SPECIES OF SPACES: how students engage with school spaces

Author(s):

Liliana Alves Couto(presenting / submitting)

Conference:

ECER 2016

Network:

29. Research on Arts Education

Format:

Video

Session Information

29 SES 10, Digital Media and Arts Education

Paper/Video Session

Time:

2016-08-25

15:30-17:00

Room:

NM- J114

Chair:

Catarina Almeida

Contribution

The video that will present bits of my research, from the empirical work developed with a group of young students in a school. The starting point was to rethink school space and the ways in which young people relate to it.

It tries to understand how symbolic and sensory dimensions of the reality of school spaces, supports a new critical awareness of students over that reality. The objective is study the processes of subjectivity in production of a new kind of knowledge, from the symbolic and sensitive relationships of students with school spaces in their appropriations and perceptions of use of it.

Readings taken, have been allowing designing a consolidated theoretical framework and necessary for to cross with the multiple possibilities offered by research. The research condition puts it on a level of analysis with bond to areas such as architecture, history of education and arts education, and to an international movement, configured in projects which focus this same desire to critically analyze school space currently in its symbolic dimensions, of power and a critical thought, from the perspective of those who inhabit it.

The outside school spaces are apparently “non learning space”, but also spaces filled by sensory signs. Its condition imposed that the perception was focused on the subjective perspective of the architecture school (as an artistic question), and on the subjective field of its symbolic perception (as a self-identification and identity question).

we felt that the content of material produced from student´s engagement with school spaces, can reveal new perspectives and the idea that school spaces have a "hidden meaning", an unknown "immateriality” and possibly a “fourth dimension“ as emotional dimension. This could lead us to “another kind of discursive speech" which expresses the symbolic, affective, sensory and aesthetic dimensions of spaces.

Method

The rout of fieldwork was done with a group of ten voluntary students from a secondary school of Santa Maria da Feira, Portugal, who frequented the humanistic scientific course of visual arts. We tried to find new strategies to go further than the most immediate knowledge of school reality. In the beginning our "ehtnomethod" was a continuous collection, monitoring and participative analysis of formal and informal young's speeches about "perceptions of use of school spaces." Then the research, required readings linked to sensory ethnography research, grounded theory, research based in the arts. Faced with the extent and contents of materials produced [written, records, photographic, drawn, audio-visual (videos) and 3D objects (scale models and decals)], it became necessary to study and use appropriate methodological strategies to proceed a rigorous and meticulous organization and analysis of that. In order to dialog with the question about participative methodologies that was and will be affiliated in those processes of theoretical, practice research and analyses. This repository represents the experiential input from students with school spaces, and appends to the project an important theoretical content "recounts the collective construction" of such engage. So we decided to make a video that synthesize all the research work developed with students in a clear and objective way. The video aims put in dialogue fragments of the “research subjectivity” process and those experiences, and also expresses the participative collaboration of the work (researcher with students). In this way, it can show contents of the material resulting from the fieldwork that might otherwise be lost, that was one of our concerns.

Expected Outcomes

Taking into account the current circumstances and constraints that the thesis is facing at present, the video may be assumed as another space, because presents itself as an object of communication and of knowledge production, maybe to keep up the writing of the thesis. This video, as specie of space, will be subject, of debate, argument and support the conclusions of our thesis. In fact the video reflects our position and decisions made in the research, as well, can put in evidence the issue about Species of spaces, which results from the symbolic and sensitive relationships that students made with school spaces (their position). Here is, underlined also, the issue of the sensitive approach to space as a skill, made by each personally or trained together and, that requires hard work of clarification and time to be developed. To conclude, this proposal offers some interesting nuances to take account to create and build pedagogical spaces for the XXI century. WHY? Well, because represents the point of view of students with their critical and radical perspective of school space and school life. And still represents their sensitive involvement on the school environments. At the same time represents an important evolution in discursive contents of young people, about their whole school culture, making them able authors to discuss the projects of schools for the twenty-first century.

References

Baron, T., & Eisner, E. W. (2006). Arts-based educational research. In J. Green, G. Camilli, & P. Elmore (Eds.), Handbook of Complementary Methods for Research in Education (Third Edition, pp. 95–110). Washington, DC: American Educational Research Association. Birks, Melanie & Mills, Jane (2011). “Essentials of grounded theory”. In M. Birks, & J. Mills (2011), Grounded Theory. A practical guide. London: SAGE publications, pp.1-14. ISBN 978-1-84860-992-8. Burke, Catherine (2007). “The View of the Child: Releasing ‘‘visual voices’’ in the design of learning environments”. In Discourse: studies in the cultural politics of education, Vol. 28, No. 3, September 2007, pp. 359-372. Charmaz, K. (2008). Constructionism and the Grounded Theory Method. In J. A. Holstein & J. F. Gubrium (Eds.) (2008), Handbook of constructionist research. Nueva York: Guildford, pp.397-412. Clandinin, J. (2007). Handbook of Narrative Inquiry. Mapping a Methodology. Thousand Oaks, CA.: Sage. Collin, F. (2006). Praxis de la diferencia. Liberación y libertad. Barcelona: Icaria editorial. Glaser, B.G. & Strauss, A.L. (1967). The Discovery of Grounded Theory: Strategies for qualitative research. New Brunswick and London: Aldine transaction. ISBN 0-202-30260-1 Hernández, F. (Coord.) (2011). Investigar con los jóvenes: cuestiones temáticas, metodológicas, éticas y educativas. Universitat de Barcelona: ESBRINA – RECERCA, pp.7-23, 104-114. Irwin, Rita L. (2009). A/r/tografia: Uma mestiçagem Metonímica. In Ana Mae Barbosa & Lilian Amaral (Eds).(2009) Interterritorialidade: midias, contextos e educação, pp. 87-104. São Paulo, Brazil: Editora Senac. JISC (2006). Designing Spaces for Effective Learning. A guide to 21st century learning space design. UK: Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), University of Bristol. Kress, Gunther (2010). Multimodality. A social semiotic approach to contemporary communication. New York: Routledge Nóvoa, António (2000). “Ways of Saying, Ways of Seeing: Public Images of Teachers (19th-20th century)”. In Paedagogica Historica, vol. VI, pp. 21-52. Pallasmaa, Juhani (2014). Los ojos de la piel. La arquitectura y los sentidos. (2ªedición). Barcelona: Editorial Gustavo Gili, SL. ISBN: 978-84-252-2626-7 Perec, Georges (2001). Especies de espacios. 2ª Edición, traducción de Jesús Camarero. Espanha: Montesinos. ISBN 84-95776-07-3. Edição original: Espèces d´espaces, edições Galilée, París 1974. Pink, Sarah (2006). The future of visual anthropology: engaging the senses. London and New York: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group. ISBN10: 0-415-35765-9 (pbk) Pink, Sarah (2009). Doing Sensory Ethnography. London: Sage Publications Ltd, Mixed Sources. ISBN: 978-1-4129-4802-9 Prosser, Jon (2007). ”Visual methods and the visual culture of schools 27”. In Visual Studies, Vol. 22, No. 1, April 2007. Obtido em 14 Janeiro de 2013 de http://publicsphere.narod.ru/VisCultSchools.pdf

Author Information

Liliana Alves Couto (presenting / submitting)

Faculdade de Belas Artes da Universidade d oPorto

Educação Artistica (doutoramento)

Sanguedo

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