Hi Diane,
Thanks for those reflective questions and that reference on Schon's book!
Yes, you're right at this poing I'm operating within Argyris and Schon's field of studies (at least as far as professional development is concerned) mainly because a key issue in my research design will be that individual engagement in meaningful professional development activities is also important for sustainable organisational development (and the ability of both teachers and the school as a whole to keep up with a continuous pace of change demands).
In the case of the dyad mentor-mentee I use the term ''meaningful'' as I will need to find out whether they think their engagement in mentoring had a positive influence on their professional learning and practice and/or had a positive influence on good practice. I'm thinking the ideas that the mentor and mentee hold of ''what consistutes good practice'' and ''how this is developed'' as their key values-in-use but what it important for me is their openness to challenge those values & paths they take to change them (as a cornerstone for dooble loop learning-organisational learning).
I'm sure your reflective questions will help me think of clever ''probes'' & strategies in my interview design. With regards to the enthousiasm and dedication with which they engage into mentoring, I believe that various motivational factors come into play that may be or may not be necessarily related to specific values held.
Regards,
Maria
--- On Sat, 13/3/10, Dianne Allen <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
From: Dianne Allen <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: mentoring and personality? and working with 'values-in-use'
To: [log in to unmask]
Date: Saturday, 13 March, 2010, 0:44
#yiv839866851 {font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;font-size:12px;}Maria,
Good question/s .. and signs of a possible and fruitful research topic ..
One thing worth thinking about is how you are using the term 'value' and what I have in mind with the term 'values-in-use'. They are related. And they are related to 'evaluation'. But there are also important differences and distinctions. (And an aside: value and worth are related; and worth and worship are related.)
Can their enthusiasm or dedication be an indicator of the value of their engagement in mentoring for their professional development?
Why not? What other explanation might you give, if it was not indicating 'value'?
Do I think that in-service mentoring programs can be valuable to trigger double-loop learning and could we explore this by interviewing both members of the dyad?
I understand 'double-loop learning' in the terms that Argyris and Schon use it, and you will see that my thesis relies heavily on Argyris and Schon's work, for my theorising.
And you have a double-barrelled question here, something to watch out for when designing interview questions.
Do I think that in-service mentoring programs can be valuable to
trigger double-loop learning?
Why not? What other explanation might you give if double-loop learning does not happen?
Could we explore this by interviewing
both members of the dyad?
Why not? What might be the risks?
You note one: "I'm slightly troubled about that because both the mentor and the mentee
in this case are part of the same work-environment (compared to
mentoring that may take place
away of the specific work-environment)and that may increase their
blindness towards their values-in-action"
What other risks are there?
How might you manage those risks?
How might you seek to address the issue of the 'same work-environment increasing their blindness towards their values-in-action', as you investigate it?
Note: at this point I do understand you to be operating very clearly within Argyris & Schon's field of studies.
And at this point Schon's discussion of methodological issues associated with reflective practice, found in the concluding chapter of Schon, D. A. (Ed.). (1991). The Reflective Turn: Case Studies in and on educational practice. New York: Teachers College Press..
Regards,
Dianne Allen
On Sat 13/03/10 8:21 AM , mariaarmaou [log in to unmask] sent:
Hi Dianne and all,
This is a very interesting dicussion. Great resource indeed! My quick question regards the way that mentoring sessions are perceived by each member of the dyad seperately and their further engagement (or dedication, enthousiasm) in mentoring and further professional development.
Can their enthousiasm or dedication be an indicator of the value of their engagement in mentoring for their professioanl development?
Also, do you think that in-service mentoring programs can be valuable to trigger double-loop learning and could we explore this by interviewing both members of the dyad (in some form of intensive interviewing at different time points for example?).
I'm slightly troubled about that because both the mentor and the mentee in this case are part of the same work-environment (compared to mentoring that may take place
away of the specific work-environment)and that may increase their blindness towards their values-in-action
Regards,
Maria
--- On Fri, 12/3/10, Dianne Allen wrote:
From: Dianne Allen
Subject: Re: mentoring and personality? and working with 'values-in-use'
To: [log in to unmask]
Date: Friday, 12 March, 2010, 20:55
Sarah, Jean and all,
A couple of elaborating comments Sarah
...
1. working with both sides of the dyad, and
self-awareness and other-awareness and safe environments
(you said: "I
certainly agree with you about working with both sides of the mentoring dyad and
wonder if working with both but separately might be preferable because values in
use might become suppressed (consciously or unconsciously), for a plethora of
reasons, if they were together.
In a climate of relative safety, empathy and
confidentially that a group of just mentors or of mentees affords you might see
actual and potential mismatch by dint of espoused
values?")
There is some advantage of working with
both, separately, as you say, because of 'safety' and 'confidentiality'.
The first step in using tools like these for self-awareness is one of helping
others consider and recognize where they are at, with no strings attached - ie
self-honesty is 'critical' to this work. Even so, it is likely that when
first doing this self-analysis that the individual will tend to recognize and
report 'espoused-values', since that is part of their self-image, what they
think they are in response to what 'the world' expects of them. It will
take some honest self-awareness, empathy, and disclosure-sharing from the
presenter/facilitator of the tool to raise the issue of the difference between
'espoused values' and 'values-in-use', so that participants can begin reach down
into the deep values-in-use.
There is also some value in working with work
groups as groups, when, if/as the safe environment is established with growing
self-disclosure, then there is real self-awareness, and meaningful and useful
other-awareness and owning of difference, and considering how difference might
work out in the working relationship.
It was my experience, of sharing a number of
self-awareness tools, in a group of peers, that showed that, as time went by,
this process was quite powerful in building working cohesion and re-empowering
professional enterprise (see
http://www.library.uow.edu.au/adt-NWU/public/adt-NWU20050901.105532/index.html
and especially chapter 8
for some more details [Allen, 2005])
2. mentoring as facilitation and changing
values-in-use see annotations interspersed
below
Regards Dianne
----- Original Message -----
From:
Sarah
Fletcher
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Friday, March 12, 2010 8:11
PM
Subject: Re: mentoring and
personality?
Dear Jean and Everyone,
A few further thoughts over
breakfast..
If we take the definition of mentoring as
facilitating significant life changes e.g career and coaching as more
geared to refining skills and reaching pre-specified ends (I am thinking
about the definitions in the National Framework from CUREE/TDA here)
then in mentoring both parties will very likely be focusing on enabling
significant changes in values in use.
Significant changes in
values-in-use is a long term project, in my view. (Any 'learning to
change is difficult, complex and takes time' [Allen, 2005]). The
first step it to know them, accurately. That involves significant
and ongoing self-analysis, and oten with some trusted and external
inputs to validate the internal view and analysis. And
values-in-use are deeply seated (embedded and out of ready conscious
sight). The second step is being sure about the purpose and
advantage of changing them. Then there is the work on shifting
such a meaning perspective (Mezirow) and risking intrapersonal
disintegration in the process (see The King and I, and 'Tis a
puzzlement.)
There is a likelihood that in
times of significant life change, values in use and espoused values will
a) come under the spotlight and b) develop/evolve i.e. undergo
change. Where values come under the spotlight there may be a
Hawthorne effect whereby values change because they are under scrutiny.
In times of substantial upheaval, values in use might become less stable
- anecdotal evidence is where mentors and mentees report that they never
thought they would react as they had in a particular situation. This
might reflect a lack of awareness of their values in use, which surface
in time of stress. Alternatively, it might be that both values in use
and espoused values are in actuality profoundly shifting.
I
suggest that when novice teachers are struggling for survival they may
exhibit 'entrenched values' clinging for security to values that have
enabled survival in the past or... they might adopt values from their
mentors (reinforcing cloning) or they may feel sufficienly confident
(perhaps based on surviving previous periods of instability) to tolerate
or maybe welcome 'fluid values' which can allow for shifts in
perception, position and even overt contradiction.
The 'model' I am working
with, with 'attitudes' being the outside ring, more on the surface, more
open to change, and often changeable by advertising programs, eg health
awareness campaigns, with 'beliefs' being the next more inner ring, and
less susceptible to change, eg religious beliefs, political attachments'
but capable of changing one's mind in response to thinking through
reasons or other challenges to attachments, has 'values' as the
innermost component of our complex. Values are much more
entrenched, and incongruent behaviour arises when values-in-use,
deepseated survival learning, come into conflict with 'beliefs' or
'attitudes'. The person of integrity is the one where there is
alignment of
values-in-use/beliefs/attitudes.
