- The authors write, “Methodology is inevitably interwoven with and emerges from the nature of particular disciplines (such as sociology and psychology) and particular perspectives (such as Marxism, feminist theory, and queer theory” (2011, p. 97). As you look at the ontologies (theories of existence) and epistemologies (theories of knowledge) of the various paradigms (p. 102 & 103), describe which paradigm most resonates with your beliefs and experiences in education.
- What do we need to discuss/ define in order for you to feel as if you have a clear understanding of each paradigm and the differences among them, particularly in reference to research questions and methodology?
Sunday, May 14, 2017
L, L & G Chapter 6
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
The Lincoln, Lynham and Guba chapter presents five major paradigms (positivism, postpositivism, critical theories, constructivism and the newly minted “participatory”). As I read the descriptions of these ideas, I found myself struggling to limit myself to a single paradigm. More specifically, there are two of these “themes of knowledge” that resonate most to me: critical and participatory. When I read the original Lincoln & Guba work, I understood my lense to be a critical one - where “human nature operates in a world that is based on struggle for power. I still remember the power surge I felt as I read Freire and his words made my feeling legitimate and worthy of study. However, with the new information described under the participatory lens, I find that many of these ideas are also powerful and relevant to my beliefs and experiences. Namely, the participatory description includes the idea that reality is subjective-objective and “co-created by mind the surrounding cosmos”. This latter set of ideas aligns with the current ideas of quantum physics, where matter or energy (which according to Einstein are interchangeable [E=mc2]) exist as potential (energy and information) until interactions with other forces provide the necessary conditions for existence.
ReplyDeleteThis description may seem a bit ethereal, but to me it is sensible: we do not exist outside or the universe (and vice versa). Alan Watts puts it this way: “Just as no thing or organism exists on its own, it does not act on its own. Furthermore, every organism is a process: thus the organism is not other than its actions. To put it clumsily: it is what it does. More precisely, the organism, including its behavior, is a process which is to be understood only in relation to the larger and longer process of its environment. For what we mean by "understanding" or "comprehension" is seeing how parts fit into a whole, and then realizing that they don't compose the whole, as one assembles a jigsaw puzzle, but that the whole is a pattern, a complex wiggliness, which has no separate parts. Parts are fictions of language, of the calculus of looking at the world through a net which seems to chop it up into bits. Parts exist only for purposes of figuring and describing, and as we figure the world out we become confused if we do not remember this all the time.”
In this light, education, or more precisely the student that participate in education, are subjects to the environmental contingencies that exists in any given time/space - and as such, cannot be studied/explored without taking into account the environment. Similarly, knowledge is the result of “participation”. Even though this participatory lens seems to make the most sense to me as a researcher - I cannot abandon the ideals of the critical lens where “knowledge that is produced CAN change existing oppressive structures and remove oppression through empowerment” (I have experienced this).
I currently feel that the one item that I need to have greater knowledge about in order to make up my mind about the epistemological approach is most appropriate for my research interests is the actual ways in which participatory research is conducted and how these compare to critical pedagogical research endeavors. I will need to read some participatory research articles and explore their methodology and applications.
So, I would consider myself a “critical, participatory, social constructivist,” if that makes sense, but me let expand upon that. I believe that knowledge is created through the unique experience of individual, but mediated through social interaction, such as the interactions that should happen in a classroom, but often don’t. I believe that everyone goes through their own meaning making process based the experience and contexts of their lives, and that there no “master narrative”. I also believe that it is the moral and ethical responsibility of schools to meet kids at their level. Not to have them conform to someone else’s predetermined idea of what education should be.
ReplyDeleteMy experience in K-12 education has led me to believe that most schools fail to meet the needs of kids. I believe that is primary due to positivistic educational polices that are developed top-down at the federal and state level by small teams of “experts” based on their ideas of what schooling should be. Schools and students are measured and assessed by standardized multiple choice tests, and narrow data metrics. Reform efforts based on this top down approach have not worked and have failed to improve the experience of schooling. I believe that they haven’t worked because you can’t just set some arbitrary standards and have kids conform to meet them. To be truly effective, I believe school reform should happen from the bottom up starting with the experiences of the students themselves. I believe that it is the school’s responsibility to meet the needs of individual student, and not have all students conform to some arbitrary, easy to measure standard.
I also believe that educational research should be practical, useful, and help change the lives participants for the better. Qualitative research appeals to me because the narratives and voices of the participants tell a much deeper story about what’s really going on in schools, and I think that it is natural fit for education. Over the course of the program, I have “tried on” various methodologies. Somehow through serendipity, I discovered Participatory Action Research (PAR). PAR is aligned with my beliefs that knowledge is social co-constructed and mediated by others. PAR is research is conducted with the participants, in the sense that they are “co-researchers” on issues that directly affect their lives. So much research is done “on” kids, not “with” kids. They are seen by some policy makers as a deficit. “How can we fix kids to make them conform”. Instead the question should be “If we view kids as assets, and experts on their experience of schooling, what can they tell us about why schools don’t work for them”. I think that’s why I’m so drawn to PAR. PAR has an action, to reposition students to have a voice in education. I’m still not such whether I chose my methodology, or it chose me. But I do know that it strongly resonates with my beliefs about what should be happening in schools.
I’m going to start with what I think I understand the word “Ontology” to mean… in which case if I am wrong I know that’s one place I need to further discuss! Based on this and other readings I think ontology refers to the “way things are’, as in the existence of systems and general beliefs of certain groups- particularly those that are organized and largely subscribed to as “powerful”. Its understanding and recognizing the circumstances surrounding the space within which one will be doing research, not necessarily agreeing or subscribing to the same views or beliefs, but simply recognizing and acknowledging that they exist. I think the meaning of the word “Epistemology” refers to our process of thinking about how and why things “are the way they are” where do those realities from, for whom are they actual realities and what do they mean or look like for anyone else. Also how do realities come into being through socialization, cultural formation and past experiences for all individuals?……… I think?
ReplyDeleteIn this case, I currently believe I would identify mostly as constructivist, with a little bit of Critical/ participatory ontologies. Mostly constructivist, because I am trying to understand the realities of my participants, how they experience certain aspects of their lives and identities. Their aspects of identities I aim to better understand are largely socially constructed, whether its identifying and belonging to in my case Cape Verdean or “Americanized” social groups, home culture groups and school culture groups etc. These groups exist (to the best of my current understanding) based largely on social construction. This also means that I believe that for my participants especially multiple realities exist, especially in the case of these multiple groups/ identities (p.102).
I feel I also identify as having some participatory and critical ontologies because I also have to acknowledge my own existence as being very different from my participants. The realties to which I am part are different from my participants being that I am not Cape Verdean, instead I am considered causation, female, born an American citizen, all of which situate my realities within a different system (critical piece) of belonging to a system of power I must understand, own and address. Also, it helps me to be able to address that system of power, which currently is over many of my participants, oppressing many (as immigrants, and EBs).
The first time I read Freire I understood none of it. In the years since I have evolved into what I believe
ReplyDeleteto be a Critical Constructivist. I believe that this matches more with my beliefs than my experiences but
my experiences are catching up. My initial struggles with Friere were tied to a mismatch between my
lived experiences and my emerging beliefs. I lacked the vocabulary and the experiences to make much
sense of his writing. It was not until I had hit about the mid-point of my graduate partnership with Dr.
Fluehr-Lobban that I had sufficient “book smarts” to make some productive use of Friere’s work. My
“experiences” started to catch up with my beliefs when I got my first job (only job) in education. I
entered college admissions fresh out of a job loading trucks in a liquor warehouse and found an
environment ripe with opportunity to apply my emerging critical perspective. I graduated high school a
racist who didn’t know he was a racist. I was blind to systems of oppression because all of the “systems”
I encountered worked nicely for me. In the two decades since I have come to see how critical it is to
expose the systems that I derived great benefit from and then work to dismantle them. I don’t have an
interest in doing research that doesn’t work toward that end.
The other “belief” that has led me to label myself as a “critical constructionist” is that the kind of research
that can achieve these ends centers on the voice of the participant. Context is critical. How participants
understand/build reality is essential in answering the questions I hope to answer. This may not make
sense but- I believe strongly that change (in this case specifically related to education) has been stifled by
reform initiatives that attempt to impose a false “reality” on a population. Stripping context or
manufacturing imagined “realities” leads to reform initiatives that are doomed to fail. One instance that
helped motivate me to shift my research to “college readiness” was the approach a mid-sized college in
the northeastern United States was taking to revisiting how we (I mean they) evaluated “college
readiness”. This review centered solely upon mining IR data comparing high school GPA and SAT
scores to first-year GPA. Traditional measures of “college readiness” have been built based on the
assets/academic “strengths” of the educational “haves” at the expense of those who have been historically
oppressed. We use euphemisms like “underrepresented” or “diverse” or (my favorite) “multicultural” but
don’t acknowledge that they have held largely silent in defining “college readiness”. I think research that
helps give voice to those who have been systematically silenced is critically important. I hope I have
answered the question
Sorry for the weird formatting. Work computer seized up while I was finishing and by some stroke of incredible luck the whole thing was saved on my OneDrive. Cutting and pasting didn't work perfectly.
DeleteOf the five paradigms presented – positivism, postpositivism, critical, constructivism, and participatory – myself, and my research interests mostly connect with both constructivist and critical perspectives. It is challenging for me to narrowly view the world through one lens without incorporating or pulling from various epistemological models. The extreme end of positivism, in which there is only one objective reality, narrowly concludes that statistical analysis of data is superior to other more subjective methods. In my opinion, a combination of paradigms provides a more realistic view. For example, combining numerical data with the support of qualitative or observational data can better establish well-rounded conclusions. With so many disparities within our educational and political system, it is essential I incorporate a critical component to my study. My ultimate goal is to build awareness of the disparities that could be taking place between privileged populations and those that tend to be systemically marginalized. For this purpose, I would first need to use a constructivist approach in building a theory supported by literature and previous studies related to my topic.
ReplyDeleteSince my passion and experience lie in dual language education, I would like to examine the demographic characteristics of past and current enrollment patterns of local dual language programs. Monolingual English speakers and emergent bilinguals both benefit from dual language education in similar ways. Immigrant students and emergent bilinguals can additionally benefit from a dual language setting by being in a culturally familiar environment. The linguistic and cultural similarities between school and home will support students’ intrinsic motivation for learning. Marginalized families, in terms of their lower socioeconomic status, might lack awareness of the benefits of dual language, whereas families from privileged backgrounds are more likely to be knowledgeable of these benefits and have better access. Since dual language programs have gained widespread popularity and continue to steadily increase, it is important to examine how they might be affected from gentrification. There are limited studies examining this phenomena, therefore theories for this demographic shift will be constructed with the goal of building awareness.
The authors introduce the newly developed participatory paradigm, which I’m still unfamiliar with. From my understanding, it justifies how personal experience is an essential component in data collection and how subjectivity is an inevitable outcome from researcher interpretations. Further readings that explicitly define it, in addition to studies that incorporate this approach would help to better clarify how it’s applied in a study design.
So this is the third time I've attempted to comment on the reading by Lincoln, Lynham, and Guba due to technical issues on my part, but here's the gist of what was said. In reviewing the overwhelming amount of information on the different ways in which social theorists and scientists evaluate situations, my mind keeps going back to my own research interest. Since my research will revolve around 8-9 year old EB students being mandated to participate in high-stakes standardized tests given in English (their second or more language), I am concerned with what they think and feel about this situation. I wonder if they think of what this means for their lives, or why they have to do it. Ultimately, it is my hope that this group of students would have an opportunity to show what they know on an even playing field with their native English speaking peers.
ReplyDeleteSo in looking at all the components of each paradigm I find myself focusing on the right hand side of the charts, in the Critical, Constructivist, and Participatory columns. I would like to play a role it getting changes made in how our EB students' content knowledge is evaluated. If this action research approach that I am trying to put together can result in my students being able to formulate a picture in their own minds of what's really going on with all the testing they have to do, perhaps that could play a role in changes being made in the future. So I see the Critical and Constructivist approaches being especially relevant to what I hope to do. For the purpose of changing what I am perceiving as a social injustice, and for every one involved to be able to piece together, or construct a clear picture of the puzzle that is this testing "mess" that has evolved from NCLB to its successor, ESSA. The Participatory approach seems very relevant to, because I foresee myself being involved in interviews and observations and everything else that would be needed to construct a story of what's going on with my students as they make way through a year of testing, which of course is on top of all the normal turmoil of just growing up and dealing with all the other kids, and trying to make sense out of this whole different world called school.
So that's where I am at the moment with all this material, but I'm sure my thinking will evolve further as this course proceeds and I get into my actual research.
I had originally written about confusion on my part about Constructivism vs. Constructionism, but we covered that in class, so I not as confused. It's still a little vague in my mind, but I'm understanding that it's not something to dwell on right now. Other than that I just want to have a more concrete grasp of the vocabulary being used for each paradigm.