Paper presented at the British Educational Research Association Annual Conference, University of Glamorgan, 14-17 September 2005.
Paul Warmington, Harry Daniels, Anne Edwards, Steve Brown, Jane Leadbetter, Deirdre Martin, David Middleton, Sarah Parsons and Anna Popova
Abstract
The aim of the Learning in and for Interagency WorkingProject (LIW) is to examine and support professional learning in multiagency settings. Its principal focus is on current innovations in UK children’s services, wherein policy demands for ‘joined up’ provision stress the need for new, qualitatively different forms of practice, in which providers operate across traditional service and team boundaries. Consequently, professionals find themselves located in complex, vertiginous activity systems in which the objects of their collective practice are undergoing radical transformation. The LIW study has drawn upon activity theory to inform its intervention research with children’s services practitioners in local authorities. Its aim is to promote ‘expansive learning’: the creation of new knowledge and practices for the emergent activity of multiagency working. The intervention methodology draws upon the Developmental Work Research (DWR) cycle modelled by Engeström’s Finnish Learning for Life project. DWR cycles are organised around ‘Change Laboratory’ workshops, wherein evidence on professional concepts and practicesis scrutinised by researchers and practitioners; contradictions are surfaced and new ways of working proposed. This paper examines DWR workshops as an intervention tool, focusing upon their utilisation of ‘contradictions’ as the key mechanism for change and development. It considers DWR’s potential for embedding conceptual tools capable of expanding professionals’ thinking and practice by confronting ‘everyday’ concepts with ‘scientific’ concepts. It raises questions about the extent to which it is possible to develop intervention techniques in which researcher / user relationships are dialogic and collaborative, and in which practitioners are able to co-construct expansive, transformative learning.
Affiliations:
Dr Paul Warmington (University of Birmingham, UK) email:
Prof Harry Daniels (University of Bath, UK), Prof Anne Edwards(University of Birmingham, UK),
Dr Jane Leadbetter(University of Birmingham, UK), Dr Deirdre Martin (University of Birmingham, UK)
Dr Steve Brown(University of Loughborough, UK), Dr David Middleton (University of Loughborough, UK), Dr Sarah Parsons (University of Birmingham, UK), Ms Anna Popova (University of Bath, UK)
Surfacing contradictions: intervention workshops as change mechanisms in professional learningPaper presented to the British Educational Research Association Annual Conference, University of Glamorgan, 14th-17th September 2005.
Paul Warmington, Harry Daniels, Anne Edwards, Steve Brown, Jane Leadbetter, Deirdre Martin, David Middleton, Sarah Parsons and Anna Popova
Introduction
‘Instead of just benign achievement of mastery, development should be viewed as partially destructive rejection of the old; instead of just individual transformation, development should be viewed as collective transformation; instead of just vertical movement across levels, development should be viewed as horizontal movement across borders.’
(Engeström, 1999, p.4)
The Learning in and for Interagency Working Project is a four-year intervention study currently being conducted in Phase III of the Economic and Social Research Council’s Teaching and Learning Research Programme. The aim of the studyis to examine and support the professional learning needed to foster ‘joined up’, multiagency working among professionals supporting ‘at risk’ young people. Its activity theory derived researchis informed by three particular concerns: the identification of new professional practicescurrently emerging within multiagency settings;the creation of new knowledge that is rooted in reflective, systemic analysisand which can be leveredinto more effective multiagency working;the location of emergent multiagency practice within a coherent understanding of the historically changing character of organisational work and userengagement. Working with ‘children’s services’ professionals in local authority settings, the LIW team’s research interventions are directed at activity systems wherein professionals are learning to ‘do’ multiagency working. Its intervention methodology is a customisation of the Developmental Work Research (DWR) cycle modelled by Engeström’s Finnish Learning for Life project. Engeström (1999) describes DWR as:
‘a methodology for applying activity theory, specifically the theory of expansive learning, in the world of work, technology and organizations.’
DWR cycles are organised around workshops, wherein evidence on professional concepts and practicesis scrutinised by researchers and practitioners; contradictions in current working practices are surfaced and new ways of working proposed. Drawing upon data emerging from the LIW Project, this paper examines the potential of DWR workshops as intervention tools, focusing upon their utilisation of ‘contradictions’ as the key mechanism for promoting change and development, (particularly in relation to shifts in representations of practice). It outlines the relationship between cultural-historical activity theory, Engeström’s notions of expansive, transformative learning and the applications of these concepts that DWR proposes. It then considers the LIW interventions as small scale, potentially expansive learning cycles focusing upon remediation: that is, the embedding of new conceptual tools capable of expanding multiagency professionals’ thinking and practice by confronting ‘everyday’ concepts with ‘scientific’ concepts and by surfacing the contradictions implicit in current professional practices. The paper identifies some the shared conceptual tools that have emerged through dialogue between LIW’s researchers and local authority professionals and considers the possibilities and constraints inherent in its promotion of professional change through modestly scaled DWR interventions.
Activity Theory: contradictions and change
This paper offers only a bare summary of the historical development of activity theory itself, that having been detailed elsewhere, including Engeström (1987, 2001a), Roth (2005) and, in relation to the LIW Project, Warmington et al (2004a, 2005), Daniels et al (2005), Edwards (2005). In short, the origins of activity theory lie in Vygotsky’s (1978, 1986) framework for analysing relationships between human actions and cultural artefactsin order to dispense with the individual/social dualism and create a Marxist social psychology. Engeström (2001a) describes the advance represented by Vygotsky’s activity theory:
‘The insertion of cultural artifacts into human actions was revolutionary …the individual could no longer be understood without his or her cultural means; and the society could no longer be understood without the agency of individuals who use and produce artifacts…’ (Engeström, 2001a, p.134)
Engeström’s (1987, 2001a) ‘second generation’ of activity theory draws upon Leont’ev (1978). Engeström (1987) advocates the study of tools or artefacts ‘as integral and inseparable components of human functioning’ and argues that the focus of cultural-historical analysis should be on tool mediation, the relationship between tool creation and other components of the activity system. In order to progress the development of activity theory Engeström (1987) expanded the original triadic subject-tool-object conception of activity so as to enable dynamic examination of systems of activity at the level of the collectiveand the community, in preference to focusing on the individual actor or agent operating with tools. This expansion of the basic Vygotskian triad, as depicted in Engestrom’s (1987) ‘triangle of mediations’ represents the activity system as a social relationship through theincorporation of the elements of ‘community’, ‘rules’ and ‘division of labour’ and emphasis upon the importance of analysing interactions between the system’s entities (Figure 1). Crucially, Engeström’s model drawsupon Il’enkov (1977, 1982) to foreground contradictions within activity systems (within and between components) as the driving force of change and development.
Figure 1: second generation activity theory model (Engeström, 1987)
Insofar as they are change mechanisms, Engeström (2001a, p.135) underlines contradictions as ‘…a guiding principle of empirical research’. He proceeds to describe:
‘…the central role of contradictions as sources of change and development. Contradictions are not the same as problems or conflicts. Contradictions are historically accumulating structural tensions within and between activity systems …Contradictions generate disturbances and conflicts, but also innovate attempts to change the activity.’(Engeström, 2001a, p.137)
Engeström’s take on activity theory claims a concern with the process of social transformation and incorporates the structure of the social world, with particular emphasis upon the conflictual nature of social practices. Engeström (1999) views the ‘reflective appropriation of advanced models and tools’ as suggesting ‘ways out of internal contradictions’, providing the means to generate new, more culturally advanced activity systems. Instabilityand contradictions are regarded as the ‘motive force of change and development’ and the transitions and reorganisations within and between activity systems are viewed as an integral part of evolution. The third generation of activity theory outlined in Engeström (1987, 1999, 2001a, b) focuses upon interacting activity systems, rather than individual activity systems. Contradictions between activity systems, as well as within activity systems become the focus of systemic analysis.
Engeström (1987, 1999, 2001a) suggests that activity theory may be summarized with the help of five principles. The first of these is that a collective, artefact-mediated and object-oriented activity system, seen in its network relations to other activity systems, is taken as the prime unit of analysis. The second principle is the multi-voicedness of activity systems. An activity system is always a nexus of multiple points of view, traditions and interests. The division of labour in an activity creates different positions for the participants, the participants carry their own diverse histories and the activity system itself carries multiple layers and strands of history engraved in its artefacts, rules and conventions. This multi-voicedness increases exponentially in networks of interacting activity systems. It is a source of both tension and innovation, demanding actions of translation and negotiation. The third principle is historicity. Activity systems take shape and are transformed over lengthy periods of time. Their problems and potentials can only be understood against their own history. Activity systems need to be analysed in terms of the localised history of the activity, its objects and outcomes, and the genealogy of the conceptual tools that have shaped the activity over time.
The central role of contradictions as sources of change and development is the fourth principle. Engeström (1987, 1999, 2001a) defines contradictions as historically accumulating structural tensions within and between activity systems. Activities are open systems. When an activity system adopts a new element from the outside (for example, a new technology or a new object), it often leads to an aggravated secondary contradiction, where some old element collides with the new one. Such contradictions generate disturbances and conflicts but also drive attempts to change the activity. These definitions of contradictions will suffice temporarily as a basis for considering the potential of DWR as an application of activity theory in the study of professional learning in practice, although it should be noted that Roth (2005) and Warmington (2005) have argued the need for further critical examination of Engeström’s conceptualisation of ‘contradictions’. In particular, despite Engeström’s own distinction, there seems to be a tendency, in the literature on the practical applications of activity theory in work-related research to equate ‘contradictions’ per se simply with‘problems’ or ‘conflicts’ and, moreover to blur distinctions between logical contradictions and dialectical contradictions (Warmington, 2005).
The fifth principle proclaims the possibility of expansive transformations in activity systems. Activity systems move through relatively long cycles of qualitative transformations. As the contradictions of an activity system are aggravated, some individual participants begin to question and to deviate from its established norms. In some cases, this escalates into collaborative envisioning and a deliberate collective change effort. An expansive transformation is accomplished when the object and motive of the activity are reconceptualised to embrace a radically wider horizon of possibilities than in the previous mode of the activity. A full cycle of expansive transformation may be understood as a collective journey through what Vygotsky termed the zone of proximal development of the activity (Engestrom, 1897, 1999, 2001a). In his initial consideration of the potential for employing activity theory derived interventions as a mechanism for supporting and analysing expansive learning in organisations, Engeström (1987, 1999) identified the need for:
‘…an interventionist research methodology …which aims at pushing forward, mediating, recording and analyzing cycles of expansive learning in local activity systems.’ (Engeström, 1999, p.3)
Subsequently, Engeström (1999, 2001a/b, 2003, cf. Engestrom and Middleton, 1996) has evolved DWR as a form of ‘applied’ activity theory to be used in contextualist studies of work, to promote learning in practice.
Developmental Work Research: a mechanism for expansive learning
Figure 2: Cycle of expansive learning (source Engeström, 2001a)
Engeström (2001a) proposes DWR as a methodology for supporting and developing expansive learning. The notion of expansive learning offers a framework for understanding forms of learning that do not adhere to standard models of vertical ‘mastery’, in which a stable, defined body of knowledge and skills is acquired by individuals or organisations that then ascend through levels of increasing competence. Engeström (2001a) comments:
‘The problem is that much of the most intriguing kinds of learning in work organizations violates this presupposition. People and organizations are all the time learning something that is not stable, not even defined or understood ahead of time. In important transformations of our personal lives and organizational practices, we must learn new forms of activity which are not there yet.’ (Engeström, 2001a, p.138, italics added)
DWR has been developed as a framework for promoting new knowledge creation: a framework in which learning is conterminous with the creation of new forms of activity, in which activities are learned as they are created. The Learning in and for Interagency WorkingLIW Project (LIW) has drawn upon DWR methodology to study and develop models of professional learning in local authority settings, wherein children’s services provision is, in the wake of the Every Child Matters Green Paper (2003) and the subsequent Children Act(2004), being nationally and locally reconfigured. Policy demands for ‘joined up’ provision stress the need for new, qualitatively different forms of practice, in which providers operate across traditional service and team boundaries. Consequently, professionals find themselves located in complex, vertiginous activity systems in which the objects of their collective practice are undergoing radical transformation and which professional knowledge forms are unstable.
Engeström (1999, 2001a) defines the cycle of expansive learning as beginning with the ‘germ cell’ of individuals questioning embedded workplace practices and progressing through stepwise transformations in collaborative practice into a new form of practice. Building upon the principle of expansive, collective transformation, DWR promotes the questioning of contradictions in existing practice in order to germinate expansive learning or, as it is frequently termed, ‘radical exploration’:
‘Radical exploration is learning what is not yetthere. It is creation of new knowledge and new practices for a newly emerging activity, that is, learning embedded in and constitutive of a qualitative transformation of the entire activity system.’ (Engeström, 2004, p.4)
While this definition emphasises expansive learning as a forward-orientated learning action, Engeström (2004, p.4) stresses that expansive learning is also ‘intertwined with horizontal or sideways movement across competing or complementary domains and activity systems’.
Down (undated; cf. Engeström, 2001a) relates the notion of expansive learning to Bateson’s (1972) theory of learning ‘levels’. Bateson (1972) distinguishes between three levels of learning(Figure 3). Level 1 learning includes the processes that are routinely referred to in everyday settings as ‘learning’: that is, generalisation from basic experiences, leading to understanding of appropriate behaviour in specific contexts. Level 1 learning is compatible even with behavioural views, as well as with cycles of experiential learning. Level 2 learning contextualises and develops strategies for maximising Level 1 learning through the extraction of implicit, deep-seated rules (including variations and exceptions to Level 1 ‘rules’). Thus if Level 1 is seen in terms of mastery of the curriculum, Level 2 learning equates with gaining a grasp of the hidden curriculum. Level 3 learning contextualises Level 2learning, through radical questioning of the meaning of behaviour and context. As such, it offers opportunities for reconceptualisation, change and development. Therefore, expansive learning can be seen as developing from Level 3 learning, in that it actively and collectively develops new patterns of activity.
Mode / Description / ExampleLevel 1 / conditioning through the acquisition of responses deemed correct within a given context / learning the correct answers and behaviours in a classroom
Level 2 / acquisition of the deep-seated rules and patterns of behaviour characteristic to the context itself / learning the “hidden" curriculum of what it means to be a student
Level 3 / radical questioning of the sense and meaning of the context and the construction of a wider alternative context / learning leading to change in organisational practices
Figure 3: Bateson’s levels of learning (source: Down, undated)
The aim of the LIW project is to develop conceptual tools to understand dialogue, multiple perspectives and networks of interacting activity systems in multiagency settings. In its study of professional learning in interagency settings the LIW project has taken new knowledge creation as its focus: the new professional practices emerging in multiagency children’s services provision. Expansive learning implies a capacity to interpret and expand the definition of the object of activity in ways that produce culturally new patterns of activity. Standard theories of learning fail to explain how new forms of practice are created and organisations transformed. A key element of the LIW study is its concern with the capacity of professionals working in multiagency settings to recognise and engage with distributed expertise in complex work places, in settings in which professional identities, values and boundaries are often rendered unstable. Equally, the research is concerned with expansive learning among service users, as they develop their interpretations of and actions in their worlds, in the course of their interactions with services and providers.
Learning in and for multiagency working
The notion of ‘multiagency’ or ‘joined up’ working pervades contemporary UK social policy. In the wake of 2003’s Every Child Matters Green Paper and 2004’s Children Act multiagency working has been characterised as the driver of social inclusion. Effective collaboration across education, social services, health services, mental health services and criminal justice has been depicted as essential to supporting young people and families who are ‘at risk’ of social exclusion. However, minimal attention has been paid to conceptualising the forms of professional learning required to expand interagency practice. Moreover, advocation of joined up working is rarely informed by coherent theories of work or by systematic understanding of the historically changing character of organisational work and service provision. In short, while interagency collaboration has acquired totemic status within current UK social policy, much policy and strategic literature implies models of working that no longer match the landscape of emerging practice. Consequently, professional boundaries between agencies, expressed in disparate goals, perspectives and priorities, have often impeded interagency working (cf. Brown et al, 2000; Webb and Vulliamy, 2001; Riddell and Tett, 2001); Trevillion and Bedford, 2003). At policy level ‘joined up’ working is promoted as a ‘self-evident good’ but strategy and operation both remain problematic.