EJOLTS review criteria – feedback table
Paper:
Students, it’s nearly your call: on our way towards a living visual taxonomy of learning support interactions
Brian Williamson
Introductory comment:
Brian – As required by the review process, I have read your latest draft while holding the EJOLTS criteria in
mind and have made the following comments against those criteria. Taken as a whole, I read these criteria
as requiring you to offer descriptions and explanations of your practice that constitute a valid claim that you
understand your own educational development and the evolution of your educational influence; I look for a
dialectical engagement with the text that enables me to integrate insights from your living-theory into my
own in order to improve it.
Peter Mellett
15th September 2015
Criterion
Comment
1a. Is there sufficient detail for a
reader to understand the valuebased explanation of the author for
their educational influence in their
own learning, the learning of others
and the learning of the social
formations where they live and
work?
Your abstract (para. 2) states that: "A living theory based on my
values and beliefs is created to explore the narrative in my
educational life around heuristic."
Question: To what extent does this statement express the
perspective of living-theory described as "... the unique embodied
and ostensive expressions of meaning in explanations of an
individual’s educational influence in learning"
(http://ejolts.net/node/2200) ?
Your statement can be reframed as "An exploration of the narrative in
my educational life around heuristic generates a living-theory as a
values-based explanation for my educational influences".
Question: To what extent does this statement express the
perspective of living-theory as described above? i.e. what's the
difference and is it significant?
1b. Is the author transparent about
what constitutes their driving
values, why and how these are
manifested in their practice, and
through what process of reflection.
1c. In other words, has the author
provided sufficient detail of their
living-educational-theory for it to be
understood?
These criteria are met – but more from a 'scientific theory' perspective
than from a living-theory perspective. This perspective (Abstract para.
2) echoes the approach by Rutherford (Geiger/Marsden 1911) who
observed the scattering of alpha particles by gold foil and developed
an atomic theory that was then used to further explore and
understand the properties of other elements.
For me, the answer to this question is 'Yes' – but I think that a shift of
perspective (and voice – see below) might better illuminate my
engagement with and understanding of your values-based
educational influence.
2. Is it potentially
comprehensible to an audience
interested in extending their
knowledge of the transformational
possibilities of Living Theory
research? By this we mean an
audience who wishes to develop
their understanding of how their
core life-affirming and lifeenhancing, ontological and
relational values inform and
transform their lives, personally
and professionally.
I always approach a text with a central question that asks: "How is
this account helping me to further my own living-theory?" In this
respect I look for a dialectical engagement with the text so that I as
the reader may grasp insights to improve the scope of my own livingtheory that relates to my practice and my values as expressed
through it. The two extremes of the spectrum of possible engagement
with a text are described by Roland Barthes as 'readerly' and 'writerly'
– where a 'readerly' text is understood in terms of already familiar
conventions and expectations and has a single reassuringly 'closed'
meaning; by contrast, a 'writerly' text requires the reader to produce
his or her own meanings and is challengingly 'open'; this 'open' play
of possibilities gives the reader an active role as co-writer rather than
as passive consumer. I find that this latter form is more helpful for
furthering my understanding of my own living-theory as I engage with
the author's.
Questions: Where on this Readerly-Writerly spectrum would you
place your account? Is this location its optimal position or could it with
advantage be moved?
3. Can it be understood by
practitioners from diverse fields of
practice and research? Where
context-specific language and
jargon are used, are they clarified?
The text is clearly written and logically organised and should be
accessible to a wide range of readers.
4. Is there sufficient evidence to
support the claims that are made?
The word 'evidence' occurs three times (on p.13) in your paper. With
respect to standards of judgment used for validation, the EJOLTS
guidance at http://ejolts.net/node/220 states: "Researchers’ livingtheory accounts provide explanations and standards of judgment of
‘improving practice’ in terms of their relational and ontological values
that are clarified as they emerge and evolve through their research".
You use phrases such as "I believe ..." and "It seemed to me ..." to
signify claims to knowledge; you tend to validate these claims by
reference to the literature ("The literature reported that ..."). Thus, I
would say that you are giving descriptions and explanations of your
experience that are leading to a theory, but not to a living theory: the
validation/evidence is rooted outside of your practice. A living-theory
researcher can incorporate insights from the literature into his or her
own evolving understanding, but that understanding can never be
reduced to an analysis of those texts.
You say: " ... doesn’t a student saying I did it ‘all on my own’ suggest
that they possess an inner motivation?" (p.7). Motivation, within the
context of the 'learning support interactions' of your title could be a
central theme that claims educational improvement supported by the
voices of your students, giving substance to the requirement that: "An
individual’s living-educational-theories (living-theories) are living, that
is they are evolving and they are lived as they are embodied and
expressed by the researcher through their practice" (EJOLTS
guidance at http://ejolts.net/node/220 ). I regard this guidance as
suggesting that the term 'living-theory' is more an adjective than a
substantive noun.
5. Are there sufficient details of how the author has validated their
claims to know so that the reader can share in that knowledge
through the creative aspects of their own reading?
I refer you here to my responses in
2. and 4. above.
6. Is the normative background of the author and their work clear?
By this we mean has the author provided sufficient details, for
instance, of their socio-cultural, historical, economic and political
contexts, and inter-personal relationships?
A clear picture of 'who you are'
emerges in the course of the text.
7. Is the intra-personal context of the author clear? By this we mean
is there sufficient detail for the reader to know enough about the
author to understand their account?
You offer a clear narrative of the
thinking and reflection that is going
on inside your head.
8. Are the author's' explanatory principles and living standards of
judgement clear in this paper?
The term 'standards of judgement'
occurs once in your paper (p. 6).
9. Is the paper of a high intellectual and scholarly quality? By this we
mean has a reasonable and well-reasoned argument been made and
has the author critically engaged with thinking of others?
Critical engagement with others –
authorities from the literature are
cited to endorse the descriptions
and explanations you are putting
forward; however, insights from
specific quotes from their work are
not critically incorporated in the
account.
10. Is the paper in the EJOLTS house style? (See
http://ejolts.net/submission.)
Yes.