,
implementation and evaluation. The importance of connecting, as Delong has
done, policy formation, implementation and evaluation and the standards of
practice and judgement in improving practice has been recently analysed (Joan
Whitehead, 2007; Whitehead, J. & Whitehead, J, 2007). The originality of Delong's
contribution to educational knowledge lies in the dynamic and responsive
relationship to forming and sustaining a culture of inquiry for
teacher-researchers as leaders of learning with systemic influence in a School
Board. Her contributions to improving practice can be appreciated in the
accounts of the practitioner-researchers in the Grand Erie District School
Board as they research the implications of asking themselves how to improve
their practice in enhancing their contributions to the creation of a world of
educational quality.
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