At the Network 19 of  ECER2013 Conference in Istanbul, we presented a contribution untitled  The ethnography of an ethnography.Studying learning experiences in and outside school with young people. The attention generated in the audience led to some of the attendees to ask how we achieved the involvement of young people in the research; since it is uncommon young remained during four months involved into a project, which they also have to conduct an ethnographic investigation on their learning experiences in and out of high school. These colleagues suggested us to share at the next ECER conference or in a paper, the strategies we have used to maintain a sustainable relationship with the youth.

Returning to Barcelona from Istanbul, at our first meeting with colleagues of our research group, we shared and reviewed what we have learned from conversations and reactions to the papers presented at ECER2013. Facing with the question of how we had managed the involvement of young people in the research process we decided to review the five cases in which we had developed the research on Living and learning with new literacies in and outside school research: contributions for Reducing school drop-out, exclusion and abandonment Among youth (Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation. EDU2011-24122) and try to answer the question regarding on what are the conditions that enable young people to be involved actively in a research process not like passive receivers, but as authors of the research process?

To answer this question we carried out a review of the negotiation process we undertake and on the ways established to promote of exchange relationship and emotional support to young people. In addition we examined the transitions that took place in the modes of participation throughout the research process, from the beginning in which the researchers had more prominent presence to final meetings where youth managed the process

We would like to remember that from this investigation  we have sought to understand the social life that occurs when young people learn to communicate and express themselves by using  multiple literacies, through a series of five multi-sited ethnographies (Marcus, 1995; Faizon, 2009) that move through school and home-life (Anderson, 1989; Denzin, 1997; Ttroman, Jeffrey and Waldorf, 2005), as well as virtual environments (Hine, 2000, 2005; Johns, Shin-Ling & Hall, 2004).

We understand that young people’s learning experiences transit beyond school borders and move without contention through their social relations in extracurricular activities, social networks, personal hobbies, at home, and so on. Our goal, therefore, is to carry out research where the focus is on how to capture some of the consequences of the juxtapositions of all these sites.

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