Participatory Approaches to Inclusion Related Staff Development PAIRS

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Participatory Approaches to Inclusion Related
Staff Development (PAIRS)

• Dr Jane Seale, School of Education, University of
  Southampton
• Slides available at http//www.slideshare.net/Jan
  e65/pairs-talk-22-jan-08-jane-seale/

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Overview

• Provide an overview of a current LATEU funded
  project that is using participatory approaches to
  involve students in evaluation of learning
  experiences and learning provision
• Give examples of the kind of evaluation
  information obtained using the participatory
  methods
• Reflect on how methods might be used by other
  colleagues, Schools, Faculties

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Why the inclusion focus?

• Inclusion Task Force recommendation to University
  that was incorporated into the Disability
  Equality Scheme- Action Plan
• The need to involve students in the design and
  delivery of staff development and CPD
  opportunities in relation to developing inclusive
  teaching practices
• LATEU wanted a project that focused on how we
  can include a wide range of students (i.e. not
  just disabled students) in the learning
  opportunities that we provide

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Defining Participatory

• Working directly with students in the evaluation
  of their learning experiences and development of
  staff development materials
• Student input sought throughout the evaluation
  project
• Early and continual participation of intended
  users (students) to produce improved teaching
  practices

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Defining Participatory

• Aims to engage participants in the design,
  conduct and analysis of research with the
  construction of non-hierarchical research
  relations
• Participants encouraged to own the outcome by
  setting the goals and sharing in decisions about
  processes
• Nothing about me, without me

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Participatory approaches related concepts

• Alliances and partnerships
• Advocacy
• Inclusion
• Ownership
• Co-operation
• Mutual learning
• learning about one another- reflexivity
• Activity (as opposed to passivity)
• Respect (for all collaborators)

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Provenance of method

• Participatory Design HCI, Engineering, Art
  Design
• Participatory Research Disability, Inclusion
• E.g. 2 funded research projects Jane Seale
  involved in LEXDIS Concepts of Access
• Higher Education emergent focus on Hearing the
  Student Voice

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PAIRS Aims

• Capture student voices regarding their learning
  experiences within the School of Education
• Use these voices to explore whether and how our
  School of Education programmes (undergraduate and
  postgraduate) include or exclude students with a
  wide range of learning needs from experiencing
  positive or high quality learning opportunities
• 2. Involve students in the analysis and
  exploration of these student voices
• Develop a collaborative partnership whereby
  students help to develop materials and methods
  that can be used to help staff in the work
  towards meeting learning needs and reducing
  barriers to inclusion.

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Phase One Tell us your stories

• Write or audio-record a one-two page letter to an
  imaginary friend
• Write a diary describing learning experiences on
  course, over the period of a typical week
• Write a reflective journal that describes a
  critical incident
• Produce a piece of creative writing or art (e.g.
  poem, picture, sculpture, song)
• Alternatively, opt to be interviewed
  face-to-face, by phone or by webcam.
• Focus for all stories learning experiences and
  whether learning needs have been met

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Phase Two help us understand the stories

• Formed an advisory group that worked together to
  decide how we will use the information about
  student learning experiences to design staff
  development initiatives in the School.

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Ethics

• Ethical approval from SOE Ethics committee
• Main ethical issues
• Payment for participation (vouchers)
• Anonymity
• Participant approval of edited/anonymised stories
  prior to use

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Recruitment

• Email
• Blackboard announcements
• Personal presentation in lectures
• Different programmes/students responded
  differently to each method
• Personal presentation worked well for UG, Fnd
  Degree and PGCE (groups I knew less well) ..time
  consuming
• Email worked well for PGR (a group I work closely
  with)
• Blackboard worked well for PGT
• Targeted all programme leaders as gate-keepers
• Also informed Learning and Teaching Co-ordinator
  Chair of Academic Standards and Quality
  Committee

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Recruitment

• 20 in Phase 1
• 5 in Phase 2
• 9 students enquired about the project but when
  sent information sheets/consent forms did not
  follow through

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Phase 1 Participant demographics
5 Male and 15 Female Participants
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Phase 1 Participant Demographics
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Phase 1 Chosen methods for providing stories

• Letter to friend- 6
• Face-to-face interview- 6
• Reflective Journal/Diary- 5
• Phone interview- 3
• Did not anticipate the preference for being
  interviewed (time consuming transcribing)
• Some participants incorporated work from their
  course e.g. reflective elements from assessed
  assignments

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Phase 1 The stories

• Examples
• Fnd Degree Reflective journal
• UG Interview
• PGCE Letter to a friend
• PGT Interview
• PGR Reflective journal
• Positive and negative feedback
• Variance in detail and passion

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Phase 2 The analysis

• 5 students (also phase 1 participants) consented
  to being members of an advisory board
• Work and family commitments as well as distance
  (1 student had graduated) meant that all work
  done via email
• Sent each participant three stories and asked
  them to code stories for themes or issues that
  they thought were significant

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Themes that have implications for staff
development

• THINGS THAT HELPED LEARNING
• Supportive tutors
• Knowledgeable and expert tutors
• Flexibility (choice, options, variety)
• Sharing and communicating with peers (peer
  support)
• THINGS THAT HINDERED LEARNING
• Workload issues
• Lack of information
• Poor communication
• Issues around essay writing skills and support

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Have we learnt anything about inclusion?

• Participants did not explicitly use words (or
  associated ones) such as I felt included or
  excluded
• Some themes do reflect practices that we might
  obviously associate with inclusive teaching
• issues related to communication and peer support
  (e.g. isolation, belonging)
• Flexibility is a key principle of inclusive
  teaching

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Chosen methods for dissemination

• Write a brief summary report which includes
  advice and guidelines along with a CD with all
  the stories on for people to access in their own
  time
• Set up a wiki which contains the stories, our
  comments and provides opportunity for staff and
  students to discuss issues raised etc.
• Give a presentation (Jane plus any PAIRS
  participant who are happy to co-present) on the
  issues raised and film the presentation and
  ensuing discussion so that it can be included in
  the wiki and on the CD perhaps

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What motivated the students to take part?

• Some had bees in their bonnet about particular
  issues (good and bad)
• Supportive tutors in a crisis
• Change in space allocation for PhD students
• Placement not enabling learning outcomes to be
  met
• Some students appearing to get away with missing
  deadlines

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What motivated the students to take part?

• For some, it was a curiosity about the methods of
  the project- wanting to learn from the way it was
  done
• For some it was a chance to have their voice
  heard
• Not a lot of evidence to suggest that payment
  alone was a sole driver for participation
• Oiled the wheels and demonstrated commitment on
  part of evaluator

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Some informal student comments

• I was genuinely impressed with the project
  methodology that you used for this research.
  Would it be at all possible for me to reference
  your work officially within my own EdD work? I
  would sincerely appreciate being able to reflect
  on your methodology within my thesis as many
  aspects of it fit brilliantly with the ideas that
  I have so far myself. Would this be possible? I
  believe it is important to not ask participants
  in research to do anything that I would not feel
  comfortable doing myself. I particularly enjoyed
  being a part of your project and this taught me
  many things about carrying out my own research
  upon/with others.

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Some informal student comments

• Although my schedule is quite busy as you know,
  I am really interested in taking part of the
  second phase. It is the kind of experiences and
  skills that I want to have. I did not come here
  just to get a PhD and then go back. I want to be
  involved in any research or courses that might
  help to improve my educational and research
  skills.
• It is my pleasure to help you in this project. It
  opens my mind to many things that may help to
  improve the organization that I will return to,
  when I finish my PhD.

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What motivates colleagues to facilitate access to
students?

• One colleague used the information sheets that I
  handed out as an example of good practice in
  their research methods teaching
• Obtain evaluation data that can use for a variety
  of QA purposes to illustrate authoritatively, the
  student voice

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Lessons Learned Applying PAIRS method to other
Schools

• Get richer information from motivated, committed
  students
• Time consuming not a one-person project
• Dont underestimate the ethical considerations
• Anonymity (of participants AND the teachers they
  name in their stories)
• Build in time to train/induct participants in
  analysis methods- I underestimated how hard
  participants might find this, and how varied
  their results would be
• Probably best used to explore one big issue
  across a School or programme once a year or so
• Not a replacement for module evaluations, not
  pragmatic and students will get just as fed up
  with it as they are with questionnaires

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Mixed Methods?

• In educational research there is debate about the
  value of mixed methods e.g. quantitative and
  qualitative
• In educational (teaching) evaluation there is
  also value in mixed methods depth and breadth
• Where participatory methods give us the depth
• Questionnaire surveys gives us the breadth

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Discussion and Questions
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References

• LEXDIS Disabled Learners Experiences of
  E-Learning- JISC funded project
• http//www.lexdis.ecs.soton.ac.uk/
• Concepts of Access for people with learning
  disabilities ESRC funded seminar series
• http//www.education.soton.ac.uk/research/field_pr
  ojects/?linkproject_details.phpid174
• Hearing the Student Voice- Escalate funded
  project
• http//www2.napier.ac.uk/studentvoices/