Transcript Document

Choreographing research in the third space:
exploring co-participative research into
creativity and partnership in dance education.
CREATE seminar, University of Exeter
17th November 2008, 16.15-17.45
Kerry Chappell, Anna Craft, Linda Rolfe,
University of Exeter
Veronica Jobbins, Laban
Today’s presentation
Rationale for this study
Theoretical context - creativity + partnership
Choreographing the methodology
Summary
Creativity stifled by increasing
constraints from performativity?
• Within dance education (Ackroyd, 2001;
Chappell, 2007, 2008;Jobbins, 2006)
• Wider education (e.g. Craft & Jeffrey, 2008)
• OFSTED reports - creativity is assumed as
a dance education product when this is not
always the case (OFSTED, 2006).
Creativity and Education
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
NACCCE, 1999
Creative Partnerships (2002)
Roberts Review (2006)
New Secondary Curriculum (2008)
Cultural Entitlement – new CCE (2008)
Find Your Talent (2008)
European Year of Creativity + Innovation (2009)
Dance Policy
Two major “shaping” factors
• Dance as art / creative and expressive
• Dance as physical activity, part of PE
Import of:
• Dance located within PE national curriculum
• Physical Activity Agenda
• Dance Review (2008)
dance partners for creativity research
response
• Co-participative study
• University-based researchers
• School-based partner researchers
What kinds of creative partnerships are
manifested between dance-artists and
teachers in co-developing the creativity of 11-14
year olds, in dance education, and how do they
develop?
Potential DPC contribution?
1. Power of arts to change and transform
(e.g. Greene, 2003), mirrored in DPC.
2. Creative dance partnerships as embodied
+ humane; DPC seeks to re-enfranchise
(Bresler, 2004; Bowman, 2004; Claxton,
1997; Chappell, 2006; Peters, 2004)
Theoretical Framework
Area 1: Creativity in Dance Education
• Smith-Autard’s Midway Model (2002)
– Creativity, imagination, individuality
balanced with knowledge of dance theatre
– Balance between expression + form
– Creating, performing, viewing appreciating
Creativity in dance education
Chappell (2006, 2008)
Other approaches to creativity
in dance education
• Cognitive approach (e.g. Brennan, 1989)
• Artistic process skills model (Hanstein,
1986, in Popat, 2002)
• Feminist + critical pedagogy approach (e.g.
Stinson, 1994, Shapiro, 1998)
• Play emphasis (e.g. Lindqvist, 2001)
Theoretical Framework, Area 2
Creative Partnership
Apprenticeship learning?
•
•
•
•
•
Modelling approaches
Authenticity of activity
Locus of control
Genuine risk taking
Scaffolding
Polarizing teachers and artists?
Galton, 2008
Teacher
Authoritarian
Didactic
Immediate
‘cued elicitation’
Pupil views negative
Artist
Egalitarian
Dialogic
Time to think
‘Guided discovery’
Pupil views positive
Alternative conceptualisations
Co-participative partnerships
(Jeffery, 2005)
Enquiry-based partnership: role of mentor, emergent 3rd space
(Chappell, Craft & Best, in review)
Methodology
• Qualitative
• Epistemology acknowledging social
construction of reality
• Broad critical theory frame
“Theory cannot be reduced to being perceived as the
mistress of experience…Its real value lies in its ability
to establish possibilities for reflexive thought and
practice on the part of those who use it….The crucial
element in both its production and use is…the human
agents who use it to give meaning to their lives.”
(Giroux, 2003)
Transformation for universitybased + partner researchers
Freire’s (1983):
praxis is not blind action…it is action and
reflection. Men and women are human beings
because they are historically constituted as
beings of praxis and in the process they have
become capable of transforming the world – of
giving it meaning.
Research roles
& relationships
• Critical theory researchers as reflexive too
• Partner researchers must not be expected to be
‘superhuman’
• Power not given + taken away by core team
• Empowerment through practice/action
(Gore, 2003)
Research roles
& relationships
Surfacing tensions re power + language
What can we do for you? - in both
directions
Relates to empowerment +
transformation
Our previous experience (Chappell & Goldsmith et al, 2008; Craft,
Burnard, Grainger & Chappell, 2006 Chappell, in press)
Experience of SUPER team at University of Cambridge (McLaughlin +
Black-Hawkin, (2007); McLaughlin, 2004)
Concept of third space …
Border crossings generate a third space between first + second
place perspective
(Zeichner, 2008)
Choreographing in the ‘third space’
Border crossings generate a third space
between first + second place
perspective (Zeichner, 2008)
Third space is
“a creative recombination and
extension, one that builds on a first
place perspective that is focused on the
‘real’ material world--- and a second
place perspective that interprets this
reality through imagined representations
of spatiality”
(hybridity theory, Soja, 1996)
Community
of practice
• Wenger’s work on communities of practice
(1998)
• Primary focus is on learning as social
participation
• Mutual engagement, in a joint enterprise and
a shared repertoire of practises
• Interplay between the participants and the
things they create are central to how we view
and choreograph our methodology
• Requires us to develop a vocabulary to ‘talk’
about the experiences we have in the
research that shape our learning
Research
design
Partner Researcher
Dance Artist
Partner Researcher
Dance Teacher
Reflective
Enquiry
Lead Researcher
Research Design
PARTNER RESEARCHER
HANDBOOK 2008-2010
Ethical procedures
Ethical relationships between the core
research team and partner researchers
are being carefully negotiated within
the guidelines of the University of
Exeter Ethics committee
Ethical procedures will also be established
for all other participants
Data Collection methods
• These will include participatory and reflective
methods , as well as ethnographic methods
including:Reflective semi-structured interviews;
reflective journals; participant observation;
conceptual drawing; photographic/video
evidence
• The team will also need to be responsive to
on-site activities, applying cycles of data
collection and analysis accordingly
Research outcomes
• Intention to disseminate using multiple
modes (e.g. visual, written, embodied)
within dance and wider education
• These include: seminars, a book,
articles, national + international
conference presentations, dance
teachers publications
Trustworthiness
• Fit between epistemology / ontology + methods
• Seeking credibility, transferability + confirmability
(Lincoln & Guba, 1985)
Challenges:
Co-participative meaning-making in context of
critical theory (motivation toward change)
Provocations to discussion
• Does the Third Space seem a convincing
concept for this enquiry-based partnership?
• What aspects of trustworthiness seem most
relevant (or problematic?) within this
research? What experiences do others have?
• How can we try to ensure that through joint
learning a genuine community of practice
emerges?
Acknowledgements
Our funders: AHRC
Also, for images:
CapeUK, Creative Partnerships Norfolk
University of Exeter PGCE course, Laban
The Open University
Our emergent partners