Jack's notes to support your educational enquiries into gifts, talents and education for the MA unit.

30 April, 2008.

You can access the full unit description for Gifts, Talents and Education from http://www.jackwhitehead.com/tuesdayma/G&TinEd12&9.htm . I'm focusing on the 9 credit unit where you undertake a small-scale action research project in which you will "research an attempt to improve the education of pupils developing gifts and talents with the overall aim of producing validated explanations of the educational influences on the learning of pupils developing gifts and talents."

As this is a new unit I think you should feel confident that your writings, about how you express and develop your own talents as educators in responding and helping to develop the talents of your students as they produce their own gifts, will be helpful to those who follow you on the Gifts, Talents and Education unit.

I imagine that you recognize that you are expressing and developing your relational and responsive talents as educators in your educational relationships with your students. One of your most significant contributions to educational knowledge, in this unit, could be to include in your action research your understandings of these relational and responsive talents and offer your account as your gift to enhance the professional knowledge-base. With appropriate ethical permissions it would also be a significant contribution to our knowledge-base if you could include your pupils'/student's stories of their learning, with your own, in a way that could help others to understanding your educational influences in your pupils'/students' learning.

Here are some resources I think you could draw on in 'framing' your action research project for your reader and in relating your conclusion to some of the most advanced theories and policies of the day. I'll place these resources, all accessible on the web, within the 4 issues of the unit description. Most of the resources for the first three issues below are on Marie Huxtable's website: http://www.spanglefish.com/mariessite/

1) Theoretical perspectives and practical understandings of the gifted and talented education.

On the left hand menu of http://www.spanglefish.com/mariessite/ you will see 'Theories, Models etc'. This contains resources to help you to understand and develop your theoretical perspectives and practical understandings of gifted and talented education.

2) School, local authority and government policies on gifted and talented education.

Do enter the url for the DCSF guidance re Gifted and Talented Education at:

http://www.spanglefish.com/mariessite/index.asp?pageid=16090

for the resources that Marie has collected on government policies on gifted and talented education.

3) The value judgments implicit in different perspectives on the education of gifted and talented children particularly in relation to inclusional approaches to education.

Do please read the homepage at http://www.spanglefish.com/mariessite/ . Marie has opened a JISMAIL e-form to support your writings on Gifts, Talents and Education and I suggest you join this if you haven't already done so. If you go into the 'My Writing' section of the homepage you can engage with Marie's understandings of the value judgments implicit in different perspectives on the education of gifted and talented children particularly in relation to inclusional approaches to education.

4a) Systemic influences on the learning of pupils developing gifts and talents

If you go into http://www.bath.ac.uk/carpp/people/judi/papers.html you will see a number of Judi Marshall's publications. Do have a read of her two papers 'Living Life as Inquiry' and 'Living Systemic Thinking'. I think the ideas may appeal to you and could be useful in 'framing' your writings for your readers.

4b) The use of action research methodologies in the improvement of educational practice and the development of educational knowledge.

I'm working on the assumption that you are bringing your embodied knowledge as educators into the Academy for accreditation. I've also been working on the assumption, which is open to question, that you can do this through creating your own living educational theory as an explanation of your educational influence in your own learning, in the learning of your pupils/students and where appropriate in the learning of the social formations in which we live and work.

If you go into http://www.jackwhitehead.com/jack/arplanner.htm you will see a couple of different forms of Action Reflection Cycles that constitute a method within an action research methodology. You could embrace the ideas of Marion Dadds and Susan Hart in the exercise of your 'methodological inventiveness' as you ask, research and answer questions of the kind, 'How do I improve what I am doing?'

" The importance of methodological inventiveness

Perhaps the most important new insight for both of us has been awareness that, for some practitioner researchers, creating their own unique way through their research may be as important as their self-chosen research focus. We had understood for many years that substantive choice was fundamental to the motivation and effectiveness of practitioner research (Dadds 1995); that what practitioners chose to research was important to their sense of engagement and purpose. But we had understood far less well that how practitioners chose to research, and their sense of control over this, could be equally important to their motivation, their sense of identity within the research and their research outcomes." (Dadds & Hart, p. 166, 2001)

"If our aim is to create conditions that facilitate methodological inventiveness, we need to ensure as far as possible that our pedagogical approaches match the message that we seek to communicate. More important than adhering to any specific methodological approach, be it that of traditional social science or traditional action research. may be the willingness and courage or practitioners – and those who support them – to create enquiry approaches that enable new, valid understandings to develop; understandings that empower practitioners to improve their work for the beneficiaries in their care. Practitioner research methodologies are with us to serve professional practices. So what genuinely matters are the purposes of practice which the research seeks to serve, and the integrity with which the practitioner researcher makes methodological choices about ways of achieving those purposes. No methodology is, or should, cast in stone, if we accept that professional intention should be informing research processes, not pre-set ideas about methods of techniques.. "(Dadds & Hart, p. 169, 2001)

Dadds, M. & Hart, S. (2001) Doing Practitioner Research Differently, London; RoutledgeFalmer.

In relation to the use of a living theory methodology in developing your educational knowledge and sharing it, you could bring our processes of democratic validation into your account. By this I mean that we share our writings with the group and ask for evaluations that include judgments about the comprehensibility, truth, rightness and authenticity of our accounts. You could reference Habermas' (1976) ideas from his text on 'Communication And The Evolution of Society as the originator of this approach to social validity:

"I shall develop the thesis that anyone acting communicatively must, in performing any speech action, raise universal validity claims and suppose that they can be vindicated (or redeemed). Insofar as he wants to participate in a process of reaching understanding, he cannot avoid raising the following – and indeed precisely the following – validity claims. He claims to be:

1. Uttering something understandably;

2. Giving (the hearer) something to understand;

3. Making himself thereby understandable. And

4. 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 a propositional content, 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 that the hearer can believe the utterance of the speaker (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 on another in the utterance with respect to a recognized normative background. Moreover, communicative action can continue undisturbed only as long as participants suppose that the validity claims they reciprocally raise are justified." (Habermas, 1976, pp.2-3)

Habermas, J. (1976) Communication and the evolution of society. London : Heinemann.

If you are using visual data of your own educational relationships and practices in your action research you might like to draw some insights from the keynote I presented on the 28^th March 2008 to the International Conference of Teacher Research on Combining Voices In Living Educational Theories That Are Freely Given In Teacher Research. The notes are at: http://www.jackwhitehead.com/aerictr08/jwictr08key.htm and the video of the keynote is at:

mms://wms.bath.ac.uk/live/education/JackWhitehead_030408/jackkeynoteictr280308large.wmv

In the first ten minutes of the video you will see me using video to explain its use in communicating the relationally dynamic nature of educational relationships and the significance of the gaze of recognition of the being of the other between educator and pupil. I think that one of your greatest contributions to educational knowledge could be in your account of your educational influences in learning where you show yourself recognizing your talent for expressing this quality in your educational relationships and in explaining your educational influences from the ground of this quality of relationship as you respond to the educational needs of pupils in relation to their learning. Your gift could be for each other and the profession as you freely give your writings as a contribution to our professional knowledge-base.

Hoping that this is helpful. Don't hesitate to respond with your questions or requests for more information or resources to support your learning.

Love Jack.

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When Martin Dobson, a colleague, died in 2002 the last thing he said to me was 'Give my Love to the Department'. In the 20 years I'd worked with Martin it was his loving warmth of humanity that I recall with great life affirming pleasure and I'm hoping that in Love Jack we can share this value of common humanity.