Complicity: An International Journal of Complexity and Education
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Complexity, pedagogy, play: On using technology within emergent learning structures with young learners
No full textThis article presents and describes how we have used notions and structures informed by complexity thinking to shape new descriptions and approaches to understanding “new literacy” practices with young learners. Using data from two studies: a two year project working with kindergarten children using drama and digital tools to develop narrative, and the other an observational study of preschooler’s multiliteracy practices occurring in their home settings, we explore how notions from complexity can offer innovative frames for teaching and learning and options for thinking about pedagogy differently. Our classroom and home observations of children’s developing digital literacy practices suggest that using complexity-informed approaches to technology can include both theoretical orientation and practical possibilities for organizing classroom learning structures
A complexity approach to investigating the effectiveness of an intervention for lower grade teachers on teaching science
No full textThis article describes the effectiveness and sustainability of teacher professional development interventions from a complexity view point as well as a more ‘standard’ viewpoint. The first aim of this study is to give a theoretical overview of effective aspects of interventions regarding teachers’ professionalizing using recent literature. The second aim is to re-interpret effectiveness and effectiveness studies using a complexity approach. The third aim is to empirically illustrate a complexity approach to the effectiveness of interventions using a multiple case studyWe have described intervention specific aspects, teacher specific aspects, context specific aspects and implementation specific aspects and have shown in the cases that during an intervention these aspects intertwine and act as a complex dynamic system.The complexity approach to interventions has implications for future empirical research as well as for the design of interventions. In future research, results of small scale and large scale research should be combined, in order to obtain a better insight in all relevant aspects and their effect on teachers’ behavior. Research ought to concentrate on the effects that all contextual aspects have intertwiningly in order to design more effective interventions and with better implementation processes.
…working with (a) rhizoanalysis…and…working (with) a rhizoanalysis…
No full textIn this conversation rhizoanalysis is introduced as a way of processing through an assemblage involving research methodology, generation of data and analytical possibilities entwined within. As a research methodology, rhizomethodology (Author, 2009) is a way of putting the Deleuzo-Guattarian philosophical imaginary of rhizome (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987) to work; it is a way of working (with) data, complexly. With/in/alongside this methodological approach, the rhizoanalysis becomes the inquiry of the research, happening throughout the whole research process. The analysis is not a constant thing relegated to a place of its own, rather, the rhizoanalysis as ‘some of rhizome’ (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, p. 9) happens throughout. With/in/through processes of thinking rhizome in flux, working rhizome (im)provis(at)ionally is an ongoing experiment with and exploration of my own thinking. Rhizoanalysis (dis)continuously (e)merges with/in/through every dimension of the thinking, ebbing and flowing with/in/through matters of always already becoming so that writing (about) rhizoanalysis is also affected by writing (the) methodology and doing (the) rhizoanalysis; nothing was/is separate or linear in the thinking or writing up~down of the research project drawn on here. Rather, there was/is an ongoing intermingling of data, methodology and analysis with theorising the literature and practicing the theory, each becoming the other(s)
When Time Makes a Difference: Addressing Ergodicity and Complexity in Education
No full textThe detection of complexity in behavioral outcomes often requires an estimation of their variability over a prolonged time spectrum to assess processes of stability and transformation. Conventional scholarship typically relies on snapshots to analyze those outcomes, assuming that group means and their associated standard deviations, computed across individuals, are sufficient to characterize the educational outcomes that inform policy, and that time does not matter in this context. In its statistically abstract form, the assumption that you can rely on snapshots is referred to as the ergodicity assumption. This paper argues that ergodicity cannot be taken for granted in educational data. The first section discusses artificially generated time series trajectories to illustrate ergodicity (white noise) and three types of non-ergodicity: short-term correlations between observations, long-term correlations (pink noise) and infinite correlations (Brownian motion). A second section presents daily attendance data observed in two urban high schools over a seven year period to show that these data are non-ergodic and suggest complexity. These findings offer a counter-example to the efficacy of using time-independent measures (‘snapshots’) to measure educational outcomes
A review of Systems Theory for Pragmatic Schooling: Toward Principles of Democratic Education
No full textEarly childhood educators’ experiences in their work environments: Shaping (im)possible ways of being an educator?
No full textEfforts to support early childhood workforce stability over many years, and across many national contexts have had limited success. Research and policy attention appears to be shifting to ways of supporting the sustainability of the early childhood workforce, and, ways that educators’ experiences in their work environments might be implicated in these issues. The purpose of this paper is to explore the complex interrelations between educators’ work environments and their experiences, as an entryway for thinking differently about workforce sustainability. A rhizoanalytic approach is used to explore one educator’s experiences in her work environment, through readings of visual, textual and affective data. The readings of (im)possible ways of being an educator shaped by this work environment, are then used as prompts for thinking differently about workforce stability and sustainability. The paper concludes with calls for an approach to supporting workforce stability and sustainability, that is based on the recognition of the interrelatedness and mutual interests of children, educators, families and governments
