Reflecting on participatory research in environmental education : some issues for methodology

We reflect on methodological issues arising in two of our own research projects as a form of practice, as a way of engaging in a praxis of project research. The projects chosen for this purpose are themselves concerned with teacher education and curriculum development in environmental education: they include participatory “reflective practice” processes in exploring issues relating to formal education in schools and informal education in communities and are grounded in the specific contexts of developing countries.
We discuss issues in participatory research such as:
• Whose research agenda gets to be explored?
• The importance of project partnerships
• Participants’ preconceptions about the nature of research
• What is “rigor” in participatory research in environmental education?
• The Colonialist Dilemma: Avoiding the “package or perish” mentality
• The Bigger Picture: Technocratic Rationality and Participatory Research.

Traversing theory and transgressing academic discourses : arts-based research in teacher education

Pre-service teacher education is marked by linear and sequential programming which offers a plethora of strategies and methods (Cochran-Smith & Zeichner, 2005; Darling Hammond & Bransford, 2005; Grant & Zeichner, 1997). This paper emerges from a three year study within a core education subject in preservice teacher education in Australia. This ‘practitioner’ research (Zeichner, 1999) engaged the problematics of authentic and meaningful learner-centred teaching and learning through an arts-based curriculum. Over the period of the study, two hundred and eighty pre-service teachers participated in a ‘dialogical performance’ (Conquergood, 2003) of pedagogy about curriculum and assessment through the construction of art about curriculum and assessment. The possibilities of an arts-based pedagogy in pre-service education were affirmed by the research. An enacted epistemological move by the teacher educators led to similar shifts by the students. This opened a space for the reappearance of learner through engagements with identities, positionings and agency. This was an act of ‘putting theory to work’ (Lather, 2006, 2007) and invoked transgressive practices of academic discourses.

Action research in cooperative education projects : developing lifelong capabilities for improving practice

There are natural synergies between action research as a method of inquiry and the practice of cooperative education. In the search to integrate theory and practice, action research is underpinned by a philosophy of experiential learning. Similarly, cooperative education is underpinned by the belief that in order to learn, there also needs to be action. The work of cooperative education students is also founded on data-based reflection is highly context based and usually collaborative; important characteristics of action research (Cardno, 2003). These similarities between action research and cooperative education provide a starting point in conceptualizing the adoption of action research for sport cooperative education projects. How can action research be integrated within cooperative education projects? This paper will discuss the theoretical basis of action research and illustrate through the use of case studies why and how action research has been utilized in cooperative education projects in sport and recreation. Sport students undertake a range of activities in the cooperative education setting. Some complete basic day to day tasks in recreation centers and with sports teams and others act as volunteers in major events. While these types of roles can fulfill desired outcomes for cooperative education program (for student, industry organization and institution), the adoption of action research can add a further dimension because it aims to create change within the setting under investigation. Through the use of cooperative education projects, students are in a unique position to frame a problem, integrate theory, determine action, and implement and evaluate that action. This paper explores how action research is used in cooperative education projects to help develop capabilities for improving practice.

Action research in higher education : the advancement of university learning and teaching

This thesis aims to contribute to the improvement and advancement of university learning, teaching, and staff development; to integrate educational theory and the practice of university teaching; and to contribute to the establishment of a new, emerging paradigm in higher education. The strategy towards achieving these aims comprises (1) an alternative research methodology in the interpretive, non-positivist paradigm; (2) an integrated framework drawing on a variety of previously unrelated theories to form an alternative model of university education; and (3) reference to the dialectical relationship between educational theory and teaching practice and their integration through action research in higher education. The thesis is not so much a critique of the traditional paradigm and of existing functionalist-structuralist approaches to higher education, but more a development and clarification of an alternative, dialectical, human action approach to higher education. The original contribution of this thesis to the theory and practice of higher education lies in the development (1) of an alternative model of university education based on an integration of previously unrelated domains of theory; (2) of a theoretical model of professional development as action research (the CRASP Model: Critical attitude, Research into teaching, Accountability, Self-evaluation, Professionalism); and (3) of action research projects in higher education. Action research is research by the university teachers themselves into their teaching practice, i.e. into problems of the curriculum and student learning. The case studies included in and appended to this thesis show that in one educational setting at least it was possible to improve and advance university learning and teaching through action research. The evidence for this advancement is provided in a number of previously published case studies compiled in the Appendix.

Technographic research in online education : context, culture and ICT consumption

Technologically-mediated learning environments are an increasingly common component of university experience. In this paper, the authors consider how the interrelated domains of policy contexts, new learning cultures and the consumption of information and communication technologies might be explored using the concept of technography. Understood here as a term referring to “the apprehension, reception, use, deployment, depiction and representation of technologies” (Woolgar, 2005, pp. 27-28), we consider how technographic studies in education might engage in productive dialogues with interdisciplinary research from the fields of cultural and cyber studies. We argue that what takes place in online learning and teaching environments is shaped by the logics and practices of technologies and their role in the production of new consumer cultures.

Stories of reform in science education : commentary on opp(reg)ressive policies and tempered radicals

This response to the two papers (by Rodriguez and Carlone et al.) on science education reform acknowledges first the coherence of the arguments presented around four reform narratives; that of the process of becoming science-enthusiastic, the nature of beliefs of science reform teachers, the barriers to reform, and the institutional expressions of these barriers. In the commentary I first discuss the reform ‘problem’ in terms of two interacting issues—the purposes of school science and the value placed on it in an elementary school curriculum. The insights produced in these papers are then used to reflect on a range of experiences and current policy debates in Australia. Finally, in this commentary, I point out: (a) the relationship of the papers to the reform issue of opposition to Standards Based Science (SBS) from proponents’ traditional conceptions of science education, discussing how this more specific reform question relates to the two papers; and (b) the singular nature of the I-meanings characterised in the Carlone et al. paper, describing (using Australian examples) how the notions of tempered radicals and I-meanings might also be used to characterise complexities in the processes of school science reform.