Bracewell & Witte (2008) Implications of practice, activity and semiotic theory for cognitive constructs of writing Ch 15 in Albright & Luke (eds) Pierre Bourdieu and Literacy Education

Mimesis - "imitation" - in the sense of "re-presentation “rather than of "copying"

The current challenge for those who study writing is how to integrate special, material and cultural factors that bear on writing with cognitive factors that underlie planning, writing and revising text.

Seeks to examine the correspondences among principle theoretical constructs of socio-cultural and cognitive approaches.

Correspondences:

·         habitus / expertise:  regular and regulating, structured and structuring

·         the role of signs, representation, semiosis in allowing a person to interact with the social and material world (activity) / symbols in cognitive theory – knowledge as representation

·         the sense of playing the game – performance under the constraint of bounded rationality        

       ‘effects do not require conscious thought, they do require semiosis’

·         role of dialectic and the significance of ill / structured tasks – dialectic is what enables the realisation of constructs in particular situations correspondence – the ill-structured task – part of achieving the goal is to define it; for activity theorist activity changes context and altered context changes activity.

Implications

Aim of article would seem to be to draw to a conclusion arguments about the nature of writing as either socio-cultural or cognitive.

Also seems to suggest that key concepts:  unlimited semiosis, habit(us), procedurialisation, tool mediation and task definition – highlight need to specify in much greater detail the ‘content’ of the writing act.

This content has 2 domains

       a) i)  the knowledge the writer brings in creating both task; ii) text and how does one retrieve, transform and construct knowledge in the course of writing

       b) i)  the material contingencies of writing, the nature of writing tools and how these effect writing; ii) the role writing plays in constructing our world

purpos / ed - the questions

·         What is your vision for the good society?

·         What is the part that education can play in achieving that and what is the part that others need to play? Who are these others? What is/what should be their relationship to education?

·         What are the building blocks we have in our schools and universities already that could move them towards that role?

·         What are the building blocks outside formal education?

·         What are the impediments to change and what causes them? And are there good reasons for these?

·         What can I see of merit in the ideas of those who disagree with me?

·         Do the ideas I suggest draw on the expertise and insight of others?

·         Do the ideas I suggest offer enough benefit to outweight the disruption that they would cause in their realisation? how would we get there?

Learning & Teaching in HE

Light, Greg, Cox, Roy, and Calkins, Susanna (2009), Learning and teaching in higher education : the reflective professional (2nd edn.; Los Angeles, Calif. ; London: Sage) 341p.

Gibbons et al (1994) the move from disciplinary-based knowledge situated in an academic context (in which experts construct knowledge) towards trans-disciplinary knowledge located in a context of application (in which students construct knowledge for themselves) 

Provides theoretical framework for teaching in HE from ad hoc to skills to the professional but is also helpful in distinguishing between a call for professionalism - externally driven accountability and call to professionalism - echoes a call to arms - to defend academic values and practices from the excess of excellence. 


The call to professionalism resists the nostalgic laissez-faire-ism of the benign amateur, while refusing the succumb to behavioural competence. 


What's interesting here is that the focus is not restricted to the events and situations of practices but the social context within which that practice occurs. Broader then Schön which is a reaction against the narrowness of competence. It seems to suggests a conception of teaching is committed to social justice rather then learning as including a dynamic which changes conciousness of context. 

Is here developing a professional language of practice based on dialogic views of language and constructivist theories of knowledge. 

Constructivism: knowledge is constructed by individuals through the use of language and other symbolic and cultural systems. Bruner 1996.

Three dimensions

Reality – discovered or invented, Light et al argue for knowledge as ‘social narrative’ [discourse]. The key consideration here is the space for human agency.

Knowledge – internal cognitive processes or socially and culturally constructed.

[ref Piaget & Vygotsky both individual psychological process as focus but one based on cognitive psychology and the other emphasises social factors in learning]

Learning - (not Light’s naming) – is knowing individual as passive spectator or individual as active constructor. 

Living Literacies - Teaching Literacy

International Partnerships – British Academy

(This draft has not been proofed Tuesday, 08 February 2011 - it is a working document, please leave your comments for me to incorporate into the text)

Subject

·         Education

·         Critical Discourse Analysis

·         Adult Literacy

Title of Project

·         Living Literacies, Teaching Literacy

Summary of Research

This collaborative project involves the University of Hull (UoH) in the UK and in Africa the University of Ghana (UG). - and / or some other Ghanaian University that offers education (UST)

The research aim is to investigate the discourses that adult educators registered on Diploma, MA and PhD programmes draw upon when conceptualising literacy as a pedagogic subject in order to explore their implications for practice.

There is an accepted orthodoxy amongst adult educators that effective pedagogy draws on the knowledge, practices, beliefs and expectations of adult learners. However, this stance does not always encompass the extent to which adult educators are a) able to critically reflect on the variance between their own notions of literacy and the theories and ideas presented to them during their course of study and b) equipped to use the qualitative methodologies that would enable them to explore their own and their learners’ literacy practices.

The project includes a broader strategy of knowledge transfer and capacity building across both Universities with a focus on curriculum development, e.learning and research methodologies.

Research Project

The proposed partnership involves staff and students based at two institutions: University of Hull (UoH) in the UK and in Africa the University of Ghana (UG). It envisages a mutual exchange of research expertise and capacity building.

Our aim is to investigate the discourses that adult educators registered on Diploma, MA and PhD programmes draw upon when conceptualising literacy as a pedagogic subject in order to explore the implications for their practice.

Three interrelated foci will identify and locate contrasting conceptualisations of literacy

·         Reflexive analysis of the literacy practices of participants – the aim here is through visual autobiography - to open the concept of literacy to critique as an ideologically defined construct  

·         Exploration of a local literacies based on a context defined by participants in which they pay close attention to the uses and significance of literacy in a specific community

·         Detailed observation of adult education encounters. Participants will develop their local literacies into a series of educational encounters and work with local providers in developing curriculum to embed the actual local uses of literacy into programme delivery

Research design and methodology

The initial reflexive analysis of the literacy practices of participants will take place in Ghana. Participants will be students registered across Diploma, Masters and PhD programmes.  Participants will produce visual autobiographical diaries tracing the development of a piece of work required for a programme on which they are registered. This aspect of the research draws on Bourdieu and Passmore to provide a reflexive account of students own literacy practices.  Through a series of peer interviews, video diaries, blogs and podcasts students, recording of naturally occurring data ie seminar discussions and analysis of assignments – participants will trace the production of a piece of writing from inception to completion including a feedback session in which they explore with lecturers and UoH practitioners the approach to the content and process of the assignment (Lillis). This module provides participants with a) material for the reflexive analysis of literacy as practice b) development of their own study skills c) a basis for developing writing for academic purposes of publication

This will be followed through with involving participants in a study of local literacies. Drawing on ethnographic research design the approach will include participant observation, audio visual recording, interviews and focus groups and document analysis.  This may involve small scale projects conducted by individual participants into any aspect of local literacy – trading encounters, travel and transport, dealing with officialdom. The approach would be to use the domains of practice identified by Barton and Hamilton and if necessary to extend or amend those to suit to local context.  Where possible participants will work with local adult education providers to conduct this study. The emphasis is on an exploration of out-of-school literacies. The data analysis will draw some tentative conclusion about these practices and then suggest what the implications of them might be for developing adult education curriculum.

The final phase of the project involves working directly with adult education projects. The emphasis will be the use of an observations schedule to detail what happens in an adult education encounter. Broadly addressing the question – where does adult education take place and what form does it take, and how is literacy embedded into this activity. Focussing on material used, style of delivery, assessment practices, use of text and the perceptions of teachers and student. The aim is to produce a series of case studies along the lines of those published by NRDC. This is not an exploration of good practice. It is the exploration of actual practice. Consistent for example with the approach of Kwesi (etc) how are text books actually used in classrooms.  The project will through this phase of the study develop examples of changed practices.  Participants will work with local providers to achieve curriculum change consistent with the actual uses of literacy identified in phase 2. The process and outcome of these changes for teachers and participants will then be analysed. 

Each of these projects will be led by an early career faculty member from either University of Ghana or University of Hull, as part of a research programme registered at UG. This may include action research in the vase of Diploma or MA students. A detailed credit bearing proposal, will be produced by each participant including specific research questions. Supervision will be a joint enterprise conducted by both Ghanaian and Uk based team through face-to-face meetings and on-line.

The broader context with which the study is situated – against a backdrop of development, changing conceptualisations of literacy and teacher education will be undertaken by a UK based academic. Critical discourse analysis will be applied to relevant material to emerge from monitoring reports based on progress towards targets for eradication if illiteracy, teacher education curricular documents and other official documents relating to adult literacy.

Curriculum Design in Pedagogic Research Methods

Etc etc to be cont’d

Deadline for entry onto British Academy e-gap
(we will need to obtain the approval of your Head of Faculty)

Feb 7^th                    

Notes forming basis of 1^st draft published to blog and Ghanaian partners invited to comment

Feb 14^th                                 

First draft of proposal sent to UoG,  PC for initial review

Fed 24^th                 

Research Conversation: second draft of proposal complete incorporating UoG , and PC 
contributions and passed to Professors B&C at University of 

Hull for initial review

Feb 28^th                

third draft sent to external readers for critical review and endorsement – Professor DB 

(if he agrees) or Professor AH at IoE or AK at Wolverhampton.

March 7^th               

Proposal redrafted in the light of feedback

March 14^th             

Final version sent to all involved for adjustment and comment