PART TWO – METHODOLOGICAL CONCERNS:

	RESEARCH METHODOLOGY AND EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH

	[This part of the thesis is much more theoretical in nature; it is concerned with the ideas which led to the adoption of my particular research methodology. It is my intention to write it in the form of a dialogue. This dialogue is one within myself but which draws upon conversations I had with colleagues during the research. During the course of the dialogue, I will bring the work of various writers into the text to further the dialogue. The form will be that of a "dialogue with the soul" as it is my intention that this reflects the essential dialectical form of the thesis generally.]

	QUESTION

	May we begin this discussion with some statement as to what "educational theory" actually is? Allow me to start with some words from O'Connor (1957):

	"The word "theory" as it is used in educational contexts is generally a courtesy title. It is justified only where we are applying well-established experimental findings in psychology or sociology to the practice of education. And even here we should be aware that the conjectural gap between our theories and the facts on which they rest is sufficiently wide to make our logical consciences uneasy."

	Or Anderson (1951)
	
	"Allowances must be made for the fact that the study of education involves problems of engineering as well as of experimentation. Nevertheless, after all allowances have been made the function of theory in the field of education is analogous to the function of theory in the field of physics and the other natural sciences."

	What do you think of these quotations?

	ANSWER

	I find this totally amazing! This is a view of theorising which I find patronising to say the least. I have no objection to integrating the theories of psychology or sociology into a theory of education. What I find particularly alarming is that I believe, as a professional educator, that my professional life is built on my own particular educational theory. To say that this is a "courtesy title" is an affront to my professionalism and to the profession as a whole. 

	In both the above cases, it seems to me that the writers are  arguing  from a botanical or agricultural point of view, where human beings are reduced to being mere appendages of something far more important.Is this to say that students are like so many grains of wheat or cattle, or steel girders and if you keep them under certain conditions the end result will be that they all can read except those who are for some reason defective? In this view of educational theory there seems to be no recognition that the students and teachers are human and subject to human moods, like excitement and boredom, sensitivity and prejudice. Theory is brought in from outside to improve the efficiency of the practice and is seen as being hierarchically  superior. I am grateful to Paul Hirst for this statement:
	
	"The theories of science and the theories of practical activities are radically different in character because they perform quite different functions." (Hirst 1966)

	Science and "practical activities" are different, not superior or inferior. It is, I think, an important distinction. 

	And further support for this view comes from Tom Kitwood (1976)
	
	"A weakness in a large proportion of educational research is that it has borrowed techniques from non-educational areas of inquiry and applied them uncritically, rather than defining problems from an educational point of view and devising methods which could in principle lead to their solution."

	QUESTION

	Do you really think that an eminent educationalist like O'Connor would apply his ideas "uncritically?" 

	ANSWER

	Perhaps Kitwood's argument is a trifle polemical, but I think that O'Connor indicates a particular world view which is radically different from my own when he says, 
	"men like to believe they are not a part of nature in a way that makes them invulnerable to reliable classification, prediction or control." 

	What a view of humanity is this that thinks of people as cattle or wheat, to be graded and placed according to the academic whim of a researcher! 

	QUESTION

	What do you mean by "academic whim?"

	ANSWER

	Allow me to recount an anecdote. When I was in college, we were taken to a local primary school to investigate Piaget's theory of child development. We set up tests to gather information about the children we met for that afternoon. Afterwards, our tutor asked us to make statements about the development and intellectual capacities of these children based on these data. How could we make such guesses? I felt that the tests we had devised were ridiculous - and were treated as jokes by some  of the children. Many of the children we tested were very nervous and had no idea what was going on - they were confused, the results would have been spurious for this reason alone. I am pleased to say that several of us refused to make such statements because we felt that we had no rights to "play god." On such academic whims as a half-grasped understanding of possibly spurious theories are decisions made about the futures of many school students. I think that the definitions of educational theory made by O'Connor or Anderson are just such whims as the ones devised by me in college days. The practical reality and experience of classroom practice are missing from both instances.

	QUESTION

	So, familiarity with the teaching situation is more important to you. Can you outline for me what your educational theory is?

	ANSWER

	First of all, let me say that familiarity is not important! It is this that I would say I am trying to break down! I think that familiarity leads to complacency or boredom. No, it is a rigorous exploration of my own practice which I am seeking, to cut through this familiarity. Although it may be based on tacit understanding of the situation and on my own professional experience, there need to be other ingredients which help to encourage inquiry.

	As to educational theory, I am unable to provide you with a list saying that I believe this or that about it. That would be empty and meaningless. No, such theory is born of reflection upon my knowledge of my own practice and its relationship with my own educational values. I believe that this is a dialectical relationship and as such is dynamic, constantly changing.

	However, what I am prepared to say is that my interest in and beliefs about language and learning, [as explained elsewhere in this thesis], are not the kind of beliefs and interests  which lead to measurement. Thus, syllabic counts of students' utterances do not tell me much about the improvement of my own interventions in the process of learning, nor can they tell me whether students are making sense of their experiences. The work of Flanders (1970) is helpful to those who are interested in the amount of contact between teachers and students - my interest is in the quality of that contact. When Alan Howe, the Director of the Wiltshire Oracy Project, came in to help with a part of my research, (see below: research report 3) we decided to make some kind of count of contributions made by the students. Alan kept a tally of contributions made voluntarily and those made after a request from me. The results were interesting only as a starting point for discussion with the students as to why they had made or not made a large contribution to the discussion. On their own, the figures said little about the quality of the process of education or how I could go about improving that process. In my investigations of the quality of the process of learning, I am interested   in   just   this. An appropriate research methodology is therefore necessary.

	THE TEACHER AS RESEARCHER

	QUESTION

	So you reject the notion of an expert providing answers to the problems of teaching. Where do you go for your advice?

	ANSWER

	Well I would not say that I reject the notion of expertise. In fact, I would say that I would like to extend the notion of the expert to include all educators - we all have expertise, drawn from experience, which we utilise in our day to day practice. It is this knowledge, or claim to knowledge, of my own practice which provides me with the raw material for my theorising about education.

	QUESTION

	Right. Does this mean that the positivist approach to educational research is inadequate?

	ANSWER

	For me yes. Let me also answer this question with a quotation from Donald Schon.

	"A professional practitioner is a specialist who encounters certain types of situations again and again. This is suggested by the way in which professionals use the word "case" .... All such terms denote the units which make up a practice, and they denote types of family-resembling examples. As a practitioner experiences many variations of a small number of types of cases, he is able to "practice" his practice. He develops a repertoire of expectations, images and techniques. He learns what to look for and how to respond to what he finds." 

	What is  this  but  theorizing? Part of the dynamic of teaching and learning is that it is an unpredictable  process, but, as Schon argues, there is much about it that is understood and rooted in previous professional experience. I find a quotation from Robert Stake very useful here. On the subject of "tacit knowledge", which is what Schon is arguing professionals draw on in making professional judgments of the kind referred to above, Stake says,  

	"Tacit knowledge includes a multitude of unexpressible associations which give rise to new meanings, new ideas, and new applications of the old." (Stake 1980)

	I would argue that in the course of doing any research, "tacit knowledge" is reflected upon and rendered "focal", that is just what the word implies, the focus of attention. There nevertheless remains an area of knowledge which is remembered somehow without words, figures or whatever. This is one aspect of professionalism which puts the professional in a unique position to research into their own practice, as I hope to show in my research reports. 

	I also agree with Rowland, when he says, 

	"In order to understand children's understanding we must first gain access to it. This cannot be achieved by the researcher who is separated from the children both physically and psychologically by the research tools used to measure their  behaviour."   (Rowland 1984)

	This statement is one of the most succinct I have come across which justifies the need for teachers to immerse themselves in the events of the classroom. It is they who are sensitive to the moods and peculiarities of the students because theirs is a regular involvement - they can be more sympathetic to the students than the person with the clipboard sitting inscrutably at the back of the room, or asking them to fill in forms and never telling them why or what the results are. 

	QUESTION

	OK. You are saying that positivism has no role in your research. But what about the work of say Paul Hirst or R.S.Peters?

	ANSWER

	The "disciplines" approach to educational theory, yes. My own feeling is  their  role arises when there is a genuine illumination of a problem which is under scrutiny. For example, I was trying to understand why a group of boys in a fifth year class I taught  seemed  to disrupt the class and not do very much work. As a part of my study, I turned to the work of Paul Willis (1977) and found that it was indeed helpful in my attempts to explain and improve the  situation. I was not able to adopt Willis' work wholesale because it did not seem entirely appropriate but it did illuminate part of the problem for me. I feel that the way I used this work both informed my work and informed the work of Willis too. Thus, I evolved a greater understanding of my practice and of Willis' book too. There was a dialectical relationship between myself and Paul Willis' text, if you like.

	It is this interrogation of texts which I think is important in drawing on the work written in the disciplines. There is little point to me in merely adopting the theories as they stand. They must be particularised and integrated with the practice. Otherwise, the practitioner would become less than professional: she would become a hand-maiden to the theorists. Problems are undoubtedly evident in the practice first but, as Schon says,

	"Problems are interconnected, environments are turbulent, and the future is indeterminate just in so far as managers can shape it by their actions. What is called for, under these conditions, is not only the analytic techniques which have been traditionally in operations research, but the active, synthetic skill of designing a desirable future and inventing ways of bringing it about." (Schon 1983)

	The argument is close to my own. There is little that external observers ("managers") can do to bring about an improved future except act as advisers - an undoubtedly important role. It is up to the practitioners themselves to imagine  solutions to their problems and act in their direction. For someone else to take over the running of the practice is an act of supreme arrogance or a statement of the lack of competence of the practitioner, which amounts to the same thing if the practitioner herself is not involved in such a statement.

	There are other problems with the "disciplines" approach to educational theory. One of the most influential figures in this approach has been Paul Hirst. His argument has gone along the lines I will try to outline now.

	Hirst's is a theory in which principles, stating what ought to be done in a range of practical activities, are formulated and justified. The theory is not itself an autonomous form of knowledge or an autonomous discipline. It involves many moral questions which focus on educational practice, such as punishment. It is not purely theoretical because any theory generated must spring from practice. However, principles of education are justified by direct reference to the disciplines, such as history, philosophy, sociology and psychology.

	R.S. Peters did say that although educational theory must be presented in a differentiated way the different disciplines must also link with  each other in matters of educational policy and practice. He also said that the selection from the disciplines must be informed by relevance to the problems and interests of teachers. Hirst (1973)

	"wished to bring out the very complex theory the practice of education must draw on." 

	I think it is important to remember that the theory comes first.

	QUESTION

	Are you implying that the practice  of education is not complex? 

	ANSWER

	I do not think so. I also think that adherents of the disciplines approach also have similar ideals to my own. Allow me to quote Peters (1964):

	"we must make sure that the research carried out under the aegis of the disciplines is brought together again in an integrated conversation on matters of common concern." 

	My reading of this statement is that there is a desire among adherents of the disciplines school of thought that dialogue about theory and practice is needed if a holistic picture is to emerge. My doubts about this ever being possible under the disciplines approach to educational theory are that the starting point is theory and practice is reduced to being a technical activity under the aegis of an academic theory which may not even be educational theory. Here is Hirst in 1983 making just this point. (Forgive me quoting at such length but it seems to be such an important piece of writing that I could not find any way of editing it.)

	"Educational theory is .... directed at more rational educational practice by the continuous attempt to develop operational theory composed of elements that are as far as possible rationally defensible. But if this pusuit is not to be misunderstood, the complex character of practice must be kept firmly in mind. In general the concepts employed in operational theory will be those used by practitioners as a result of their formal and informal education, training and socialization....Much of the understanding within this level of theory will have been developed in the context of immediate practical experience and will be co-terminus with everyday understanding. In particular many of its operational principles, both explicit and implicit, will be of their nature generalizations 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 A MISTAKE (my emphasis) Rationally defensible practical principles, I suggest, must of their nature stand up to such practical tests and without that are necessarily inadequate. This demand stems from the fact that only principles generated in relation to practical experience and that are operationally tested can begin to do justice to the necesssarily complex tacit elements within the practice. Indeed, I would now argue that the essence of any practical theory is its concern to develop principles formulated in operationally effective practical discourse that are subjected to practical test." (Hirst 1983)

	Here is an amazing volte face! From an academic base for educational theory to a common-sense view is quite a move. For me, it indicates the present weakness of the disciplines approach to educational theory that one of its main proponents should undergo this transformation. 

	QUESTION

	Do you mean that the problem of theory and practice get in the way of Hirst's approach?

	ANSWER

	Yes, this is another weakness in the disciplines approach which is exposed in this quotation from Hirst. This is the problem of the gap between theory and practice which the approach does not resolve, despite a desire to do so. Wilfred Carr, in a brilliant paper (1980), tackles this very problem. It is crucial for an understanding of educational research because, as I have tried to point out, education is a practical activity. Carr begins his analysis by saying that a "theoretical enterprise" (Carr op cit) does not become authentic or valuable simply ny using the academic adequacy of enterprises that are already under way. For Carr, these "theoretical entrprises must first show their ability to investigate particular concerns in a scientific way. 

	Although I would agree with much of what Carr says, I am concerned that I have the  feeling that Carr is arguing in a very detached and theoretical way, the very thing he is challenging in his article. As Carr himself says,

	"educational theory .... seeks to emancipate practitioners from their dependence on practices that are the product of precedent, habit and tradition by developing modes of analysis and enquiry that are aimed at exposing and examining the beliefs, values and assumptions implicit in the theoretical framework through which practitioners organise their experiences. It is only by so challenging the adequacy of conventional theories of educationalpractice that the observations, interpretations and judgments of practitioners will become more rational and coherent and their practices will be conducted in more disciplined, intelligent and effective ways." (Carr op. cit.)

	If, as Hirst (1983) and Schon (1983) argue (see references above), the basis of a theory of a professional practice is in the practical experience of the practitioner her/himself, then why should s/he then have to appeal to academic theory which is drawn from a totally different field of study to make any analysis? A physician would not have to solve a problem by turning to psychological theory because there is already a corpus of knowledge called medical theory. This would not bar the physician from turning to psychological  theory with a view to integrating parts of it into her medical understanding. Why should the same not be applicable to educational theory? It seems perfectly logical to me that this should be the case.

	"Rather, by subjecting the beliefs and justifications of existing and ongoing practical traditions to rational criticism, theory transforms practice by transforming the ways in which practice is experienced and understood. The transition is not, therefore, from theory to practice as such, but rather from irrationality to rationality, from ignorance and habit to knowledge and reflection (....) educational theory is 'theoretical' in the sense that it is subject to notions of cogency, rigour and disciplined reflection and 'practical' in that it respects and preserves the practical context in which educational problems emerge and any solutions have to be tested." (Carr op. cit.) 

	QUESTION

	I understand. How does this work in practice?

	ANSWER

	It means that I must gather information about my practice, reflect upon this information, decide what it is that concerns me the most, imagine solutions to these concerns, act upon the potential solutions, gather information about what happens and so on. This is the ACTION-RESEARCH SPIRAL. 

	QUESTION

	It seems to me that any form of research needs to begin with concerns or problems. What is so different about action-research?

	ANSWER

	Well, to begin with, as I have already mentioned, the concerns are those which I, the individual practitioner, discover in my practice.

	QUESTION

	And where do these concerns spring from?

	ANSWER

	From the dialectical relationship between my practice and my educational values. When I look at video tapes of myself teaching, for instance, I can see that there are things which concern me. For example, I discovered that although I value critical reflection and discussion, I found it very difficult to allow the students sufficient scope to reflect  or  discuss with me. I also found it difficult to explain or to understand what my educational values actually were. Now, having discovered such a negation, I imagined solutions to the concerns, acted upon these solutions in attempts to improve my practice and to understand what was going on. The process involved other  professionals in advisory capacities and through this process of discussion and reflection I was able to come to a deeper understanding of my practice, which constitutes an improvement for me. For example, here is a transcript of myself in discussion with Alan Skelton, a colleague from the University of Bath, about the nature of my values.

	AS: We talked a little bit about what you thought rational discourse was, and from what you said erm it seemed to be that people had the chance to say their piece and also there was some cooperation there. Are they the only two qualities?

	AL: No there's lots of others like you've got to feel confident enough to say what you really think.

	AS: I think that's right because otherwise what's the point of having a discussoon ot you're not gonna say what you real;ly think?

	AL: We're talking about quality in rational discourse and rational discourse implicitly .... implies quality anyway.

	AS: What about respect for other people's feellngs?

	AL: That's a kind of sub-heading of feeling confident and cooperative isn't it?

	AS: Don't you think it's a bit mnore contentious than that because if you want to say what you really think where does the divide come to stop you saying what you think?

	AL: I think it's a sub-heading in the sense that to cooperate with each other you've got to be aware that each other .... is gonna take risks and to be able to take risks you've got to be confident in the first place that you can actually take them." (Skelton 1986)

	I hope this section of talk illustrates the difficulty of placing a linguistic box around values. They are elusive things and I think that it is only through dialogue of the kind I have quoted above that I can come to an understanding of what my educational values actually are. I believe also that my values can only be understood in practice.

	QUESTION

	How does this discussion constitiute an improvement?

	ANSWER

	Allow me to answer this question with the words of Jean Rudduck and David Hopkins (1985):

	"teacher research is linked to the strengthening of teacher judgment and consequently to the self-directed improvement of practice." 

	Thus, to improve ("judge") my practice is to know more about it, and to know more about it is to improve it. By knowing more about it, I am, as a professional, motivated to try to improve, to try to reach my ideals and live out my values. It is this dialectical relationship between theory and practice which moves me forward as a professional educator.

	QUESTION

	You have used the words "I" and "my" frequently. What use is this to other practitioners?

	ANSWER

	I start from Polanyi's theory of "Personal Knowledge" (1958) Polanyi argued that insights can only be made by someone who is prepsred to live with their ideas in a fully committed way. However, just because I passionately believe something, it does not follow that this is the truth, or right, or rational or whatever. So, although a personal commitment cannot guarantee the truth, it is obvious that a claim to know something involves some personal commitment because without commitment a theory would be regarded as irrelevant: in fact, I cannot envisage a theory without commitment - apathy could not lead to theorising. A quotation from Polanyi (op cit) himself might be useful here:

	"It is the act of commitment in its full structure that saves personal knowledge from being merely subjective. Intellectual commitment is a responsible decision, in submission to the compelling claims of what in good conscience I conceive to be true ... Any conclusions, whether given as a surmise or claimed as a certainty, represents a commitment of the person who arrives at it. No one can utter more than a responsible commitment of his own, and this completely fulfils his responsibility for finding the truth and telling it. Whether or not it is the truth can be hazarded only by another, equally responsible commitment." 

	My understanding of "personal knowledge" is that it is, first of all, my commitment to and claim to know my own practice as a professional educator. From here, I go public through my practice itself - my relationships with students and colleagues, for instance - and through dialogue about my practice. This leads to the generation of educational knowledge - the "what" of teaching and learning. After a synthesis of all these stages, I reflect and theorise. This process is reflected in the action-reflection spiral.

	QUESTION

	But I'm still not sure about how useful this "personal knowledge" is to other professionals.

	ANSWER

	Well, although I start from Polanyi's ideas, I do not finish with them. I claim to know my own practice and put my claim to an audience of authorities on the subject. The claim will be judged by reference to a system of ideas already accepted by the audience.

	QUESTION

	But doesn't this lead to problems? What if the audience do not share your beliefs, ideas or commitment?

	ANSWER

	I understand what you are saying but I do not see how it could be otherwise. It is quite rational to judge a claim to knowledge by the knowledge we already possess. Perhaps Kuhn's ideas about paradigm shifts are helpful here. Certain ideas dominate thinking at certain times. For example, explanations for the behaviour of the universe have changed over time. I can think of many people who suffered for their ideas about the nature of the universe - Galileo for example. The point is that there are people who will agree with my point of view just as there are those who will disagree. The question is made up of validity, generalisability, logic and politics.

	(A DISCUSSION OF VALIDITY)

	QUESTION

	How do you know whether your claim to know is valid?

	ANSWER

	In considering the notion of validity, I am drawn to the work of Jurgen Habermas. In his book "Communication and the Evolution of Society" (1979) he says

	"Insofar as [anyone] wants to participate in a process of reaching understanding, he cannot avoid raising the following .... validity claims. He claims to be:
	a. uttering something understandably;
	b. giving [the hearer] something to understand;
	c. making himself thereby understandable; and
	d. coming to an understanding with another person.

	The speaker must choose a comprehensible expression so that speaker and hearer can understand one another. The speaker must have the intention of communicating a true proposition (or propositional context, the existential presuppositions of which are satisfied) so that the hearer can share the knowledge of the speaker. The speaker must want to express his intentions truthfully so the the hearer can believe the utterance (can trust him). Finally the speaker must choose an utterance that is right so that the hearer can accept the utterance and speaker and hearer can agree with one another in the utterance with respect to a recognized normative background .... The goal of coming to an understanding is to bring about an agreement that terminates in the intersubjective mutuality of reciprocal understanding, shared knowledge, mutual trust and accord with on another." 

	Thus, there are four types of validity claims: comprehensibility, truth, truthfulness and rightness. Habermas also says that authenticity is only realisable in interaction and that it is only over time that we can realise the truth or honesty of participants' claims. It is therefore important to build a "dialogical community."

	QUESTION

	What is a "dialogical community" and why is it so important?

	ANSWER

	The answer to this question requires that I should recount the chronological development of my thinking. When I was writing my first research report, I came across the work of Collingwood (1939). This is a lengthy quotation from his "Autobiography":

	"I began by observing that you cannot find out what a man means by simply studying his spoken or written statements, even though he has spoken or written with perfect command of language and perfectly truthful intention. In order to find out his meaning you must also know what the question was (a question in his own mind and presumed by him to be in yours) to which the thing he has said or written was meant to answer .... It seemed to me that truth .... in the sense in which a philosophical theory or an historical narrative is called true, which seemed to me the proper sense of the word, was something that belonged .... to a complex consisting of questions and answers .... Each question and answer in a given complex had to be relevant or appropriate, and to "belong" both to whole and to the place it occupied in the whole. Each question had to "arise"; there must be that about it whose absence we condemn when we refuse to answer a question on the ground that it "doesn't arise." Each answer must be the right answer to the question it professes to answer .... By "right" I do not mean "true." The "right" answer to a question is the answer which enables us to get ahead with the process of questioning and answering .... It follows too, and this is what especially struck me at the time, that whereas no two propositions can be in themselves mutually contradictory, there are many cases in which one and the same pair of propositions are capable of being thought either that or the opposite, according as the questions they were meant to answer are reconstructed in one way or another." 

	I found this very liberating because I had been struggling to write the first research report and Collingwood's words gave me the insight necessary to write in the form of a dialogue. I was also struck by my memory of discussions with various colleagues and friends at various times when I felt that we got much further through discussion than we would have got through reading ar writing. I went back to my college days and the first inkling that discussion in seminars was a better way to learn because it reflected the dynamic of thought and allowed me to shape meaning "at the point of utterance" (Britton 1973) or as Vygotsky says (1962),
	
	"The relation of thought to word is not a thing but a process, a continual movement back and forth from thought to word and from word to thought. In that process the relation of thought to word undergoes changes which themselves may be regarded as development in the functional sense. Thought is not merely expressed in words; it comes into existence through them. Every thought tends to connect something with something else, to establish a relationship between things."

	All this seems to me to be provocative enough for me to realise the need for dialogical communities. I am interested in finding the questions which led me to make the claims I make, so I am accepting Collingwood's thesis. I accept Vygotsky's thesis about the dialectical relationship between thought and language, so I must discuss my ideas and claims. I accept Polanyi's thinking, so I have a commitment to my own ideas and claims to know. Because I accept Habermas' formulation, I think I must try to be comprehensible, communicate the truth, express myself truthfully and utter things in the right way. All these are underpinned by a notion of sharing, talking, communicating, arguing, discussing. As Walker (1985) suggests,

	"It is a fundamental belief in science, and one which has been carried over to social science and educational research, that research is primarily reported to the scientific peer group. It is this "invisible college" which scrutinizes research, and through a process of critical debate and a "free market" mechanism of acknowledgement and reference, admits it to the status of received knowledge."

	What I am saying is that my present enquiry has been
	carried out by using the insights	of colleagues in an open manner: I WANTED to discuss the things I found in my practice and I make no apology for doing so. Walker also says:

	"The very form of the dialogue makes a point not made in other ways. It invites participation; in itself it rejects .... an authoritative judgement; it demonstrates "open-endedness", divergence of view, unresolved conflict and discrepancy in a manner that statements cannot." (Walker op cit)

	A DISCUSSION OF DIALECTICS 

	QUESTION

	Is this not really dialectical logic?

	ANSWER

	Well, I think so. This leads me to the work of Gadamer. His 'logic of question and answer' is one aspect of dialectics which I find very helpful. 

	"The art of dialectic is not the art of being able to win every argument. On the contrary, it is possible that someone who is practising the art of dialectic, i.e. the art of questioning and seeking truth, comes off worse in the argument in the eyes of those listening to it. Dialectic, as the art of asking questions, proves itself only because the person who knows how to ask questions is able to persist in his questioning, which involves being able to preserve his orientation towards openness. The art of questioning is that of being able to go on asking questions, i.e. the art of thinking. It is called 'dialectic' for it is the art of conducting a real conversation.... Dialectic consists not in trying to discover the weakness of what is said, but in bringing out its real strength. It is not the art of arguing that is able to make a strong case out of a weak one, but the art of thinking that is able to strengthen what is said by referring to the object." (Gadamer 1975)

	The importance of Gadamer's thinking on the subject of question and answer seems to me to lie in the idea of dialogue and, once again, immersion in or commitment to the case at hand. 

	QUESTION

	Why is the logic of question and answer or dialectics so important to you?

	ANSWER

	There are, I think, a couple of reasons. First of all, the implication is that through the process of formulating questions I, the practitioner, can really probe the meaning of events. As Kitwood (1976) says,

	"To practitioners of education, tentative or incomplete answers to significant questions are of more value than excellently contrived answers to trivial or trumped up problems."

	I could not agree more and so the process of finding the right question is of great moment. And who is in a better position to ask such questions than the practitioner herself? Of course, it is always possible, in fact desirable, to discuss these questions along the lines suggested by Gadamer above. 

	A further way in which this process is useful and important is in realisation that there are always questions to be asked. Just as the action-reflection cycle is continuous, so is the process of question and answer: they mesh together. In looking at my practice, I realise that there are a lot of questions that need to be answered - not because it is a bad practice, but because it is social and therefore problematic, just as all social events are. 

	This leads me to consider a further aspect of the action-research cycle. It is not only through question and answer that the dialectic manifests itself. Integrating texts into one's own work is also important. An example of this may be found in the work of Jack Whitehead. Here, he attempts to interrogate the work of Henry Giroux by "dialoguing" with it:

	"GIROUX

	'1) the dialectic is a form of praxis that links critical reasoning with a critical intervention in the world;

	2) the dialectic is not guided by absolute laws but is a process of critique and praxis that under different historical circumstances takes different forms;

	3) the dialectic necessitates human agents acting collectively to transform the world in which they live;

	4) the dialectic is grounded in a vision that links historical and critical sensibilities as modes of reasoning that inform and enrich each other;

	5) the dialectic is not value free, but rests on interests that oppose oppression in all of its forms.'

	JACK

	It is this very procedure of 'specifying' your 'concept of dialectic' in propositional terms which detracts attention away from developing an understanding of 'dialectic in action.'

	When I think about the nature of the dialectic I always shrink from such definitions because I bear Ilyenkov's (1977) point in mind:

	'The concretisation of the general definition of Logic presented above must obviously consist in disclosing the concepts composing it, above all the concept of thought. Here again a purely dialectical difficulty arises, namely that to define this concept fully, i.e. concretely, also means to 'write' Logic because a full description cannot by any means be given by a 'definition' but only by 'developing the essence of the matter.' [Ilyenkov "Dialectical Logic" 1977]" (Whitehead 1986)

	The reasons I have for quoting this extract from the work of Whitehead is that it is an attempt to hold a dialogue with Giroux's text and it is in this way a development of the idea of a question and answer form of presentation. It reflects the way in which, it seems to me, we interrogate text to find its meaning. 

	There is another way in which this passage is interesting - the form of Giroux's work is criticised as being opposed to the ideas he is attempting to put forward. This is a manifestation of the dialectic itself. He is a "living contradiction" in that he espouses the dialectic, and there is no doubt that it is a genuine espousal, yet he is locked into a propositional form of presentation of his ideas. Nowhere in his book is there a chance to see him actually living his life as a professional practitioner. This is a pity as his theoretical ideas are very attractive. Unfortunately we are not allowed to see what they mean in practice. 

	QUESTION

	There is, then, a contradiction in the work of Giroux. How does this help us to understand the nature of the dialectic? 

	ANSWER

	Ilyenkov (1977) is helpful on this subject. 

	"Contradiction as the concrete unity of mutually exclusive opposites is the real nucleus of dialectics, its central category."

	This is helpful in that I believe this is the way in which development takes place. It is the tension between the objects to be understood (e.g. phenomena in the classroom like the incident of the racist poem in my first research report) and the action of the individuals who try to understand and improve them (e.g. my attempts to act upon the thinking of the boys in the racist poem incident) that actually moves our understanding forward. At the same time, there are internal contradictions which affect change and improvement. In the case of the racist poem incident, there were, within the incident, the contradictions between my educational values and the actual lived practice. Here, I was able to see myself as a 'living contradiction', to use Ilyenkov's (1977) phrase. It was the shock of seeing myself performing in that way which led me to consider ways of changing my practice to attempt to improve the process of education. 

	I also claim that dialectical knowledge can absorb formal logic because it is valuable as a tool of analysis and knowledge. Thus, the use of video film of the racist poem incident is, at one level, a way of slowing the incident down until it was static and could be analysed. But the limitation of this activity is that it does not tell me anything about what I intended to do as a potential way of improving the situation I analysed. As a way of understanding the motion of human activity, formal logic is severely limited. As soon as I was dealing with my attempts to improve the process of education in my practice, dialectical logic was imposed upon me. Thus, in the unity of my practice, there was negation  of my educational values. I found it very difficult to live out my values because of the conflicting demands made by different items within the same value system, i.e. my value of discussion as profound pedagogical method with my value of human rights and human worth: I denied one at the expense of the other. This was compacted with my values about truth and integrity. In such a situation, there must be contradiction of me as an individual attempting to live out my own educational values. The picture is further complicated by the denial of my educational values by the other actors in the incident: the boys. They, by their act of giving me the racist poem, contradicted my educational values in the sense that the poem was racist and therefore flew in the face of my desire to promote racial awareness and understanding and also instigated the whole process of investigation into the way I deal with students' ideas in the classroom. It was through these contradictions that improvement took place: improvement of understanding and of practice, which in turn led to contradictions. (The implications of this for my practice is examined in the research reports, to which I draw your attention.)

	This relationship between critical reflection on past action and the continuing struggle to improve the process of education forms a liberating   experience  of professional life. Essentially, I think this is because I realise that the impetus for change lies with me, not forgetting the influence that students and colleagues will have, through discussion and a shared approach to the events under scrutiny. I am attracted to the words of Paulo Freire.

	"The starting point for .... an analysis [of conscientization] must be a critical comprehension of man as a being who exists in and with the world. Since the basic condition for conscientization is that its agent must be a subject (i.e. a conscious being), conscientization , like education, is specifically and exclusively a human process. It is as conscious beings that men are not only in the world but with the world, together with other men. Only men, as 'open' beings, are able to achieve the complex operation of simultaneously transforming the world by their action and grasping and expressing the world's reality in their creative language .... Conscientization is viable only because men's consciousness, although conditioned, can recognize that it is conditioned. This 'critical' dimension of consciousness accounts for the goals men assign to their transforming acts upon the world. Because they are able to have goals, men alone are capable of entertaining the result of their action even before initiating the proposed action. They are beings who project." (1985)

	It is this critical consciousness which is both liberating and progressive. This is not to say that the dialectic is merely cause and effect. One of the implications of a dialectical approach to understanding is that events  are   rooted  in  history and the actions of people. Thus, to return to the racist poem incident, racism and anti-racism exist outside my classroom for historical reasons and the clash of ideas in the incident came about because of these factors, as well as because of the reasons to do with the personalities of the actors, largely my own. But it is through the tension between all the forces affecting the classroom that causes the development of practice, reflection and understanding. The dialectic is about attempting to understand the parts and the whole. 

	QUESTION

	But if we are to accept Gadamer's idea that we are not yet ready for the logic of question and answer, where does this leave your thinking? Are you ready for dialectics?

	ANSWER

	Now, here I come across another of the problems of the dialectic: it is not easy to throw off the products of a life of education which is individualistic and intellectual, dichotomises theory and practice, celebrates intellectual work at the expense of manual or professional labour. I sometimes find it very difficult to accept the criticism offered by students or colleagues and any notion that in discussion with those mentioned in this thesis there has been no struggle of power, status or experience is wrong. I believe that this is another aspect of the dialectic at work in my professional life - I am granted the status of an 'expert' and demand to be treated as such, despite my values about equality and dialogue. Again, I see myself as a 'living contradiction.' I believe that I must live with the problems and continue to try to improve. Without such contradiction, I would not be able to improve the quality of my work. I struggle to live out my values, yet find myself falling short; I struggle to understand my actions, and begin to do so in discussion with others. These are living forms of theory.

	QUESTION

	So where does this help in an understanding of educational knowledge?

	ANSWER

	It is self-reflective transformation of practice. As an action-researcher I am endeavouring to bring my practice under self-reflective control through my commitment to rationality, truth, truthfulness and rightness. The implications of this are that I am critical of the ideological and institutional conditions which deny my attempts to bring about such control. It is also an attempt to bring about a unity of theory and practice. In the sense that by reflecting on my practice, I am interested in, indeed committed to, a "critical revival of practice" (Carr and Kemmis 1983) that is, to praxis. In turn, this intentional activity can only be studied by me because only I have the access to the commitments and professional theory which inform my practice. I am reminded that I ground myepistemology in "personal knowledge" (Polanyi 1958) and that in my struggles to 

	"retrospectively reconstruct an interpretation of the action in context as a basis for future action. Knowledge achieved in this way informs and refines both specific planning in relation to the practice being considered (i.e. my own) and the practitioner's general practical theory of education." (Carr and Kemmis op. cit.)

	Because my epistemology is grounded in personal knowledge (Polanyi 1958) and in the dialectic, I felt I had to write my research reports in the first person to reflect this. This also serves to represent the struggles I have gone through to  retrospectively understand my practice and to improve it.

	QUESTION

	How does action-research fit in with all this about dialectics?

	ANSWER

	In my personal experience, action-research is a dialectical process through which we can come to understand our own practice.   It is not merely a descriptive account of what went on in those lessons I have examined, it is also analytical and shows the struggles I underwent and my attempts to improve my practice over a period of time. Action-research is a planned though commonsense process of:

	- perceiving problems in my practice, relating to some of my educational values not being realised

	- imagining solutions to these problems

	- planning courses of action and acting in the direction of such plans.

	- observing and gathering data as the plan is acted upon

	- reflecting upon the action and the data

	- modifying problems in light of findings

	- imagining solutions to problems ..........

	and so on through a continuous cycle of action and reflection. The dynamic tension between the acting and reflecting moments of the cycle is the tension of dialectics, between theory and practice. 

	(A DISCUSSION OF GENERALISABILITY)

	QUESTION

	How does all this lead us to generalise from the case studies in this work and its like?

	ANSWER

	I think the expression "it's like" is a very interesting one - if something is like something else there must be some kind of generalisation going on in the mind. One is generalising from experience. 

	However, let me quote Hamilton (1981):

	"In its most general form, generalization theory has four elements .... First it acknowledges the dynamic (i.e. non-steady state) quality of human history; second, it accepts the open-ended nature of research and action; third, it aims to reduce (or codify) the apparent complexity of human experience; and finally, it operates through the translation of private knowledge into public discourse. To generalize is to render a public account of the past, present or future in a form that can be "tested" through further action and inquiry."

	I admit confusion at Hamilton's claim that we can render an account of a future event, but nevertheless this is a clear account of what generalisation ought to do. I think this fits in with all the words of Polanyi, Habermas and Collingwood.

	I reckon, following all these three, that only through dialogue can we hope to understand each others' claims to know anything. Thus, I can reiterate that my commitment to my thesis is proof that I am seeking truth and that this commitment deserves respect and commitment from whoever discusses with me or reads my words. Part of this respect is in joining or setting up a dialogical community. I find this very exciting.

	QUESTION

	But the question of how one can generalise from an account of someone's own practice still remains.

	ANSWER

	Let me continue with a very shrewd statement from Gary Wehlage (1981) who says,

	"The consumer of the research, not the author, does the generalizing. The task falls to the reader to be on the lookout for analogous situations in which insights can be applied.

	This seems to me to be absolutely right. Further to this, Robert Stake (1980) says,

	"What becomes useful understanding is a full and thorough knowledge of the particular, recognizing it in new and foreign contexts."

	It seems to me that Stake is arguing a similar point to Wehlage in that he suggests that it is the reader of the study who generalizes. This is a similar notion to that of Marx (1976) when he says,

	"Use-values are only realized in use or consumption .... Although a use-value emerges from the labour process, in the form of a product, other use-values, products of previous labour, enter into it as a means of production. The same use-value is both the product of a previous process and a means of production in a latter process. Products are therefore not only results of labour, but also its essential conditions."

	This means that the use I have made of the insights of the people I have quoted in this thesis gives their wor use-value to me at this particular time. To produce my work, I have used the work others. In my turn, I offer my work for others to use if it has use-value for them. So it is not possible to produce work without other work - it is through labour that we give meaning to our lives. It is this tension between our own work and the work of others that moves our understanding forward. Thus, the ideas of, say Douglas Barnes, have had their influence on my practice and, in using them, I have integrated them into my own ideas and practice and so developed both the ideas of Barnes and my own ideas and practice.

	Regarding the generalisability of my own knowledge, I can indicate where this has already happened. In their paper "Action Research and the Politics of Educational Knowledge" (1987), Whitehead and Lomax made use of my work. Here they say that tacit theory must be made public in a form which takes account of the questions and contradictions in practitionders' minds but which yet moves the ideas forward. 

	"JACK

	I think this is the most urgent problem we need to resolve. I think Andy Larter (1985) can help. He is interested in the work of Popkewitz (1984) Whitty (1985) and Giroux (1981). Like Kemmis and Carr (1983), these researchers use the propositional form to communicate their theories. What we need to work on with Andy is the integration of the insights of these theorists into our own educational practice and to show this process within our dialogical form of discourse."

	I feel that I can say that these two academics have found some use in the form of presentation in my first research report. Thus, it is true to say that they have generalized from it in a way which pushed their understanding of the presentation of case study reports deeper, by which I mean that a report which is presented as layer upon layer of description will allow a fuller picture to emerge. It is not a problem which we have resolved but it is something we share as a general problem with a possible solution raised by my paper. We are working on the issue as a group of colleagues who share more than the written word. We have, through the South-West Action Research Network, attempted to identify with each others' problems, concerns and thinking and to attempt to resolve them through dialogue of the kind to which  Bernstein (1983) refers when he talks about the need to genuinely discuss without status or the desire to win the argument entering the scene. 

	I also experienced something similar when I presented a research report at the BERA conference in Sheffield in 1985. I felt that those who had read the report or who were conversant with it through the dialogue of the seminar identified with the problems I wrote about and were committed enough to enter into discussion concerning the problems and the attempts I made to improve my practice. I think this was because we all understood that 

	"the aim of the practical arts is to get things done. The better generalizations often are those more parochial, those more personal." (Stake 1980)

	To sum up then, the kind of generalisation I am talking of is not the objective kind but an inter-subjective kind, growing out of personal commitment, dialogue and a commitment to improving understanding. This is what Stake means when he refers to parochial and personal generalisations. It is also when knowledge is useful in that it can illuminate or add to understanding that we can talk of generalisability.

	QUESTION

	Are you asking for a change to the accepted meaning of the term "generalisation?"

	ANSWER

	Yes. I see generalisation as a complex concept. There is Polanyi's idea that 

	"The skilful performer is seen to be setting standards to himself and judging himself by them; the connoiseur is seen valuing comprehensive entities in terms of a standard set by him for their excellence. The elements of such a context .... all point beyond themselves and are endowed with meaning in this context; and on the other hand a comprehensive context itself like dance, mathematics, music, possesses intrinsic or existential meaning." (Polanyi 1958)

	Thus, I can transcend my own intrinsic subjectivity by struggling to fulfil my personal commitment to universal standards. Polanyi argues that it is this intellectual commitment which makes personal knowledge more than merely subjective. My commitment to my work of attempting to improve the process of learning through action and reflection gives it, in this way, a universality in intention: that is, I make statements with universal intent not only because my commitment compels me to do so but also because the existential meaning of that act demands that I do so. To use Polanyi's words, 
	"commitment is a 'shirt of flame,' blazing with passion and .... consumed by devotion to a universal demand." (Polanyi op cit)

	Also in my understanding of generalisability there is my idea of "use-value." This is my belief that my work is generalisable in the sense that someone else has found merit in it. To produce my work, I have used the work of others because I felt that there was merit in it. In my turn, I offer my work for others to use if it has use-value for them. So it is not possible to produce work without other work. It is this tension between our own work and the work of others that moves human understanding forward.

	Another facet of my concept of generalisation is the form of presentation. It really did take me a long time to work out this particular form. I wanted to maintain the dialogic nature of the work and yet integrate into it the ideas of educational and other academics as well as the discussions that went on in the classroom. However, the form of the dialogue is not all. It offers me the facility of allowing my work to have an ongoing, unfinished feel, which is in keeping with the question I have frequently asked, "How do I/we improve this process of education here?" Answers to this question cannot be finite: for me this is a continuous process. As Rob Walker says:

	"The very form of the dialogue makes a point not made in other ways. It invites participation; in itself it rejects .... an authoritative judgement; it demonstrates "open-endednes", divergence of view, unresolved conflict and discrepancy in a manner that statements cannot." (Walker 1985)

	But there is more to it than this too. I reckon that a dialogic form also speaks to a different audience than the "educational research establishment," to use a phrase from Walker (op cit). One of my desires is to close the gap between theory and practice: this seems to me to be a good thing to do. I have tried to write a thesis which speaks to the educational research establishment as well as to a wider professional audience. I think that in using the form of the dialogue that I have gone some way towards bringing these two branches of activity together.