Huxtable, M.
Educational Journal of Living Theories x(y): nx-ny, http://ejolts.net/drupal/node/xy
Huxtable, M.
Volume x(y): nx-ny
www.ejolts.net
ISSN 2009-1788
Educational Journal of Living Theories
Integrating personal, political, and professional educational practice that gives meaning and purpose to my life and work
Marie Huxtable
Educational Journal of Living Theories x(y): nx-ny, http://ejolts.net/drupal/node/xy
Huxtable, M.
Educational Journal of Living Theories x(y): nx-ny, http://ejolts.net/drupal/node/xy
Huxtable, M.
Marie Huxtable
University of Cumbria, UK.
Copyright: © 2016 Huxtable.
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License, which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
This paper shows Living Theory research as a form of research that enables me to recognize and research the integration of my personal, professional, and political educational practice to improve and so live a loving life that is satisfying, productive and worthwhile.
Changes in policy and practice in 2012 demanded by central government meant my field of practice had to change. My concerns however, were, and still are: that practice, theory and research often appear to lose connection with the educational purpose of education; theory and practice appear to be developed independently, and without explanation or evaluation related to educational values; educational practitioners appear to practice in discrete worlds, each vying to exert their hegemony over the development of educational theory, practice and provision. In this paper I show how, by continuing to research as a Living Theory researcher (Whitehead, 1989), I am addressing those concerns as I try to improve what I am doing to realise my values in action and integrate personal, professional and political educational practice that gives meaning and purpose to my work and life. I describe and explain my developing understanding of Living Theory research as a multidimensional and relationally dynamic collaborative form of research, where collaboration is an expression of embodied meanings of ‘i am because we are’ together with ‘we are because i am’, represented as i~we~i.
Keywords: Living Theory research; living-educational-theory; collaboration; praxis; multidimensional relationally dynamic.
Educational Journal of Living Theories x(y): nx-ny, http://ejolts.net/drupal/node/xy
Huxtable, M.
Introduction
I began by observing that you cannot find out what a man means by simply studying his spoken or written statements, even though he has spoken or written with perfect command of language and perfectly truthful intention. In order to find out his meaning you must also know what the question was (a question in his own mind, and presumed by him to be in yours) to which the thing he has said or written was meant as an answer. (Collingwood 1991, p.31)
The question in my mind that has given rise to this paper is, How can I contribute to the flourishing of humanity as I live a loving life that is satisfying, productive and worthwhile?
The question has arisen and evolved from my doctoral research. In 2012 I successfully submitted my doctoral thesis (Huxtable, 2012), created in the process of researching my practice to improve it. My practice was that of a senior educational psychologist, responsible for implementing an inclusive local authority policy on high ability learning. The work was named APEX (ALL are Able Pupils EXtending Opportunities). (Details accessible from http://www.actionresearch.net/writings/apex/livinglegacies2012.pdf.) I had responsibility for developing educational provision that would enhance each child’s and young persons’ abilities to learn to live loving, satisfying, productive and worthwhile lives, for themselves and others. The educational provision to which I refer included developing a programme of: workshops for children and young people; collaborative learning opportunities for them and their teachers; and conferences, workshops and a professional Masters as in-service professional development for teachers and teaching assistants.
As I researched my practice as a professional educational practitioner to improve it, I clarified my ontological values of a loving recognition, respectful connectedness and educational responsibility, and social values of an inclusive, emancipating and egalitarian society, as they emerged within living boundaries through the evolution of my living-theory praxis (Huxtable, 2012). I continue to draw on the following original ideas I developed through my doctoral research:
· Living Educational Theory praxis, highlighting the fundamental importance of educators creating ‘values-based explanation of their educational influences in learning’ (Whitehead, 1989), as they research to develop praxis within living-boundaries.
· Living-boundaries as co-creative space within which energy-flowing values can be clarified and communicated.
· Inclusive gifted and talented education developed from an educational perspective, which enables each learner to develop and offer talents, expertise and knowledge as life-affirming and life-enhancing gifts. The knowledge is that created of the world, of self, and self in and of the world.
· Living-Theory TASC, a relationally-dynamic and multidimensional approach to research and developing praxis, which integrates Living Theory research (Whitehead, 1989) with Thinking Actively in a Social Context (TASC) (Wallace & Adams, 1993). (TASC is a form of Action Research used internationally by learners of all ages.)
Changes in policy and practice demanded by central government meant my employment with the local authority was terminated in 2012. Since then my fields of practice have changed but my concerns have not. My concerns were and are that practice, theory and research often appear to lose connection with the educational purpose of education, theory and practice appear to be developed independently without explanation or evaluation related to educational values, and educational practitioners appear to practice in discrete worlds each vying to exert their hegemony over the development of educational theory, practice and provision.
Since the termination of my paid employment I have employed myself in new fields of practice and continue to research as a Living Theory researcher (Whitehead, 2008) and learn from and with members of an ever-expanding Living Theory community. You can get a sense of the diversity of fields of practice and cultural contexts the Living Theory community embraces by visiting the homepage of the living-posters (Figure 1). You can also access my own poster from the homepage, which provides a visual overview of some of my current practice and connections and indicates some of the people with whom I collaborate. The three-minute video provides a brief introduction to me.
Figure 1. Living-posters home page – access from http://www.actionresearch.net/writings/posters/homepage061115.pdf
I continue to engage in Living Theory research as this enables me to address my concerns by developing and integrating personal, professional and political educational practice that gives meaning and purpose to my work and life. This account is in the form of a multimedia narrative to communicate my meanings of a multidimensional and relationally-dynamic understanding of collaboration and educational practice. This understanding is an expression of meanings of ‘i am because we are’ and ‘we are because i am’, represented as i~we~i (Huxtable & Whitehead, 2016).
The rest of the paper is organized as follows:
· My developing understanding of Living Theory research and addressing some confusions and criticisms.
· Living Theory research as an integration of personal, professional, political educational practice.
· Conclusion
Clarifying my understanding of Living Theory research and living-theory.
Living Theory research (Living Educational Theory research), and living-theory (living-educational-theory)
Thanks to the ambiguity of the English language ‘living theory’ can be understood to have different meanings and it is this that has led to confusion and misunderstanding, exemplified by this extract from McNiff’s (2013) recent writings:
… Whitehead has aimed to develop a form of theory different from traditional propositional forms... he calls this 'living theory'. I have always seen the term as a verb more than noun — i.e. theory is something you do and live (not an unusual idea in the literatures; see also Chomsky's idea of 'I-theories' below) — and I have actively supported it, from my perspective that practitioners live their own theories of practice through the way they conduct the practiceand explain how they do so. If 'theory' is about offering descriptions and explanation for a practice, practitioners' explanations for how and why they practise as they do constitute their personal theories of practice, and these theories are dynamic, living and transformational. My support for the idea evenextended to my writing a book and putting Jack's name as first author to honour his contributions to the field, although the book you are reading moves beyond the ideas explored there.
However, I have become increasingly concerned that the original idea of 'livingtheory' (as a practical form of action) seems to have become reified into 'LivingTheory' (as a proper noun denoting a movement). This change can be confusing for practitioners. A teacher once asked me at a workshop, What is the difference between"living theory" and "action research"?' (this may have been 'Living Theory'). The idea of 'Living Theory' as a reified objectpresents the theory as something separate from the practice. Once again, 'theory' becomes an object of study rather than a living practice, and the reification of theterm potentially denies the very principles and valuesthat inspired it. So since about 2010 1 have distanced myself from this form of language.
Since the 1970s Whitehead has aimed to have this form of theory legitimated by the Academy, so the focus of the work has now shifted from legitimation for the form of theory to securing influence at world level. (p.65)
McNiff talks of ‘living theory’ simply as a theory that is living, living in the sense of evolving. Living theory can also be taken to mean people are doing the living and they are living a theory as a form of practice. What she does not refer to is ‘living-theory’ as a term Whitehead (1989) coined to mean a valid values-based explanation created by a practitioner-researcher of their educational influence in their own learning, the learning of others and the learning of the social formations they live and work in. All living-theories are living, that is evolving. All living-theories are lived, that is the individual is trying to give as full expression as they can to their life-affirming and life-enhancing values as they live and work, recognizing and resolving contradictions as far as they can. However, not all living theories are living-theories!
I have used a hyphen to clearly identify living-theory and upper case to identify Living Theory research as nouns with an explicit meaning given to them by Whitehead (1989). (I will clarify what I understand by these nouns later.) McNiff does not refer to living-theory or Living Theory research and so does not go beyond it as she claims here. Living Theory research, far from separating theory, action, practice and values, brings them together to form generative and transformational praxis with a moral intent. I began to address this in my thesis in 2012 and will leave further discussion for another paper. I do agree with McNiff that Living Theory research is in the process of becoming a movement and Whitehead’s focus has shifted from enabling living-theories to be legitimated by the Academy to also securing influence of Living Theory research at world level to enhance the contribution it can make to the flourishing of humanity.
Noffke (1997) offers a different criticism of Living Theory research on the grounds that it is self-study research and:
‘The process of personal transformation through the examination of practice and self-reflection may be a necessary part of social change, especially in education; it is however, not sufficient.’ (p. 329)
In Living Theory research the generative and transformational educational influence a person has on others and on social formations, through their way of being, is recognized as far more complex than Noffke suggests. In Living Theory research there is an explicit recognition of the influence of the individual in and on the collective. Fowler and Christakis (2008,) working in a different field, refer to this in their paper, ‘Dynamic spread of happiness in a large social network’:
More generally, conceptions of health and concerns for the well- being of both individuals and populations are increasingly broadening to include diverse "quality of life" attributes, including happiness. Most important from our perspective is the recognition that people are embedded in social networks and that the health and well-being of one person affects the health and well-being of others. This fundamental fact of existence provides a conceptual justification for the specialty of public health. Human happiness is not merely the province of isolated individuals. (p.8)
Many living-educational-theories, as well as mine, include explanations of educational influence in the learning of socio-cultural formations and answer Noffke’s criticism by contributing to the development of personal, professional and political practice. This claim is supported by many living-theory theses such as the latest of Sadruddin Bahadur Qutoshi, Creating Living-Educational-Theory: A Journey Towards Transformative Teacher Education In Pakistan, accredited by Kathmandu University, Nepal, 2016. (Qutoshi, 2016). There are many others, some of which can be found on http://www.actionresearch.net/living/living.shtml.
To be sure we are sharing an understanding of Living Theory research (Living Educational Theory research) and living-theory (living-educational-theory) I will clarify my understandings of both.
I use capitals to distinguish Living Educational Theory research (often shortened to Living Theory research) from an individual’s living-educational-theory (often shortened to living-theory).
Living Theory research offers a distinct educational paradigm, approach and methodology for self-study, educational practitioner-researchers who want to contribute to the growth of an educational knowledge base. Whitehead (1980) distinguishes between education and educational research and knowledge with respect to the disciplines like Pring (2000), but goes further than Pring to distinguish what is educational research and knowledge by reference to the nature of values and the theory generated. The values referred to are life-affirming and life-enhancing, and a ‘better source of motivation for engaging in bigger-than-self problems than other values’ (Crompton, 2010, p.9).
In Living Theory research ontological and social values are those give an individual’s life meaning and purpose and carry hope for the flourishing of humanity. Beliefs are what I believe to be true. Values and beliefs are often aligned but not always. For instance, I have been aware of the tensions created by the ‘nature nurture’ argument amongst psychologists and its implication for the educational system since I embarked on my first degree in psychology. I realized then that while some were making claims (and still do) about the relationship between race and intelligence there was nothing that would persuade me of the rightness of their argument, which provides the underpinning of the eugenics movement.