Educational encounters with adult students in difficult learning situations
(2008)- Abstract
- The present study is a retrospective investigation of the researcher’s pedagogic and psychological praxis in Municipal Adult Education in Sweden. At the time, the adult education unit in question had an outreaching project at Samhall, a state-owned company producing goods and services with an assignment from the government to provide meaningful work to employees with disabilities. A group of 23 workers failed in an earlier diagnostic procedure for admittance to adult education. The aim of the present study was to investigate possibly hidden resources for learning in a second educational encounter between the applicants and the present researcher in what is considered as difficult learning situations. The research questions concern how... (More)
- The present study is a retrospective investigation of the researcher’s pedagogic and psychological praxis in Municipal Adult Education in Sweden. At the time, the adult education unit in question had an outreaching project at Samhall, a state-owned company producing goods and services with an assignment from the government to provide meaningful work to employees with disabilities. A group of 23 workers failed in an earlier diagnostic procedure for admittance to adult education. The aim of the present study was to investigate possibly hidden resources for learning in a second educational encounter between the applicants and the present researcher in what is considered as difficult learning situations. The research questions concern how learning and teaching can be understood, when traditional test procedures are replaced by dialogue in educational and psychological diagnosis. It is part of the research question to understand how the students experience themselves as learners and how they give meaning to problem solving, mainly in Swedish and mathematics, and also which impact the interaction with the educator has. The study is inspired from hermeneutic and phenomenological traditions with a special focus on contextual analysis and life-world perspectives. Data were gathered as audio-taped records of the educational encounters. Verbatim transcripts from four of the encounters were chosen for in depth analysis and these texts were analysed in detail in several successive turns, oscillating between parts and whole of phenomena. A picture emerges, through the different phases of analysis, described as rings of an ever-moving model where the complexity of the whole, only by artificial means of 'freezing' the constant dynamics, can be taken apart and interpreted. The main findings are characterised as a 'relational grammar of interaction’ with form aspects, delimited as sequences and shifts where some shifts are considered as more significant than others. Relations and aspects of meaning were discerned as themes of content, focussing primarily the perspective of the student but also considering the impact of the researcher. The common denominator over the four encounters appears in terms of metacognition as a relation between life and learning, where existential aspects of exclusion as well as the content of curriculum and subject matter appear as important. Mediation in diagnostic and didactic encounters between students and important others, such as the teacher, are viewed in relation to Martin Buber’s dialogic philosophy and encounters between an I and a Thou. Teaching and learning in difficult learning situations is in the present study understood as ‘being part of each others’ intelligence’, thereby making possible the release of hidden potentials for learning. Implications are seen for adult education, suggesting that metacognitive aspects of teaching and learning may unite students and a normal variation of differences in mixed settings rather than separate them. (Less)
- Abstract (Swedish)
- Popular Abstract in Swedish
Avhandlingen utgörs av en retrospektiv studie av författarens pedagogiska och psykologiska praktik i Grundläggande Kommunal Vuxenutbildning i södra Sverige. Den grundläggande vuxenutbildningen genomförde i sin uppsökande verksamhet ett projekt vid Samhall AB, ett statsägt företag som producerar varor och tjänster och som har regeringens uppdrag att skapa meningsfulla och utvecklande arbeten för anställda med funktionshinder. En grupp bestående av 23 anställda hade sökt till vuxenutbildningen men misslyckats i s.k. ”inslusstest” vid ett tidigare besök av lärare från Komvux. Syftet med föreliggande studie är att, i vad som betecknas som svåra lärandesituationer, undersöka eventuella dolda resurser... (More) - Popular Abstract in Swedish
Avhandlingen utgörs av en retrospektiv studie av författarens pedagogiska och psykologiska praktik i Grundläggande Kommunal Vuxenutbildning i södra Sverige. Den grundläggande vuxenutbildningen genomförde i sin uppsökande verksamhet ett projekt vid Samhall AB, ett statsägt företag som producerar varor och tjänster och som har regeringens uppdrag att skapa meningsfulla och utvecklande arbeten för anställda med funktionshinder. En grupp bestående av 23 anställda hade sökt till vuxenutbildningen men misslyckats i s.k. ”inslusstest” vid ett tidigare besök av lärare från Komvux. Syftet med föreliggande studie är att, i vad som betecknas som svåra lärandesituationer, undersöka eventuella dolda resurser för lärande hos den aktuella gruppen. Forskningsfrågorna rör hur lärande och undervisning kan förstås ur ett livsvärldsperspektiv när traditionellt strikta testförfaranden ersätts med dialog i pedagogisk och psykologisk diagnos. Intresset riktas även mot hur de studerande upplever sig själva som lärande människor och hur de skapar mening vid problemlösning framförallt i matematik och svenska samt vilket inflytande samspelet med forskaren har i interaktionen.
Data har insamlats genom ljudbandsinspelningar vid individuella pedagogiska möten mellan de studerande och författaren. Transkriptioner från fyra av dessa möten har djupanalyserats i ett flertal turer pendlande mellan helhet och delar. Studiens metodologiska ansats är inspirerad från fenomenologiska och hermeneutiska traditioner med särskilt fokus på kontextuell analys. En bild framträder genom de olika analysfaserna vilken kan beskrivas som ett universum av komplexitet med ringar i ständig rörelse. Helhetens komplexitet ”fryses” i sin rörelse på analytiska grunder och ringarna tas isär och granskas. De huvudsakliga resultaten av analys och tolkning träder fram som en ”interaktionens relationella grammatik” i vilken formaspekter visar sig som sekvenser och skift i interaktionen där vissa skift förefaller starkare och mer betydelsefulla än andra. Relationer och meningsaspekter urskiljdes som innehållsliga teman, främst med fokus på de studerandes perspektiv men i viss utsträckning även på forskarens perspektiv. En gemensam nämnare för de fyra mötena tolkas i termer av metakognition som relation mellan liv och lärande, där existentiella teman såsom exkludering framträder, men även teman som rör innehåll i kursplaner och skolämnen framstår som betydelsefulla. Mediering och rollen som katalysator i dialog och diagnos i dessa pedagogiska möten speglas i Martin Bubers dialogfilosofi och mötet mellan ett Jag och ett Du. Undervisning och lärande i svåra lärandesituationer förstås i den föreliggande studien som ”att vara del av varandras intelligens” genom vilket frigörande av dolda resurser för lärande kan ske. Tillämpning av studiens resultat i vuxenundervisning ses genom att metakognitiva aspekter av lärande och undervisning kan förena studerande och den naturliga variationen av olikheter i blandade undervisningsgrupper. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/1241447
- author
- Ohlsson, Lisbeth LU
- supervisor
- opponent
-
- Doctor Skidmore, David, University of Bath, UK
- organization
- publishing date
- 2008
- type
- Thesis
- publication status
- published
- subject
- keywords
- difficult learning situations, Adult education, hidden potentials for learning, teacher-student interaction, dialogue and diagnosis, contextual analysis, metacognition, inclusive education, life-world, metakognition, kontextuell analys, dialog och diagnos, dolda resurser för lärande, livsvärldsperspektiv, interaktion mellan lärare och studerande, inkluderande undervisning, svåra lärandesituationer, vuxenutbildning
- pages
- 295 pages
- publisher
- Pedagogiska institutionen, Lunds universitet
- defense location
- Palaestra, nedre hörsalen
- defense date
- 2008-10-17 13:00:00
- ISBN
- 978-91-628-7609-8
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- 9bd76811-b760-4ec1-a3eb-32c4c045eed2 (old id 1241447)
- date added to LUP
- 2016-04-04 10:55:20
- date last changed
- 2021-11-24 17:09:07
@phdthesis{9bd76811-b760-4ec1-a3eb-32c4c045eed2,
abstract = {{The present study is a retrospective investigation of the researcher’s pedagogic and psychological praxis in Municipal Adult Education in Sweden. At the time, the adult education unit in question had an outreaching project at Samhall, a state-owned company producing goods and services with an assignment from the government to provide meaningful work to employees with disabilities. A group of 23 workers failed in an earlier diagnostic procedure for admittance to adult education. The aim of the present study was to investigate possibly hidden resources for learning in a second educational encounter between the applicants and the present researcher in what is considered as difficult learning situations. The research questions concern how learning and teaching can be understood, when traditional test procedures are replaced by dialogue in educational and psychological diagnosis. It is part of the research question to understand how the students experience themselves as learners and how they give meaning to problem solving, mainly in Swedish and mathematics, and also which impact the interaction with the educator has. The study is inspired from hermeneutic and phenomenological traditions with a special focus on contextual analysis and life-world perspectives. Data were gathered as audio-taped records of the educational encounters. Verbatim transcripts from four of the encounters were chosen for in depth analysis and these texts were analysed in detail in several successive turns, oscillating between parts and whole of phenomena. A picture emerges, through the different phases of analysis, described as rings of an ever-moving model where the complexity of the whole, only by artificial means of 'freezing' the constant dynamics, can be taken apart and interpreted. The main findings are characterised as a 'relational grammar of interaction’ with form aspects, delimited as sequences and shifts where some shifts are considered as more significant than others. Relations and aspects of meaning were discerned as themes of content, focussing primarily the perspective of the student but also considering the impact of the researcher. The common denominator over the four encounters appears in terms of metacognition as a relation between life and learning, where existential aspects of exclusion as well as the content of curriculum and subject matter appear as important. Mediation in diagnostic and didactic encounters between students and important others, such as the teacher, are viewed in relation to Martin Buber’s dialogic philosophy and encounters between an I and a Thou. Teaching and learning in difficult learning situations is in the present study understood as ‘being part of each others’ intelligence’, thereby making possible the release of hidden potentials for learning. Implications are seen for adult education, suggesting that metacognitive aspects of teaching and learning may unite students and a normal variation of differences in mixed settings rather than separate them.}},
author = {{Ohlsson, Lisbeth}},
isbn = {{978-91-628-7609-8}},
keywords = {{difficult learning situations; Adult education; hidden potentials for learning; teacher-student interaction; dialogue and diagnosis; contextual analysis; metacognition; inclusive education; life-world; metakognition; kontextuell analys; dialog och diagnos; dolda resurser för lärande; livsvärldsperspektiv; interaktion mellan lärare och studerande; inkluderande undervisning; svåra lärandesituationer; vuxenutbildning}},
language = {{eng}},
publisher = {{Pedagogiska institutionen, Lunds universitet}},
school = {{Lund University}},
title = {{Educational encounters with adult students in difficult learning situations}},
year = {{2008}},
}