Je Kan's posting could help to focus our educational conversation for October 2006. Je Kan asks
'What is a living educational standard of judgement' and suggests that 'discernment' may be a
more appropriate idea than 'judgement' . It was a pleasure to see Je Kan at BERA 06 and hear more
about his practitioner-researcher at Fukuoka University in Japan. I'm hoping that his plans to put
together a proposal for an international symposium on practitioner-researcher for BERA 07, come
to fruition.
I'm wondering if our contributions on how we evaluate the quality of our contributions to
educational knowledge and educational theory, might be enhanced by including insights from our
evaluations of John Furlong's and Alis Oancea's ideas on Assessing Quality in Applied and
Practice-based Educational Research, in our responses to Je Kan?
Furlong, J. & Oancea, A. (2005) Assessing Quality in Applied and Practice-based Educational
Research. Oxford; University of Oxford, Department of Educational Studies
Retrieved on 30th September 2006 from
http://64.233.183.104/search?q=cache:lz1CTUH-ukgJ:www.bera.ac.uk/pdfs/Qualitycriteria.pdf
+John+Furlong+assessing+quality&hl=en&client=firefox-a
You can access the table of the dimensions and sub-dimensions they propose from:
http://www.jackwhitehead.com/bera06/furoan.jpg
For the information of international participants in our e-seminar, the research of UK researchers
in Higher Education is being assessed for what is known as the Research Assessment Exercise on
the criteria:
4* Quality that is world-leading in terms of originality, significance and rigour.
3* Quality that is internationally excellent in terms of originality, significance but
which nontheless falls short of the highest standards of excellence.
2* Quality that is recognised internationally in terms of originality, significance and
rigour.
1* Quality that is recognised nationally in terms of originality, significance and
rigour.
Because there is no general agreement about the criteria of assessment to use to judge/discern
the quality of practitioner-research, our 2006-7 e-seminar could help by clarifying the criteria
and standards we use in our practitioner-research.
I do find inspiring the qualities Je kan uses to evaluate the quality of his life and research:
1. I would never consciously do harm to another salient being by
thought, word or deed.
2. I would live my life as inclusionally as possible seeking to
communicate my values to others while respecting our differences.
3. Never to conform to the ideology and methodology of a “ Banking
Educator”
4. to serve people to the best of my ability in Buddhist service.
5. To hold in loving enquiry the claimed knowledge and knowing of my
self and others certain in the fact that I do not know and the boundaries
to my knowledge is my ignorance.
What I'm wondering is whether we need to find ways of showing the living expression of the
ontological values that give meaning and purpose to our lives and that we often seek to
communicate in such propositional statements. I am thinking of the need to use multi-media
forms of representation in explaining our educational influences in our learning, in the learning of
others and in the learning of social formations. I am thinking of visual narratives that show the
meanings of the ontological values, whose living forms cannot, I claim, be expressed in the above
'statements' as the meanings are expressed and clarified in the course of being lived in practice.
Can visual narratives carry the meanings of our living ontological values and show how they can
be used to form living epistemological standards of judgement/discernment for practitioner-
research? I think they can. The e-journal Ontario Action Researcher has just published a multi-
media account on:
Living Inclusional Values In Educational Standards Of Practice And Judgement.
This was a keynote Address for the Act, Reflect, Revise III Conference, Brantford, Ontario, 11
November 2005. Ontario Action Researcher, Vol. 8.2.1.
You can access it at http://www.nipissingu.ca/oar/new_issue.htm
In answer to Je Kan's question 'What are living educational standards of judgement?' I'm
suggesting that they are the kind of living standards that emerge from the expression and
clarification of the ontological values we use to give life meaning and purpose. I believe that the
meanings of these values cannot be carried solely by propositional statements. I am suggesting
that visual narratives containing explanations of educational influences in learning are needed to
communicate the meanings of the living standards of judgement/discernment for practitioner-
research. Many thanks Je kan for such a stimulating contribution.
In relation to integrating insights from John Furlong's and Alis Oancea's assessment framework in
their table at:
http://www.jackwhitehead.com/bera06/furoan.jpg
into my response to Je Kan, I would say that as practitioner-researchers we could go beyond these
categories. I think we could do this by expressing, explicating and communicating the living
standards of judgement/discernment we use in the generation of our living educational theories
of our educational influences in our own learning, in the learning of others and in the learning of
social formations. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts.
Love Jack.
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