Hi Carrie!! We met at the last AERA meeting -- we were in the same
workshop!. Great to see you on the list.
It could be that improvisation makes everyone equal -- because nobody
knows what will develop next -- so nobody can be "wiser". And being
equal is probably the first condition to not only listening but also to
being listened to??
What do you think??
Ana
lobman@rci.rutgers.edu wrote:
>I am new to the list--allow me to introduce myself, my name is Carrie
>Lobman and I am a professor of early childhood education at Rutgers
>University.
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>I am writing in response to Willow's questions about the use of the arts
>in educational research and teacher professional development. My
>research focuses on performance and improvisation as untapped resources
>for teachers and teacher educators. I have found that when teachers are
>given training in improvisation they develop as leaders in the
>classroom and it opens them up to more creative and collective ways of
>interacting with children. I believe this is because improvisation
>reconnects adults to an ability we all had as children--the ability to
>be other than who we are and to create collectively with other people
>without being overdetermined by the end product. I've recently concluded
>a pilot study where I provided improvisational training to preschool
>teachers and then studied the effects on their teaching. While I am
>still analyzing the videotaped observations from the workshops and the
>classrooms the strongest initial result had to do with how the teachers
>understood what it meant to listen to children. The improvisation
>training pushed them to see listening and responding as a building
>activity where you are collectively creating the conversation with the
>children rather than trying to "make a point" or even provide a learning
>moment. Its been a very interesting project.
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