Alongside the neoliberalisation of UK Higher Education (HE), the values of speed, competition, ma... more Alongside the neoliberalisation of UK Higher Education (HE), the values of speed, competition, marketisation and individualism increasingly shape teaching and learning globally. This article takes seriously the feeling of unease expressed by lecturers and students in this context, proposing that posthumanism offers a theoretical, methodological and praxical means to challenge neoliberal logics and their effects. Through assemblages, diffractive analysis and an experimental film, we explore how module redesign and delivery around 'posthumanist projectbased learning' (PBL) attends to materiality, embodiment, affect, ethicality, social justice and political transformation. We argue that by de-centring the human, posthumanist PBL alerts students, teachers and researchers to the 'trouble' that haunts educational experiences and centres an ethics of community that reshapes the boundaries of accountability. Our work indicates how posthumanism might offer new ways to engage in HE knowledge productionand position materiality, care and our common future as the drivers for teaching and learning.
Within the context of developing creativity discourse and policy, this paper begins by exploring ... more Within the context of developing creativity discourse and policy, this paper begins by exploring a number of the tensions that emerged from research using an interdisciplinary framework to investigate creativity with English expert specialist dance teachers. The paper then interrogates and articulates the productive dynamics of one of these tensions that occur between individual, collaborative and communal creativity. This tension is discussed within the wider debate of individualised versus collaborative/communal creativity and the encouragement of the former by individualised, marketised creativity policies. It is argued that one constructive product of articulating how dance professionals negotiate this tension within education is a pertinent and helpful example of a more humane framework for creativity than that espoused by the individualised marketisation agenda. In turn the paper draws out the idea of humanising creativity as a productive process that has the potential to chal...
In this paper we explore the relationship between creativity and identity in dance education. We ... more In this paper we explore the relationship between creativity and identity in dance education. We consider how, when creating dance, young people can go on a 'journey of becoming'; how in the process of making dance, they are also being made. We draw on the Dance Partners for Creativity research, a qualitative in depth study of creative partnership practice in secondary level English dance education, to develop these ideas. Understanding the journeys of becoming within this research has helped us to refine the concept of 'humanising creativity'. This is an active process of change guided by compassion and shared values. It comes from people engaging in collaborative thinking and joint action to imaginatively develop new ideas which are valuable to them and their community. The research and conceptual development
Deliverable 2.2.2 is the second of the two public versions of the document; the first was deliver... more Deliverable 2.2.2 is the second of the two public versions of the document; the first was delivered in Month 9 and this one in Month 18 of the three-year project. Similarly to D2.2.1, and D2.1.1 Interim, this document explicates the key concepts and principles relating to C 2 Learn’s Learning Design. Developed by the OU team working closely with feedback from other consortium members, it sets out the over-arching theoretical frame of the project which encompasses Creative Emotional Reasoning (Deliverable 2.1.2) and its practical application in relation to the project’s learning approach. Deliverable 2.2.2 is structured in three parts. The first considers the overall goals of the C 2 Learn gameful design encompassing a ‘playful’ digital gaming and social networking environment or "Co-creativity space" (C 2 Space). The C 2 Space exemplifies students’ and teachers ‘playful’ experiences or what they do.
Deliverable 5.4.1 is the first installment of a document describing the outcomes of Co-creativity... more Deliverable 5.4.1 is the first installment of a document describing the outcomes of Co-creativity Evaluation Analysis of data and information gathered through the pilot activities (M21 cycle), following the methodology defined by T2.3. Led by the UEDIN team, in close collaboration with OU, EA and BMUKK it sets out in detail the qualitative and quantitative analysis performed, according to the defined conceptual foundations and assessment methodology of the project (D2.3.1-2), leading to a synthesis of the pilot findings.
Deliverable 2.3.2 is the final installment of a document detailing the C 2 Learn Co-creativity As... more Deliverable 2.3.2 is the final installment of a document detailing the C 2 Learn Co-creativity Assessment Methodology, its rationale, method, tools and accompanying operationalisation. Led by the UEDIN team in close collaboration with the OU team, and other appropriate consortium members, it sets out the over-arching theoretical frame of the project further developed from C 2 Learn (FP7-318480) Co-Creativity Assessment Methodology D2.3.2, December 2014 Version: 4.0, 9 th December 2014 FINAL Page | 4 Deliverable 2.2.2 which closely integrates Creative Emotional Reasoning (Deliverable 2.1.2) and Wise Humanising Creativity, and argues in turn for an integrated approach to the assessment methodology which combines documenting change and lived experience. Deliverable 2.3.2 firstly deals with theoretical and then methodological integration, and from this details the evaluation categorisation scheme. It goes on to detail the methodology, and its accompanying aims, indicators and data colle...
Anna was a possibility thinker of the very best kind. As a team of researchers working on the Pos... more Anna was a possibility thinker of the very best kind. As a team of researchers working on the Possibility Thinking (PT) concept together over the last ten years, we spent many hours pouring over second-by-second film analysis of children in different settings, debating whether PT and its features were there or not. Sometimes our evidence would suggest it was not. At these times, Anna was a reliably good place to check for a reminder of what we were looking for.
Congress on Research in Dance Conference Proceedings, 2009
ABSTRACT Drawing on the Dance Partners for Creativity Research Project, this paper will consider ... more ABSTRACT Drawing on the Dance Partners for Creativity Research Project, this paper will consider the research methodologies and methods employed by a team of dance education professionals who seek to contribute to reinvigorating practice in relation to young people's creativity in secondary-level dance education in England. They have developed a focus on investigating the kinds of creative partnerships that are manifested between dance-artists and dance-teachers in a range of school settings. Using critical pedagogical and socio-constructivist approaches, the research draws on ethnographic, participatory, and reflective methods. The focus is on how partnerships can function as research sites, with participants as co-researchers.
This paper reviews the nature of PT (transformation from what is to what might be, in everyday co... more This paper reviews the nature of PT (transformation from what is to what might be, in everyday contexts for children and teachers), and reports on how PT manifested in two English primary schools engaged in social change. It identifies shared characteristics across the schools as well as unique ways in which PT manifested. With a focus on uniquely positioned professional wisdom, each school was engaged in change which rejected some assumptions whilst integrating new ideas relevant to their community, leading to quiet revolutions. Implications for primary schools which generate their own practices and narratives regarding educational futures, are discussed. has involved both inductive and, later, deductive analysis. There have been two main foci to the empirical work to date: the nature of possibility thinking, and what fosters it. Focus 1: The nature of PT. The early empirical studies developed Craft's original conceptualisation generating a framework for identifying PT in a seminal study undertaken by Burnard et al., 2006 with children aged 3-7, defined in a later chapter (Craft et al, 2008): Posing questions: children's verbal and non-verbal questions, typically made visible through playful 'as if' activity Play: children's highly engaged, serious, extended exploration, imagining situations, generating diverse ideas and problems and solving these. Immersion: children's deep involvement in a benign environment combining high emotional support with high cognitive challenge. Innovation: children's strong, playful connections between ideas, triggered, scaffolded and extended by thoughtful adult provocations. Risk-taking: children courageously reaching into original spaces. Being imaginative: children engaging in what might be, designing and inventing. Self-determination: children exercising independence in generating and following through ideas.
Paper presented at World Congress of Dance and the Child International conference held at the Uni... more Paper presented at World Congress of Dance and the Child International conference held at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. Kerry Chappell, Charlotte Slade and Amy Phillips are working to evaluate and research the development of choreographic understanding and wise humanising creativity for 14 - 21 year olds within this Siobhan Davies Dance project. This is an exciting three year project working with three cohorts of young people. It puts choreography in an interdisciplinary arts context and will feature workshopping, appreciation of different art forms and a Choreographic Festival curated by the young people themselves. The Exeter team will be researching the young people's choreographic development and potential personal change during their time on the project using the wise humanising creativity framework developed by Kerry Chappell and Anna Craft.
For a year until end 2007, 7 - 11 year-olds and teachers in North-East England, are collaborating... more For a year until end 2007, 7 - 11 year-olds and teachers in North-East England, are collaborating with a dance company and external researchers Craft and Chappell, on two research Throughlines, one for pupils and one for teachers. This paper focuses on the latter: How does developing creative movement change the ways we teach and how we feel about our teaching? 1 The methodological frame is qualitative, a single case study using ethnographic and other data, analysed using grounded theory, involving children, teachers, and researchers. Drawing on 'Possibility Thinking' posited by Craft (2000, 2002), Craft et al (2001) and since developed both generically (Burnard, 2006, Cremin et al, 2006) and also within domains such as dance (Chappell, in press), the paper reports work-in- progress, summarising the first half of the data collection and analysis. A proposed model of enquiry-based imaginative or creative pedagogy is offered, drawing on Alexander (2007, this volume), in turn...
This paper offers analysis and evaluation of ‘Creative Science Teaching (CST) Labs III’, a unique... more This paper offers analysis and evaluation of ‘Creative Science Teaching (CST) Labs III’, a unique and immersive approach to science teachers’ continuing professional development (CPD) designed and run by a London-based organisation, Performing Arts Labs (PAL), involving specialists from the arts, science and technology as integral. Articulating the key features of the experience and its perceived influences and by setting
This paper will present and critique the mediation of tensions arising as a result of the collisi... more This paper will present and critique the mediation of tensions arising as a result of the collision of creativity and performativity policies in English primary education, in the context of the three-way model of creative partnership being used for professional development in ...
... interpreter' (Stake, 1995) of the actions and reflections of these three expert speciali... more ... interpreter' (Stake, 1995) of the actions and reflections of these three expert specialist dance ... Although dance is seen to contribute to personal and social education, direct references to ... Laban's Modern Educational Dance articulation of self-realisation (1948) is critiqued, but no ...
The concept of possibility thinking (PT) as a driving force of creativity has been investigated b... more The concept of possibility thinking (PT) as a driving force of creativity has been investigated both conceptually and empirically for over a decade in early years settings and primary classrooms in England. In the first wave of qualitative empirical studies, play formed part of the enabling context. Criteria for episode selection for PT analysis were that episodes exhibited children immersed in sustained focused playful activity. During the second wave of PT studies, the research team's attention was drawn to children's imaginative storying in such playful contexts and it emerged that consideration of narrative in PT might prove fruitful. The current paper revisits key published work, and drawing on data previously analysed for features of PT, seeks to explore how narrative might relate to the current theorised framework. Fourteen published PT episodes are re-analysed in order to consider the role and construction of narrative in PT. The new analysis reveals that narrative plays a foundational role in PT, and that reciprocal relationships exist between questioning, imagination and narrative, layered between children and adults. Consequences for nurturing children's creativity and for future PT research are explored.
Alongside the neoliberalisation of UK Higher Education (HE), the values of speed, competition, ma... more Alongside the neoliberalisation of UK Higher Education (HE), the values of speed, competition, marketisation and individualism increasingly shape teaching and learning globally. This article takes seriously the feeling of unease expressed by lecturers and students in this context, proposing that posthumanism offers a theoretical, methodological and praxical means to challenge neoliberal logics and their effects. Through assemblages, diffractive analysis and an experimental film, we explore how module redesign and delivery around 'posthumanist projectbased learning' (PBL) attends to materiality, embodiment, affect, ethicality, social justice and political transformation. We argue that by de-centring the human, posthumanist PBL alerts students, teachers and researchers to the 'trouble' that haunts educational experiences and centres an ethics of community that reshapes the boundaries of accountability. Our work indicates how posthumanism might offer new ways to engage in HE knowledge productionand position materiality, care and our common future as the drivers for teaching and learning.
Within the context of developing creativity discourse and policy, this paper begins by exploring ... more Within the context of developing creativity discourse and policy, this paper begins by exploring a number of the tensions that emerged from research using an interdisciplinary framework to investigate creativity with English expert specialist dance teachers. The paper then interrogates and articulates the productive dynamics of one of these tensions that occur between individual, collaborative and communal creativity. This tension is discussed within the wider debate of individualised versus collaborative/communal creativity and the encouragement of the former by individualised, marketised creativity policies. It is argued that one constructive product of articulating how dance professionals negotiate this tension within education is a pertinent and helpful example of a more humane framework for creativity than that espoused by the individualised marketisation agenda. In turn the paper draws out the idea of humanising creativity as a productive process that has the potential to chal...
In this paper we explore the relationship between creativity and identity in dance education. We ... more In this paper we explore the relationship between creativity and identity in dance education. We consider how, when creating dance, young people can go on a 'journey of becoming'; how in the process of making dance, they are also being made. We draw on the Dance Partners for Creativity research, a qualitative in depth study of creative partnership practice in secondary level English dance education, to develop these ideas. Understanding the journeys of becoming within this research has helped us to refine the concept of 'humanising creativity'. This is an active process of change guided by compassion and shared values. It comes from people engaging in collaborative thinking and joint action to imaginatively develop new ideas which are valuable to them and their community. The research and conceptual development
Deliverable 2.2.2 is the second of the two public versions of the document; the first was deliver... more Deliverable 2.2.2 is the second of the two public versions of the document; the first was delivered in Month 9 and this one in Month 18 of the three-year project. Similarly to D2.2.1, and D2.1.1 Interim, this document explicates the key concepts and principles relating to C 2 Learn’s Learning Design. Developed by the OU team working closely with feedback from other consortium members, it sets out the over-arching theoretical frame of the project which encompasses Creative Emotional Reasoning (Deliverable 2.1.2) and its practical application in relation to the project’s learning approach. Deliverable 2.2.2 is structured in three parts. The first considers the overall goals of the C 2 Learn gameful design encompassing a ‘playful’ digital gaming and social networking environment or "Co-creativity space" (C 2 Space). The C 2 Space exemplifies students’ and teachers ‘playful’ experiences or what they do.
Deliverable 5.4.1 is the first installment of a document describing the outcomes of Co-creativity... more Deliverable 5.4.1 is the first installment of a document describing the outcomes of Co-creativity Evaluation Analysis of data and information gathered through the pilot activities (M21 cycle), following the methodology defined by T2.3. Led by the UEDIN team, in close collaboration with OU, EA and BMUKK it sets out in detail the qualitative and quantitative analysis performed, according to the defined conceptual foundations and assessment methodology of the project (D2.3.1-2), leading to a synthesis of the pilot findings.
Deliverable 2.3.2 is the final installment of a document detailing the C 2 Learn Co-creativity As... more Deliverable 2.3.2 is the final installment of a document detailing the C 2 Learn Co-creativity Assessment Methodology, its rationale, method, tools and accompanying operationalisation. Led by the UEDIN team in close collaboration with the OU team, and other appropriate consortium members, it sets out the over-arching theoretical frame of the project further developed from C 2 Learn (FP7-318480) Co-Creativity Assessment Methodology D2.3.2, December 2014 Version: 4.0, 9 th December 2014 FINAL Page | 4 Deliverable 2.2.2 which closely integrates Creative Emotional Reasoning (Deliverable 2.1.2) and Wise Humanising Creativity, and argues in turn for an integrated approach to the assessment methodology which combines documenting change and lived experience. Deliverable 2.3.2 firstly deals with theoretical and then methodological integration, and from this details the evaluation categorisation scheme. It goes on to detail the methodology, and its accompanying aims, indicators and data colle...
Anna was a possibility thinker of the very best kind. As a team of researchers working on the Pos... more Anna was a possibility thinker of the very best kind. As a team of researchers working on the Possibility Thinking (PT) concept together over the last ten years, we spent many hours pouring over second-by-second film analysis of children in different settings, debating whether PT and its features were there or not. Sometimes our evidence would suggest it was not. At these times, Anna was a reliably good place to check for a reminder of what we were looking for.
Congress on Research in Dance Conference Proceedings, 2009
ABSTRACT Drawing on the Dance Partners for Creativity Research Project, this paper will consider ... more ABSTRACT Drawing on the Dance Partners for Creativity Research Project, this paper will consider the research methodologies and methods employed by a team of dance education professionals who seek to contribute to reinvigorating practice in relation to young people's creativity in secondary-level dance education in England. They have developed a focus on investigating the kinds of creative partnerships that are manifested between dance-artists and dance-teachers in a range of school settings. Using critical pedagogical and socio-constructivist approaches, the research draws on ethnographic, participatory, and reflective methods. The focus is on how partnerships can function as research sites, with participants as co-researchers.
This paper reviews the nature of PT (transformation from what is to what might be, in everyday co... more This paper reviews the nature of PT (transformation from what is to what might be, in everyday contexts for children and teachers), and reports on how PT manifested in two English primary schools engaged in social change. It identifies shared characteristics across the schools as well as unique ways in which PT manifested. With a focus on uniquely positioned professional wisdom, each school was engaged in change which rejected some assumptions whilst integrating new ideas relevant to their community, leading to quiet revolutions. Implications for primary schools which generate their own practices and narratives regarding educational futures, are discussed. has involved both inductive and, later, deductive analysis. There have been two main foci to the empirical work to date: the nature of possibility thinking, and what fosters it. Focus 1: The nature of PT. The early empirical studies developed Craft's original conceptualisation generating a framework for identifying PT in a seminal study undertaken by Burnard et al., 2006 with children aged 3-7, defined in a later chapter (Craft et al, 2008): Posing questions: children's verbal and non-verbal questions, typically made visible through playful 'as if' activity Play: children's highly engaged, serious, extended exploration, imagining situations, generating diverse ideas and problems and solving these. Immersion: children's deep involvement in a benign environment combining high emotional support with high cognitive challenge. Innovation: children's strong, playful connections between ideas, triggered, scaffolded and extended by thoughtful adult provocations. Risk-taking: children courageously reaching into original spaces. Being imaginative: children engaging in what might be, designing and inventing. Self-determination: children exercising independence in generating and following through ideas.
Paper presented at World Congress of Dance and the Child International conference held at the Uni... more Paper presented at World Congress of Dance and the Child International conference held at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. Kerry Chappell, Charlotte Slade and Amy Phillips are working to evaluate and research the development of choreographic understanding and wise humanising creativity for 14 - 21 year olds within this Siobhan Davies Dance project. This is an exciting three year project working with three cohorts of young people. It puts choreography in an interdisciplinary arts context and will feature workshopping, appreciation of different art forms and a Choreographic Festival curated by the young people themselves. The Exeter team will be researching the young people's choreographic development and potential personal change during their time on the project using the wise humanising creativity framework developed by Kerry Chappell and Anna Craft.
For a year until end 2007, 7 - 11 year-olds and teachers in North-East England, are collaborating... more For a year until end 2007, 7 - 11 year-olds and teachers in North-East England, are collaborating with a dance company and external researchers Craft and Chappell, on two research Throughlines, one for pupils and one for teachers. This paper focuses on the latter: How does developing creative movement change the ways we teach and how we feel about our teaching? 1 The methodological frame is qualitative, a single case study using ethnographic and other data, analysed using grounded theory, involving children, teachers, and researchers. Drawing on 'Possibility Thinking' posited by Craft (2000, 2002), Craft et al (2001) and since developed both generically (Burnard, 2006, Cremin et al, 2006) and also within domains such as dance (Chappell, in press), the paper reports work-in- progress, summarising the first half of the data collection and analysis. A proposed model of enquiry-based imaginative or creative pedagogy is offered, drawing on Alexander (2007, this volume), in turn...
This paper offers analysis and evaluation of ‘Creative Science Teaching (CST) Labs III’, a unique... more This paper offers analysis and evaluation of ‘Creative Science Teaching (CST) Labs III’, a unique and immersive approach to science teachers’ continuing professional development (CPD) designed and run by a London-based organisation, Performing Arts Labs (PAL), involving specialists from the arts, science and technology as integral. Articulating the key features of the experience and its perceived influences and by setting
This paper will present and critique the mediation of tensions arising as a result of the collisi... more This paper will present and critique the mediation of tensions arising as a result of the collision of creativity and performativity policies in English primary education, in the context of the three-way model of creative partnership being used for professional development in ...
... interpreter' (Stake, 1995) of the actions and reflections of these three expert speciali... more ... interpreter' (Stake, 1995) of the actions and reflections of these three expert specialist dance ... Although dance is seen to contribute to personal and social education, direct references to ... Laban's Modern Educational Dance articulation of self-realisation (1948) is critiqued, but no ...
The concept of possibility thinking (PT) as a driving force of creativity has been investigated b... more The concept of possibility thinking (PT) as a driving force of creativity has been investigated both conceptually and empirically for over a decade in early years settings and primary classrooms in England. In the first wave of qualitative empirical studies, play formed part of the enabling context. Criteria for episode selection for PT analysis were that episodes exhibited children immersed in sustained focused playful activity. During the second wave of PT studies, the research team's attention was drawn to children's imaginative storying in such playful contexts and it emerged that consideration of narrative in PT might prove fruitful. The current paper revisits key published work, and drawing on data previously analysed for features of PT, seeks to explore how narrative might relate to the current theorised framework. Fourteen published PT episodes are re-analysed in order to consider the role and construction of narrative in PT. The new analysis reveals that narrative plays a foundational role in PT, and that reciprocal relationships exist between questioning, imagination and narrative, layered between children and adults. Consequences for nurturing children's creativity and for future PT research are explored.
C2Learn: Fostering Creativity in Learning through digital games (www.c2learn.eu) is a three-year ... more C2Learn: Fostering Creativity in Learning through digital games (www.c2learn.eu) is a three-year research project supported by the European Commission through the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7), in the theme of Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) and particularly in the area of Technology-Enhanced Learning (TEL) (FP7 grant agreement no 318480). In this document we report the activities of the second and third main pilot cycles, which have just been completed (end October 2015). Their end concides with the completion of the C2Learn project overall, as foreseen by the C2Learn User Evaluation Plan (deliverables D5.2.1 and D5.2.2). The current final iteration of this deliverable is an update of the previous iteration, D5.3.3, which in April 2015 reported on just the second main pilot cycle. The aim of piloting was to provide updated input to the iterative design, development and evaluation processes of the project, by testing the C2Learn technological solution in real-life educational settings. The present report on the pilot activities focuses more on the procedures and conditions of the pilot activities. The outcomes and user feedback informs all relevant processes and deliverables of the project, and among them predominantly D5.4.2 ‘Co-creativity Evaluation Analysis’.
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The aim of piloting was to provide updated input to the iterative design, development and evaluation processes of the project, by testing the C2Learn technological solution in real-life educational settings.
The present report on the pilot activities focuses more on the procedures and conditions of the pilot activities. The outcomes and user feedback informs all relevant processes and deliverables of the project, and among them predominantly D5.4.2 ‘Co-creativity Evaluation Analysis’.