Diverse Approaches to Research in Education (DARE) is a seminar series co-hosted by Faculty of Education’s Research Hub and the Research Advisory Working Group (RAWG). The series provides a forum for faculty and students to share their research approaches and methods in connection to theories, creates a pedagogical space for intergenerational learning, and makes our scholarship more visible.
Ancestral Inheritance: Intergenerational Learning through Story
Sara Florence Davidson has collaborated with her father, Haida artist, Robert Davidson over the past several years on projects that extend the field of Indigenous education. Together they have written an article, “Make your mind strong: My father’s insights into academic success;” an educational text, Potlatch as Pedagogy: Learning through Ceremony; and a series of picture books which highlight the Sk’ad’a [Learning] principles and focus on themes of intergenerational learning from place and the sharing of cultural knowledge.
Central to these collaborations are the stories that Sara’s father has shared with her as a way to pass along intergenerational cultural knowledge. Drawing on Indigenous Storywork methodology (Archibald, 2008), Sara has worked to make meaning from her father’s stories to better understand herself, as a learner and researcher, and her Haida culture. She writes about these understandings to help educators better understand Indigenous pedagogies and meet the needs of Indigenous (and all) students.
In this presentation, Sara will share the many different ways in which her self-understanding and research has been informed by Indigenous Storywork.
Presenter's bio
Dr. Sara Florence Davidson (Sgaan Jaadgu San Glans) is a Haida/Settler Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Education at Simon Fraser University. She completed her PhD in Literacy Education at the University of British Columbia, and her research focuses on Indigenous pedagogies, literacies, and stories.
Previously, she worked as an educator with adolescents in the K-12 system for close to a decade in both British Columbia and Yukon Territory. Much of her classroom experience was working with Indigenous students in rural and/or remote communities and with students who were making the transition from rural communities to urban centres to complete their education. She also has experience at the post-secondary level working with Adult Learners.
With her father, she is the co-author of Potlatch as Pedagogy: Learning through Ceremony and the Sk’ad’a Stories, a picture book series which is based on family stories and highlights Indigenous pedagogies and intergenerational learning. Sara is passionate about reading, writing, and listening to stories. She lives on unceded Stó:lō Territories with her partner and their two dogs.
Presenter
Dr. Sara Florence Davidson
Date/Time
Wednesday, September 28
3:30 – 5:30 p.m.
Place
SRY 5140
SFU Surrey campus
EcoPortraiture: The Art of Research when Nature Matters
What are the implications for educational research when nature is understood as an active co-teacher and co-researcher? Participants in this interactive outdoor session will explore the implications and try out practices from the recent book Ecoportraiture: The Art of Research When Nature Matters (Eds. Blenkinsop, Fettes & Piersol, 2022). Ecoportraiture offers theoretical and practical guidance into an emerging methodology with deep roots in the anti-racist, emancipatory research tradition of portraiture initiated by Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot and Jessica Hoffman Davis. This session aims to foster taking multiple perspectives and listening to multiple voices in the context of outdoor learning and teaching, and demonstrate the practice of Ecoportraiture as a new approach to conducting educational research.
Presenters' bios
Dr. Sean Blenkinsop is a Professor in the Faculty of Education at Simon Fraser University. Trained as a philosopher of education at Harvard, he has published widely in the fields of outdoor, environmental, and ecological education. Recent work has focused on creating, supporting and researching two unique K-7 outdoor/environmental public schools which focus on changing the culture of education to one that seeks to build relationships with the natural world, understands local places and its inhabitants to be co-teachers, and recognizes the outdoors as a significant place of learning. None of which can be done without the imagination and a good sense of humour. His latest book Wild Pedagogies was just published by Palgrave-Macmillan.
Dr. Mark Fettes is an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Education at Simon Fraser University. His interest in indigenous and intercultural education has led to a long-term effort to understand the role of imagination in learning, teaching, and schooling. He has worked with teachers at all levels of the formal education system, with a focus on helping them find more imaginative and engaging ways of teaching the mainstream curriculum. His most important contributions have been made in the context of community-based research projects focused on school district-First Nation partnerships and on ecological schooling. The theoretical side of this work explores the relationships between experience, language, imagination and community.
Dr. Gillian Judson is an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Education at Simon Fraser University. She teaches in Educational Leadership and Curriculum and Instruction programs. Dr. Judson’s scholarship examines imagination’s role in leadership, learning (K-post-secondary), and imaginative and ecological teaching practices (PreK through post-secondary). Her latest books are entitled Imagination and the Engaged Learner: Cognitive Tools for the Classroom. (Egan & Judson, 2016), Engaging Imagination in Ecological Education: Practical Strategies For Teaching (Judson, 2015), and A Walking Curriculum (Judson, 2018/2019). She has a new book on Imagination’s Role in Leadership coming out early next year with Teachers College Press.
Presenters
Dr. Sean Blenkinsop, Dr. Mark Fettes & Dr. Gillian Judson
Date/Time
Wednesday, October26
1:00 – 3:00 p.m.
Place
Discovery outdoor parking lot
Burnaby Campus
Making Sense of Data: Learning Analytics for Learning Design
In this talk, Drs. Tenzin Doleck and Phil Winne explore the use of learning analytics for learning design and education practices. They will respond to the following questions through examples in their own research:
- What are different data sources used in learning sciences research?
- What methods/kinds of instruments are most useful for gathering those data?
- What are some important techniques for educational data analytics?
- Why and how should we care about issues of Fairness, Accountability, Transparency, and Ethics (FATE) in educational data analytics?
In light of answers to these questions, Drs. Doleck and Winne will propose a few changes to everyday educational practices that have potentials to advance learning science and improve education.
Presenters' bios
Dr. Tenzin Doleck is an Assistant Professor and Canada Research Chair (Tier II) at Simon Fraser University. He received his PhD from McGill University. Prior to joining Simon Fraser University, he was Provost's Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Southern California. His research and course development interests are in data science, educational data mining, and learning analytics. His research has been funded or is currently funded by the following sources: Canada Research Chairs Program (CRCP), Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) - John R. Evans Leaders Fund (JELF), and British Columbia Knowledge Development Fund (BCKDF).
Dr. Phil Winne is Distinguished SFU Professor of Education and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, the American Educational Research Association, the American Psychological Association, the Association for Psychological Science, and the Canadian Psychological Association. Formerly a 2-term Tier I Canada Research Chair, he researches self-regulated learning, metacognition and learning analytics; and develops software technologies to support learners and gather big data for learning science. Author of more than 200 scholarly publications, he has been honored to receive the Robbie Case Memorial Award, the Barry J. Zimmerman Award, and the Canadian Society for the Study of Education Mentorship Award. In this interview, Dr. Winne talks about his current research and his experiences as a researcher and educator.
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