Class notes, M O29

Teachers,

Some thoughts and questions on our class tonight:

Bracey:
When is using the mean appropriate?  The median?  The range?
How do you know if groups, and the conditions of their learning, are comparable?

What do the statistics from assessments really tell us?  What else must a teacher include in order to get better interpretation of the data?

To answer Corrie question: School leaders are not 'stupid' for using standardized measures as evaluators of teachers.  They are efficient and frugal.  Tests have what is called 'face validity;' on their face, most people accept them as valid.  And, in a crude sort of way, they are.  Our discussion in class concerned the validity and reliability of their inferential statistics.  Most people do not (and can not) pay attention to inferential statistics.

Observations:
Eric Fischel, "Year of the drowned dog" - explanation

Fredric Remington, "Fight for the water hole" - explanation

When observing, do we impose a narrative upon a scene?
Is it possible to observe without judgment, or interpretation?
How does a new teacher both trust her growing instinct, yet remain skeptical and inquisitive into why she does what she does?

Class notes S O20

Teachers,

Notes and questions from today's class:

How do you move from should to do?
What moves knowledge into action?

What data/information about our teaching can we collect and analyze?
What are the contextual factors of our teaching for which that data has meaning?

What are our goals, objectives, aims, ends, philosophies (what do I want to achieve, to happen, to be learned)?
What effort am I willing to apply to reach my objectives?
If I am not reaching them, do I change my action or have  I changed my beliefs?

How do I change from a judgment stance to one of inquiry and reflection?

What keeps me from asking "what in the world is going on?"
How do I turn from seeking solutions to problems, to seeking better understand about what happened to know what problem to address (what are meaning problems)?

How much of the contextual factors do I need to understanding before I have 'enough' understanding to act/decision?

How often do I take the effort to reflect on what did happen?
What a claim valid (what leads to mutual understanding in communication)?
Do we share the same objective world (are we talking about the same thing)?
Do we share the same subjective world (do we mean the same thing)?
Do we share the same normative world (do base our actions on the same principles and norms)?

When does an experience and anecdote represent the general reality?

Class notes, S O6

Teachers,

Some questions that arose during our class this past Saturday.  Look for a set of posts related to the articles in the next few days.  Please share your thoughts, if they add to the learning.

Thanks.

article critiques

• What is the conversation in this area?  What are the current norms, expectation and accepted methodologies and evidentiary criteria?
• To whom is the research directed?  What are the expectations of readers of this journal?  How difficult is it to get published in this journal?  How does that level of ease or difficult affect the standards of evidence?
• What can I learn about this area?  How can the research change my assumptions, schema and understandings?
• I am reviewing the idea or the research on the idea?
• Is the research deductive (does it start with a belief and find evidence for that belief)?  Is the research inductive (does it start with the evidence and ground up to a more general theory about the collected data)?  Is the author an analyst of the data or an advocate for an idea?
• Do authors attempt to generalize their findings (universally true, true for all regardless of any context)?
• Do the authors attempt to prove/validate a theory or do they intend an exploration of a phenomenon?
• Do the authors attempt to make a policy recommendation or do they advise more research?  Does the population of participants support their intent?

data gathering

• Attention matters; how narrowly should I focus?  What do I miss?
• How much control do I have over my focus and attention?  How can I become more aware of what I am aware? How do I know I know what I know?
• Humans are pattern detectors; is what we perceive really there?  What do we ignore, miss, make invisible in order to detect that pattern?
• Do we detect a pattern because our identity demands it?  Are we willing to allow our worlds to be rocked?
• How do find the balance between focusing on the context and investigating the margins?
• How do we make the invisible visible?
• What assumptions do we make about another's experience?  To what extent do I attempt to position-take with that other person in order to understand their experience?
• What is working for me?  Why do I think so?  In other words, it 'works' to do what?

Bracey, chapters 1 and 2 for S O20

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"Position-taking" - the empathic and active self-distancing of our own feelings to see through the experience of another.  If, as van Manen claims, we are "fated to never be transparent to ourselves" and we need to "make thoughtful sense of the meaning the child's experience has for the child as well as for our adult view," how can we tell when our efforts at position-taking result in a confabulation of the other's point of view or a confirmation of what we expect and want the other's point of view to be?

John  Lloyd, tedtalk on the Invisible

Jonathan Haidt, on intuition and reasoning (from the NYTimes, S O7): "We effortlessly and intuitively “see that” something is true, and then we work to find justifications, or “reasons why,” which we can give to others.  Both processes are crucial for understanding belief and persuasion. ... And intuitions are rarely stronger than when they are part of our partisan identities ... But I never said that reasons were irrelevant. I said that they were no match for intuition, and that they were usually a servant of one’s own intuitions. Therefore, if you want to persuade someone, talk to the elephant first. Trigger the right intuitions first. "

Reading question: van Manen and Schon

Teachers,

As hoped for and promised, though a bit tardy.  As you read each article, please keep these questions as a guide:

Max van Manen, "Beyond assumptions"

• Why does van Manen begin his paper with the claim that there are no agreed upon techniques and procedures for action research?
• van Manen seeks "a more self-reflective human science-oriented form of action research while restoring the pedagogical quality of our relation to children." What does this imply about the forms of research typically undertaken by teachers?  Why would he want it to change?
• What impact does his claim that "theory enlightens practice after the action has occurred" have on self-reflection?
• What are "meaning questions," in contrast to improving pedagogy or problem-solving in classrooms?
• How might you investigate a teacher's "pedagogical thoughtfulness and pedagogical tact"?
• What might van Manen mean by "the way we make thoughtful sense of the meaning the child's experience has for the child as well as for our adult view"?
• What are the implications for data collection if "the most captivating stories exactly those that help us to understand better what is most common, most taken-for-granted, and what concerns us most ordinarily and directly in our tactful pedagogical interactions with children "?
• How are we to understand our decision-making and teaching practice if we are "not completely transparent to ourselves"?
• How can the research process enable you to find your "pedagogical nature"?

Donald Schön, "Educating the reflective practitioner"

• How does Schön argue for indeterminacy in professional practice?  Why does he do so?
• How does "technical rationality" contrast with "reflection-in-action"?
• What steps would you take to answer the question “what it is it that we do when we do what we do"?
• What kind of method and rigor is required for "reflection on reflection-in-action"?