[Xmca-l] Re: Of Possible Interest to the XCMA/CHAT Family
Dr. Ana Marjanovic-Shane
anamshane@gmail.com
Sun Feb 28 13:49:07 PST 2016
Dear Sue,
I am looking forward to your feedback and critique.
Ana
> On Feb 28, 2016, at 4:00 PM, Susan Davis <s.davis@cqu.edu.au> wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>
> Thank you Larry, Helen and Ana for your comments.
>
> Helen - always lovely to find out who else is out there exploring the
> possibilities of working with the arts to bring about transformative
> learning and Larry I really like that proposition that in drama the
> premise begins with ‘I can’ and then moves to ‘I think’. That is very
> much the case with drama, and sometimes children/participants are very
> nervous or uncertain when they begin a drama process, often because they
> begin from a position of ‘I can’t’ but through the acts of doing they
> begin to see that they in fact can do and become.
>
> Ana I would agree with the first part of your statement about drama in
> education being used to help socialise students into socially recognised
> valuable practices and would think that was a good thing given research
> that shows reductions in empathy in young people in recent times. I have
> concerns with the rest of your proposition and the sweeping nature of the
> critique.
>
> A colleague and I have been preparing a short response to your article and
> I will check with him to see if he is happy for me to post it here.
>
> I would of course be happy to hear other ‘dialogue’ as well.
>
> Kind regards
>
> Sue
>
>
> On 29/02/2016 2:35 am, "Ana Marjanovic-Shane" <anamshane@gmail.com <mailto:anamshane@gmail.com>> wrote:
>
>> Dear all,
>>
>> Thanks for starting this thread about drama in education. I recently
>> published a paper that takes a critical stance toward Heathcote's drama in
>> education approach and other approaches to education that are based on
>> some form of drama, play and/or improv - *"Spoilsport" in Drama in
>> education vs dialogic pedagogy*.
>> To play a "spoilsport" myself, in this paper, I claim that Drama in
>> Education belongs to an educational paradigm that is mainly based on
>> socialization of students into the socially recognized valuable practices,
>> values and understanding of the world, which are heavily based on
>> agreement, collaboration and following of the authority, without students
>> having legitimate rights and a possibilities to critically disagree,
>> provide different points of view and question the existing social
>> practices, values and ways of understanding the world. In other words, in
>> this educational paradigm - students' disenssus, critical approach to
>> testing different ideas, views, desires, values, etc. is actively
>> suppressed, or at best limited, curbed and restricted.
>>
>> In the paper I provide a detailed analysis of (a part of) the same video
>> posted here earlier - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owKiUO99qrw. Below
>> is the abstract of my paper. If interested - you can get it at Dialogic
>> Pedagogy Journal website -
>> http://dpj.pitt.edu/ojs/index.php/dpj1/article/view/151
>>
>> So, what do you think?
>>
>> Ana
>>
>> ____ ____ ____ ____ ____
>> "Spoilsport" in Drama in education vs dialogic pedagogy
>> Abstract
>>
>> In this paper two educational paradigms that both attempt to overcome
>> alienation often experienced by students in the conventional education.
>> These two educational paradigms are embodied in different educational
>> practices: First, Drama in Education in its widest definition, is based on
>> the Vygotskian views that human cognitive, semantic (meaning-making), and
>> social-emotional development happens in or through play and/or
>> imagination,
>> thus within the imagined worlds. Second, Critical Ontological Dialogic
>> Pedagogy, is based in the Bakhtin inspired approach to critical dialogue
>> among the “consciousnesses of equal rights” (Bakhtin, 1999), where
>> education is assumed to be a practice of examination of the world, the
>> others and the self. I reveal implicit and explicit conceptual
>> similarities
>> and differences between these two educational paradigms regarding their
>> understanding the nature of learning; social values that they promote; the
>> group dynamics, social relationships and the position of learners’
>> subjectivity. I aim to uncover the role and legitimacy of the learners’
>> disagreement with the positions of others, their dissensus with the
>> educational events and settings, and the relationships of power within the
>> social organization of educational communities in these two diverse
>> educational approaches. I explore the legitimacy of dissensus in these two
>> educational approaches regarding both the participants’ critical
>> examination of the curriculum, and in regard to promoting the
>> participants’
>> agency and its transformations. In spite of important similarities between
>> the educational practices arranged by these two paradigms, the analysis of
>> their differences points to the paradigmatically opposing views on human
>> development, learning and education. Although both Drama in Education and
>> Dialogic Pedagogy claim to deeply, fully and ontologically engage the
>> learners in the process of education, they do it for different purposes
>> and
>> with diametrically opposite ways of treating the students and their
>> relationship to the world, each other and their own developing selves.
>>
>> <http://dpj.pitt.edu/ojs/index.php/dpj1/article/view/151 <http://dpj.pitt.edu/ojs/index.php/dpj1/article/view/151>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Fri, Feb 26, 2016 at 1:58 PM Larry Purss <lpscholar2@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> The central thematic therefore ;
>>> *making people care about things is the core of learning.
>>>
>>> This process of coming to care may be that consciousness is in the 1st
>>> place not a matter of *I think* but of *I can*
>>> I want to explore the phenomena of the *phantom limb* that occurs when a
>>> person who has lost an arm in actuality continues to feel pain in what
>>> is
>>> now a virtual limb which continues to be sensed [felt] as painful.
>>> Merleau-Ponty took this phenomena as a clear example of how phenomena
>>> becomes embodied or *endowed* in the experience of the person.
>>> The invention of a device called a *virtual reality box* was created by
>>> Ramachandran. The way *virtual* and *reality* are put in conjunction is
>>> significant. The 1st term occurs in the realm of the non-existent
>>> [virtual]
>>> the 2nd term in the realm of the actual [reality].
>>>
>>> In the virtual reality box a mirror is placed and the one actual arm is
>>> in
>>> the box. When the person looks into the box he *sees both arms* because
>>> the
>>> box creates a reverse symmetrical image. The person visually is
>>> presented
>>> with an embodied or endowed right and left arm.
>>> The person is then instructed to move the phantom left arm into the left
>>> side of the box and move the real right arm into the right side of the
>>> box.
>>> The patient looked down, saw two arms, and was able to move *both* arms
>>> at
>>> the same time.
>>> When this was done the person's *synesthetic* response embodied two
>>> normal
>>> arms. The absent arm became present virtually. The phantom limbs arm
>>> then
>>> is extinguished in that virtual arm, hence the phantom limb and its
>>> sensations were *extinguished*. This virtual reality box shows how
>>> consciousness is in the first place not a matter of *I think* but in the
>>> 1st place is a matter of *I can*.
>>>
>>> Shifting back to the virtual reality *stage* where drama is a process of
>>> *I can* I sense a similar process of the play of conjunction between the
>>> virtual PLACE/zone and the actual PLACE/zone.
>>> If learning is in the 1st place learning to care then this caring is in
>>> the 1st place endowing experience with *I can* prior to the experience
>>> of
>>> cognizing as *I think*.
>>> The place of the *speaking voice* as the *I can* process when in the
>>> presence of an audience is also meaningFULL [subject matter that
>>> matters]
>>> becoming endowed through learning [as coming to care for things as the
>>> subject matter that matters].
>>> I hope this reflection has some resonance with understanding knowing as
>>> occurring in the 1st place as an undergoing of an experience as a
>>> process
>>> occurring within virtual actual places.
>>>
>>>
>>> Sent from Mail for Windows 10
>>>
>>> From: Helen Grimmett
>>> Sent: Thursday, February 25, 2016 2:09 PM
>>> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
>>> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Of Possible Interest to the XCMA/CHAT Family
>>>
>>> Beautifully put Sue, and exactly why I believe infusion of the arts into
>>> the curriculum is so important. There is nothing quite like 'living' a
>>> concept for understanding it and feeling why it matters.
>>>
>>> This sometimes gets me into trouble with other arts educators who are
>>> adamant that each of the arts needs to be taught for its own sake and
>>> inherent value rather than 'reduced' to its utilitarian value of
>>> enhancing
>>> learning in other subjects. But I don't see why these are two mutually
>>> opposing positions. All children deserve access to quality arts
>>> education
>>> that teaches arts skills and processes, but surely the point of learning
>>> these skills is to put them to use in making life more meaningful. If
>>> the
>>> arts help make learning in other subject areas more meaningful then
>>> surely
>>> that helps strengthen the case for quality arts education rather than
>>> diminish it.
>>>
>>> Thanks for introducing me to another aspect of Heathcote's work too. I'm
>>> very familiar with Teacher-in-role and the Mantle of the Expert, but had
>>> never heard of 'Rolling Role'. I'm looking forward to reading the book!
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>> Helen
>>>
>>> --
>>> *Dr HELEN GRIMMETT *
>>> Lecturer in Primary and Early Years Education
>>> Professional Experience Liaison - Primary
>>>
>>> *Education*
>>> Monash University
>>> Room 159, Building 902, Berwick Campus
>>> 100 Clyde Road
>>> Berwick VIC 3806
>>> Australia
>>>
>>> T: +61 3 9904 7171
>>> E: helen.grimmett@monash.edu <name.surname@monash.edu>
>>> monash.edu
>>>
>>>
>>> The Practice of Teachers' Professional Development: A
>>> Cultural-Historical
>>> Approach
>>> <
>>>
>>> https://www.sensepublishers.com/catalogs/bookseries/professional-learning
>>> -1/the-practice-of-teachers-professional-development/
>>>>
>>> Helen Grimmett (2014) Sense Publishers
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 26 February 2016 at 06:51, Susan Davis <s.davis@cqu.edu.au> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Good questions and reflections Larry and David,
>>>>
>>>> Heathcote believed that through drama you could situate students
>>>> differently in relation to knowledge through them having an actual
>>>> ‘experience’ of it, in what she called ‘now’ time. So rather than
>>> being
>>>> told about ‘knowledge', or reading about it as something that happened
>>>> ‘over there’ to other people, it is about bringing the students into a
>>>> more immediate experience as they have to consider ‘what would I do in
>>>> this situation' . One way she suggests you can do that is by just
>>> moving
>>>> situations and events into the present tense… so if you are doing
>>> history
>>>> and examining a particular event you can set up a context and instead
>>> of
>>>> saying ‘they were’ you say ‘we are’, ‘I am’. It is in a way an
>>>> ontological and epistemological shift that is realised through
>>> practical
>>>> action and tasks, so children ‘experience’ knowledge through tasks and
>>>> action.
>>>>
>>>> She says of ‘now’ time:
>>>> . Things have to be made to matter;
>>>> . The task must feel important and worthwhile;
>>>> . There needs to be a valuable and perceivable outcome;
>>>> . People must enjoy power to influence and operate in the
>>> circumstances;
>>>> . Tasks must create feedback possibilities;
>>>> . Situation must feel reasonable and genuinely truthful;
>>>> . People must feel protected from feeling stared at; and
>>>> . The self-spectator must become alert and be registered. (Tape 9)
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> The skill of the teacher is in then exercising high selectivity in
>>>> arranging a multiplicity of signs and tools to establish the context
>>> and
>>>> curate the experience so that it activates interest and engagement.
>>> She
>>>> talks of finding the ’thread’ that they can take from their lives into
>>> the
>>>> dramatic (or historical) context… and that might be something very
>>> simple
>>>> - taking on role within a family group, putting on a name tag for a
>>> role,
>>>> putting a pencil behind your ear so later in the 'Victorian workroom'
>>> you
>>>> will be able to quickly retrieve it.
>>>>
>>>> In terms of learning that matters she really is concerned with having
>>>> children come to appreciate that learning matters, being deeply
>>> concerned
>>>> with things matters and that if you attend to things and can have an
>>>> ‘experience’ of knowledge, you will care about it and that learning
>>> will
>>>> stay with you. She was quite fond of a quote by Blake “he who would do
>>>> good to another must do so in minute particulars”.
>>>>
>>>> As I conclude in the book … Heathcote argued, school is an
>>> artificial
>>>> construct, with mandated curriculum requirements and expectations
>>> being
>>>> imposed from on high, so the engagement process is about making the
>>>> curriculum accessible and attractive for students so they can become
>>>> committed and involved enough to learn things that will ‘stick’ and
>>> make
>>> a
>>>> difference.
>>>> This is ultimately about enabling students to have experiences of
>>>> coming to care about things, and care about things that matter.
>>> Through
>>>> this engagement and commitment process Heathcote hoped that students
>>> would
>>>> understand that to achieve anything worthwhile you have to invest
>>> energy
>>>> and pay attention to details, that details matter. This type of
>>>> commitment is at
>>>> the core of meaningful learning: "Making people care about things is
>>> the
>>>> process of learning". (Tape 9)
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> I hope that helps!
>>>>
>>>> Cheers
>>>> Sue
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On 26/02/2016 12:46 am, "Lplarry" <lpscholar2@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> David, Susan,
>>>>> To ask "How do we get rid of the feeling that what we are doing is a
>>>>> *dummy run?*
>>>>> Answer: To realize what really *matters* that is experienced as a
>>>>> living matter.
>>>>> David suggesting this is not a question of *being* - focus on the
>>> word
>>>>> *is* but rather to focus on the word *knowing*.
>>>>> So how does the instructor come to *know* what actually is a subject
>>>>> matter that *really matters* in contrast to *dummy matters* that are
>>>>> actually *dead matters*.
>>>>> Questions: Is this meaning of *knowing* focusing on epistemology and
>>> the
>>>>> notion of *genetic epistemology?*
>>>>> Is knowing related to *signifying* and contrasted with what known as
>>>>> *signified*
>>>>> Susan contrasts acquiring *living* knowledge in contrast to *dead*
>>>>> formalized knowledge.
>>>>> David suggests instructors must *know* the difference.
>>>>> I am now wanting to hear more on how to move beyond developing "dummy
>>>>> knowledge and to create "places" -zones - in which life is lived
>>> within
>>>>> spaces of subject matters that really matter and make a real
>>> "difference".
>>>>> Larry
>>>>>
>>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>>> From: "Susan Davis" <s.davis@cqu.edu.au>
>>>>> Sent: 2016-02-24 3:34 AM
>>>>> To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
>>>>> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Of Possible Interest to the XCMA/CHAT Family
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks Robert,
>>>>> It’s great to have the book published as part of your series. The
>>> book
>>> is
>>>>> called “Learning that matters: Revitalising Heathcote’s Rolling Role
>>> for
>>>>> the digital age”.
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>> https://www.sensepublishers.com/catalogs/bookseries/imagination-and-praxi
>>> s
>>>>> /
>>>>> learning-that-matters/
>>>>>
>>>>> For those who haven’t heard of Heathcote before, she was a ‘master’
>>>>> teacher who achieved international recognition for her teaching
>>> practice
>>>>> in the 70s and 80s - in particular for pioneering processes such as
>>> Mantle
>>>>> of the Expert - which use role and fictional contexts to position
>>> children
>>>>> as ‘experts’ and active agents in investigative processes. She also
>>>>> invented this system called ‘Rolling Role’ which is a form of
>>>>> trans-disciplinary learning - where multiple classes work with the
>>> same
>>>>> common context, but from their particular frame or subject
>>> perspective.
>>>>> The beauty of it is that no one group ‘owns’ the outcome, but groups
>>>>> regularly ‘publish’ and share artefacts and outcomes throughout the
>>>>> process, with each group having to use and ‘roll’ the work of what
>>> has
>>>>> gone before. It was a system she believed was perfectly suited for
>>>>> revisiting in the digital age… so that is what the book hopes to
>>> assist
>>>>> with… the Vygotskian and CHAT work was very helpful in
>>> conceptualising
>>> and
>>>>> understanding this work.
>>>>>
>>>>> At times reading the work of Vygotsky and Heathcote it felt like they
>>>>> could have been writing about education today!
>>>>>
>>>>> Educational experience, no less than theoretical research,
>>>>> teaches us that, in practice, a straightforward learning of concepts
>>>>> always
>>>>> proves impossible and educationally fruitless. Usually, any teacher
>>>>> setting out
>>>>> on this road achieves nothing except a meaningless acquisition of
>>> words,
>>>>> mere
>>>>> verbalization in children, which is nothing more than simulation and
>>>>> imitation
>>>>> of corresponding concepts which, in reality, are concealing a vacuum.
>>> In
>>>>> such cases, the child assimilates not
>>>>> concepts but words, and he fills his memory more than his thinking.
>>> As a
>>>>> result, he ends up helpless in the face of any sensible attempt to
>>> apply
>>>>> any of
>>>>> this acquired knowledge. Essentially, this method of
>>> teaching/learning
>>>>> concepts, a purely scholastic and verbal method of teaching, which is
>>>>> condemned
>>>>> by everybody and which advocates the replacement of acquisition of
>>> living
>>>>> knowledge by the assimilation of dead and empty verbal schemes,
>>> represents
>>>>> the
>>>>> most basic failing in the field of education. (Vygotsky 1934/1994a,
>>> pp.
>>>>> 356-7)
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> So – getting rid of the dummy run. On the face of it you
>>>>> have a rather interesting paradox in drama, because it looks like
>>> drama
>>> is
>>>>> entirely artificial and that the whole thing would be a dummy run –
>>> we
>>> are
>>>>> only
>>>>> pretending actually. And we use words
>>>>> like pretend and play and in our culture it does suggest that it’s
>>>>> ephemeral
>>>>> and there’s no real work/life purpose for it…. So it seems to me we
>>> need
>>>>> to
>>>>> look and see what it is that makes something NOT feel like a dummy
>>> run…
>>>>> It seemed to me that one of the important aspects of not
>>>>> being a dummy run is that it matters now, we feel like its urgent
>>> now.
>>>>> (Heathcote 1993, Tape 9)
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Cheers
>>>>> Sue
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Dr Susan Davis
>>>>> Senior Lecturer | School of Education & the Arts | Higher Education
>>>>> Division
>>>>> CQUniversity Australia, Noosa Campus |
>>>>> PO Box 1128, Qld 4566
>>>>> P +61 (0)7 5440 7007 | X 547007 | M +61 400 000 000| E
>>> s.davis@cqu.edu.au
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On 24/02/2016 12:14 am, "Robert Lake" <boblake@georgiasouthern.edu>
>>>> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Susan Davis has published a book that weaves LSV, Dorothy Heathcote
>>> and
>>>>>> CHAT
>>>>>> into one seamless, present tense unfolding of "rolling role". If
>>> anyone
>>>>>> would like to write a review of it I can get you a copy. It has been
>>> five
>>>>>> years since Heathcote's passing and I suspect her work will become
>>> more
>>>>>> and
>>>>>> more important in this era of standardized everything.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> *Robert Lake*
>>>>>>
>>>>>> https://www.sensepublishers.com/media/2709-learning-that-matters.pdf
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> For a sense of the dynamic of Dorothy's pedagogy, scroll to about 5
>>>>>> minutes into this.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owKiUO99qrw
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>> --
>> *Ana Marjanovic-Shane*
>> Dialogic Pedagogy Journal editor (dpj.pitt.edu)
>> Associate Professor of Education
>> Chestnut Hill College
>> phone: 267-334-2905
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