Hi Dan and Joan
This is a very good question that you ask, Dan. When I ran an action
research course in my role as staff developer at a local polytechnic
some years back, my participants had the same type of question. "Does
the work that we'd normally engage in as reflective practitioners now
have to get ethics approval, because we're doing it formally in a course
that's called 'action research'?" The institution, to resolve the need
to avoid having the ethics committee getting bogged down in lots of
small, practitioner-based research projects, decided the issue by
requiring staff to submit their proposal to their Head of Department,
who in turn decided whether it was sufficiently different to 'normal
practice' to require ethics approval.
I'll be interested to hear what Joan says. Meanwhile, Joan, I have
forwarded your essay to a nursing lecturer who's just completed the
first reflective task of a course called Postgraduate Certificate in
Tertiary Teaching, as I know she will find it really valuable to know
that the kinds of questions she investigated in her task are being
replicated elsewhere in the world. Are you okay about her citing this
work in her next task, if she finds it relevant? Thanks so much for the
sharing.
Warm regards
Pip Bruce Ferguson (teaching developer, New Zealand)
On 13/06/2010 3:04 a.m., Dan Woodrow wrote:
> Hello Joan,
> I enjoyed reading your essay and I was so impressed with the
> thoughtful student comments. You must feel proud of their adoption of
> a teaching and learning approach that was probably very foreign to
> them. I look forward to reading the article one day.
>
> The research you have done reminds me of our own nursing program
> curriculum where we actively promote a community of learning and later
> a community of practice for our students. I am always excited when
> our teachers and learners co-construct the curriculum and come from a
> place of unknowing. There seems to be so much more learning which
> occurs on the part of the student and the teacher.
>
> As I am new to Living Theory (which I think I might live through may
> daily reflective practice as a practitioner and teacher) could you
> help me understand the separation between program evaluation and
> evaluative research.
> For instance did your institutional ethics committee consider a
> research proposal or would this be considered program evaluation
>
> Thanks again for the article which reinforces my own beliefs about
> teaching and learning.
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Joan Walton <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Friday, June 11, 2010 4:58 am
> Subject: Re: living theory research
> To: [log in to unmask]
>
> > Hi Juin Ee,
> >
> > I have not long completed an essay on taking a living
> > theory approach to my
> > teaching of a group of second year undergraduate
> > students. I sent it off
> > list to Brendan and Geisha, but as there seem to be a number of
> > people with
> > similar queries, you and others may also find it useful.
> >
> > Best wishes,
> >
> > Joan
> >
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