Peter Woods

Researching the art of teaching : ethnography for educational use

Preface. Acknowledgements. Introduction: The Ethnographers Self 1. Teaching as Science and Art 2. The Promise of Symbolic Interaction 3. Seeing Into the Life of Things 4. Living and Researching a School Inspection 5. Collaborating in Historical Ethnography 6. Tools of the Trade: Extensions of the Ethnographers Self 7. Audiences and the Politics of Dissemination. References

Feeling Deprofessionalised: the social construction of emotions during an OFSTED inspection

Abstract In a qualitative study of a primary school, it was found that the technicist approach of an OFSTED inspection impacted against the holistic and humanistic values of the teachers, producing a high degree of trauma among them. This trauma was not a simple emotional response of the moment, nor was it a product of school failure or lack of leadership, for neither of these applied. It was, rather, socially and politically constructed. The teachers’ reactions have to be seen against the background of government reforms over the last decade. In this context, the particular emotions released suggest that the inspection examined here had a latent function of deprofessionalisation. Professional uncertainty was induced, with teachers experiencing confusion, anomie, anxiety and doubt about their competence. They also suffered an assault on their personal selves, closely associated among primary teachers with their professional roles. This took the form of mortification, dehumanisation, the loss of pedagogic ...

Conversations with Teachers: some aspects of life‐history method

Life histories have much to offer educational research. The paper seeks to illustrate, through a consideration of the central life‐history method of ‘conversations’, the possibilities for teacher involvement and for educational theory. A strong relationship between researcher and teacher, in which both identify with the research, is essential, and especial consideration, therefore, has to be given to the negotiation of access. Life histories have a strong affinity with ethnography, following many of the same principles, but they can enhance ethnography by adding historical and subjective depth. Accounts are validated through a variety of means, including alternative viewpoints and documentary evidence. The structure of a range of conversations is discussed, and the central techniques examined. Finally, analysis is traced from the initial distillation of material, through ‘secondary’ analysis to ‘formal theory’. Throughout, teacher and researcher work closely together, and the eventual ‘findings’ are a pro...

Critical Events in Education

From time to time, education is marked by critical events. In contrast to routine processes and any gradual cumulation of learning, these bring radical change in both pupils and teachers. They also have a confirmatory and preservation function in sustaining teachers’ beliefs, interests and commitment, and aiding strategic redefinition. They could have a wider influence through a ‘community of interactive professionals’. The critical events studied are marked by constructivist learning theory and relationships that generate distinct forms of communitas. They go through fairly well‐defined stages from initial conceptualisation to final celebration, with a rhythm of learning between structure and freedom developing. The conditions favourable to the occurrence of critical events include legitimation within the curriculum structure, a facilitative school ethos and, above all, a critical agent.

A research team in ethnography

There are signs that teams are becoming more popular in ethnographic research. New technology and, in the UK, the Research Assessment Exercise have facilitated the establishment and continuance of teams. In this paper, the authors discuss their experiences in one particular research team in recent years. Securing adequate funding has been the essential structural prerequisite. The authors distinguish among project, federated, and whole teams, depending on function and level of analysis. They consider team structure, approach, business, and processes, and the relationship between individual and team. Teamwork has enabled a wider and deeper coverage of work, a broader comparative base, and multiple researcher triangulation. The team provides a forum for the discussion of ethical issues, an immediate supportive reference group. It has opened up horizons, and promoted individual change and development. It has aided analysis and writing, and promoted clearer and more robust arguments. The article concludes with some caveats.

Choosing Positions: living the contradictions of OFSTED

Abstract A new system of schools’ inspection, under the ‘Office for Standards in Education’ (OFSTED), was set up in 1992. Nominally independent, it was appointed within the frame of the general restructuring of public institutions and of the governments marketization and managerialization of the education system in the late 1980s and early 1990s. As the operations of OFSTED bear directly on inspectors and teachers, it provides good opportunities to study the effects on them of restructuring and how they cope with the powers of the slate. The values behind the new reforms contrast sharply with the prevailing child‐centred discourse preferred by primary school teachers. Inspectors, in the actual execution of inspections, represented themselves as moderating their approach in a kind of humanistic managerialism which apparently goes some way to meeting the teachers’ position. However, this is not how the inspections were experienced by the teachers. They were conscious of a deep and damaging value clash in t...

Managing Marginality: Teacher Development through Grounded Life History.

Abstract In exploring an exceptional educational event in his school, a teacher had recourse to his life history. The event was the fullest expression in his teaching to date of his self, and to understand the event fully, it was necessary to see how that self had come into being, developed, resisted attack, been mortified, survived, and at times prospered. His philosophy of teaching was rooted in these childhood experiences, which he saw as starkly divided between the alienating world of formal schooling and a natural world of real learning. Critical incidents and degradation ceremonies marked those occasions when the two came into conflict. The sense of marginality that resulted has stayed with him throughout life, though it has had its moments of exquisite pleasure as well as intense pain. In managing his marginality, he has cultivated private places and a reference group of significant others who have supported and developed his preferred beliefs. But success in teaching is the main support. Finally, ...

Sociology, ethnography and teacher practice

Abstract It is argued that the increasing use of qualitative techniques, especially ethnography, in the study of education offers strong possibilities for bridging the traditional gaps between theory and research, on the one hand, and teacher practice on the other. Its potential lies in its ability to produce information that teachers value, its role as an aid to the appreciation of theory through its inductive processes, its practical importance, and its emphasis on the self, which helps give teachers a sense of control over their lives. In preservice teacher education, ethnography might be used chiefly to induce reflectiveness and to encourage observational skills. But it is in inservice education that it is likely to have most impact, for teachers are themselves, by this stage, ‘participant observers’. There are even greater opportunities in the rapid growth of joint enterprises between academics and teachers, such as the use of life histories, action research, and role sharing.

Educating all : multicultural perspectives in the primary school

Researching education for all becoming a pupil - the first term at school ruled out or rescued? the process of statementing becoming a junior - pupil development following transfer from infants into the middle years - transfer at nine plus learning through friendship pupil perceptions of religious and cultural diversity multicultural mathematics - a whole school approach living and growing - developing multicultural perspectives in a Church of England junior school.

Contemporary issues in teaching and learning

1. Introduction 2. Communities of learning and thinking, or a content by any other name A.L. Browne and J.C. Campoine 3. Physics in the primary school: peer interaction and the understanding of floating and sinking C. Howe and A. Tolmie 4. Learning from Jason M.J. Drummond 5. Integrating assessment with learning - a constructivist approach P. Murphy 6. Educational assessment: the myth of measurement P. Broadfoot 7. Responding to pressures: a study of four secondary schools S. Brown, S. Riddell and J. Duffield 8. The challenge of turning round ineffective schools J. Gray and B. Wilcox 9. The problem of good primary practice R. Alexander 10. A new professional discourse? Adjusting to managerialism P. Woods and R. Jeffrey 11. Schooling and the cultural production of masculinities M. Mac an Ghaill 12. Redefining black womanhood H. Mirza 13. Liberal education and the nature of knowledge P.H.Hirst