23/10/2011 by lizit.

A fortnight ago I wrote of a new sense of direction with my thesis writing. That has continued.

On a practical level, the buckets have been moved around, some have had their contents split into smaller buckets and some buckets have had their contents mixed in the same container. That represents more than just moving jigsaw pieces. It has led me into thinking more deeply about what it is I am saying and, perhaps more importantly, how I am saying it. I am also a lot happier about my theoretical positioning. For months now I have been trying to get my head around the various theoretical standpoints open to me, half the time not understanding them and the the rest of the time not seeing how they applied to me either. Through thinking about how to organise the various material in my thesis, I have recognised that I am not coming from a single theoretical standpoint - or if I am, I don’t know what it is and at the moment it is fairly irrelevant. What I am doing is embracing a systems approach. It always was there in the small print of one of the chapters, but I’ve now realised it is what is holding the whole together.

A systems approach does not only permit, but insists on looking at things from many different viewpoints or perspectives. It may involve soaring high over the system and taking an overview - looking at the pieces and how they connect - or it may involve getting into the nitty gritty of bits of the system and how they work in the day-to-day. It may involve looking at the roles of the different stakeholders in the system and how they function together and separately. It may involve acknowledging the differences between formal and informal power structures - the importance of the person with the key to the stationery cupboard…

Bit by bit I am making sense of the story I am telling and seeing more and more connections. I am having to be far more organised than I have ever been about noting the insights as they occur - some will find their way into my thesis and others will no doubt be useful in other contexts. I am beginning to write and edit and review and understand and write some more. There is a subtle shift which means I’m engaging with my work in a new way.

So far so good! But why oh why is the technology, which should operating transparently in the background, so difficult to tame? Three times in the last fortnight, I have spent time sorting out broken references. The first time happened when splitting the whole into its constituent parts. Everything seemed to be OK, and then I noticed some of my references were simply not right - they had somehow moved down the document, all still in the correct order but in the wrong places. Then, last weekend, editing a shorter document and noticing again references were not where they belonged. An hour spent cutting and pasting unformatted references sorted that! Then yesterday, a carefully crafted paragraph half-way through the document, and moved on to make further edits, forgetting to hit the save button first. As I made the next edits, a sudden awareness that the reference I was editing had disappeared to be replaced by the page number I was inserting - and then adding insult to injury, it replaced the following reference and all the subsequent references shifted too. This is specialist software provided by large companies and supposedly designed for the kind of task I am engaged in. Why on earth doesn’t it do what it says on the tin? There is more than enough to think about without having to worry about whether my document has edited itself!

So we win some, we lose some. If only the technology worked as it should, I would be a very happy bunny at the moment!

Posted in thesis, personal rant, systems, bibliography | Print | 2 Comments »

24/04/2011 by lizit.

A recent blog of eLiz Hartnett’s caught my eye. In it she reproduces a diagram that she had seen at a recent conference and uses the diagram to reflect on the focus of her thesis and where it sits within her discipline.

I have been aware that one of the things I am tussling with is just where does my research fit, and looking at eLiz’s blog helped me to realise that part of my difficulty is the interdisciplinary nature of what I am doing and not being sure who I am addressing, or, in a disciplinary sense, where my focus is. Although, I am no closer to sorting that out, my attempt at diagramming did clarify some of the reasons why I am struggling.

My research focuses on a sub-set of the SEN system and I am using that sub-set to explore the metaphor of struggle and fight which occurs frequently in the language used in academic literature, policy documents and conversation. Drawing clarified that not only is struggle prevalent in a whole range of different ways in the system, but it is also prevalent in the theoretical framework. Maybe it is no wonder that I have problems sorting out where I am looking and where I belong!

I sense this is a diagram to come back to and work with some more, though I suspect it might be one of those diagrams that becomes increasingly confusing, before it becomes clearer.

Posted in SEN, struggle, systems | Print | 1 Comment »

18/07/2010 by lizit.

Like many research students, one of my concerns is the need for some kind of originality in the work I am undertaking. I am still unsure exactly what that means - and how much originality is necessary - but it seems to relate to various different things.

It could be originality of method - not so much inventing a new methodology as using existing methodologies in different ways.

It could be exploring an area which hasn’t been explored before.

It could be exploring an area which has been explored before but from a different perspective.

It could be bringing a range of ideas from different areas together and looking at how they interconnect and may provide a different way of looking at an area.

The more I read about my area of interest - the learning journeys of those involved in caring for and supporting children and young people on the autistic spectrum - the more work I realise has already been done. I also realise that much of this work has been done from very specific perspectives: the support needs of parents following diagnosis; the parent as advocate; the continued professional development of teachers or doctors or social workers; the role of electronic media in informing patients. Although partnership is a theme - partnership between parents and professionals in various settings - it is unclear how much this is a reality most of the time, although there is a fair bit about the advocacy role of parents.

One of the possible areas of interest is the contrast between the formal processes and the informal processes, for example what the code of practice says should happen and what happens in practice - and why don’t the two match up. Another area is the whole question of whether there is an autistic spectrum community of practice. If it exists, where does it exist and in what form? Or is it a number of discrete areas of expertise in which some participants are able to act as gatekeepers giving access to their area of expertise, or infiltrators gaining knowledge of another area.

Looking at learning journeys is about the various ways in which people learn about the spectrum. Knowing that there is a mix of formal, informal and serendipitous probably doesn’t tell us much of itself, but when this is applied to the outputs of the domain, i.e. the services, resources, support, etc, and the decision making processes, life gets very interesting.

Posted in decision making, resources, systems, community of practice, learning, reflections, planning | Print | 1 Comment »

03/06/2010 by lizit.

I’m reading Merrill and West’s book on using biographical methods and working through the first set of transcriptions. Perhaps inevitably, there is a lot of stuff going on in my head.

Perhaps one of the key learning points is seeing just how much my own perspective colours how I understand others. I was working on one of the transcriptions yesterday and can see very much the psychodynamics of the interaction and why I found it so difficult. At the same time, I can see how in other interactions, transference was working differently with me feeling far more positive about the exchange.

I am interested by the section on analysis - and the different ways in which Merrill and West approach the task. West’s use of the gestalt - a holistic approach - resonates with me, but I can also see how looking at the parts can be useful, as long as this does not become mechanistic when key ideas and insights can be lost within a category rather than the significance being recognised.

Perhaps because I am reading other people’s stories, I am also returning to my own. Although this stems as well from my attempts at diagramming the autistic spectrum domain, I found myself remembering the nightmare scenario of the only respite that could be offered to a troubled young man was a police cell - and having mental health workers in my house telling me I had no option but to ring the police as they had no appropriate provision (and they were from the tier 4 regional mental health services!). There is something totally wrong about a child acquiring a criminal record - a formal warning - for behaviour within the home stemming directly from a neurological condition.

But that points to the complexity of the domain. It may well be that it is possible to envision the people working as a community of practice, but the people come from different organisations and each organisation has its own procedures, systems and structures and each is involved in making available or rationing scare resources. A person might well see the relevance of making a particular provision, but that person also has a role within a system and…. Maybe it is easier and safer for those employed to care for and support people on the spectrum not to know too much about systems and organisations other than their own. Maybe too, this is when I have to look again at the work of Harry Daniels and Anne Edwards…

Merrill, B., & West, L. (2009). Using Biographical Methods in Social Research. London: Sage.
Edwards, A., Daniels, H., Gallagher, T., Leadbetter, J., & Warmington, P. (2009). Improving Inter-professional Collaborations: Multi-agency working for children’s wellbeing. London: Routledge.
Daniels, H., Edwards, A., Engeström, Y., Gallagher, T., & Ludvigsen, S. R. (2010). Activity Theory in Practice: Promoting learning across boundaries and agencies. London: Routledge.

Posted in biography, systems, community of practice, Aspergers/HFA, narratives, reflections | Print | 1 Comment »