Questioning Learning

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Questioning Learning
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The BMAF research project

• Focus on 3 Undergraduate Business and Management
  modules in Organisation Studies
• Exploring how to work with subject content and
  assessment processes in ways that will develop
  critical thinking and writing skills and be
  consistent with values held by staff and students
  in relation to inquiry based approaches.
• Exploring the emotional dimensions of student and
  staff experiences in relation to this approach
  in particular the role of anxiety in relation to
  learning.

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Underpinning theoretical assumptions

• Learning from experience
• Critical reflection
• The importance of context both internal and
  external
• The significance of different types of knowing

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A process of Inquiry Based Learning(Adapted from
Gibbs, 1998)
DESCRIPTION What happened?
ACTION FEELINGS If it happened again
what What you were thinking and feeling? would
you do? Engaging in dialogue to discover
new meanings CONCLUSIONS EVALUATION What
else could you have done? What was good/bad
about this experience? ANALYSIS What
sense can you make of this?
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How does all this translate into what we mean by
Inquiry Based Learning?

• In inquiry-based learning, students begin by
  identifying their own questions about the topic
  of study.
• Inquiry-based learning requires that students
  play a major role in answering the question.
• Tutors invite students to evaluate and develop
  IBL in dialogue with each other and the tutor.

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Case Study

• Managing Change Module

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What questions do you bring?

• What interests you in the concept of Managing
  Change?
• What learning do you hope to develop?
• In the first tutorials we will work with you to
  help you develop your own inquiry questions.

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Some inquiry questions that tutors bring to the
module

• In what sense can change be managed?
• What are the values and assumptions in
  organisation change initiatives?
• What is the relationship of changes in society to
  changes in business organisations?
• What can be learned about these assumptions from
  stories about change?
• What kinds of changes would we support or reject?

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The Experience.

• Arnolfini visit to exhibition Port City.
• Described as a large-scale international
  exhibition addressing issues of migration, trade
  and contemporary slavery.
• Think of the experience as a stimulus or a
  provocation

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The Onions

• In a thinking mode
• Polarity Black and white.
• Both/And Productivity and decay.
• Layers many levels of understanding.
• Life cycles change and metamorphosis.
• Creativity Use of the functional for other
  purposes.
• In a feeling mode
• Confusion, discomfort, curiosity, amusement,
  energy, enjoyment.

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So what does IBL mean for you / us in this module?

• Identify and research your own question(s) about
  organisational change.
• Keep a log of how your enquiry questions and your
  learning develop and change.
• Participate in group enquiries on organisational
  responses to environmental issues such as climate
  change, the energy crisis or globalisation.
• Offer peer feedback and contribute key learning
  points within your tutorial group .
• Be assessed on the quality of your enquiry.

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How is the module assessed?

• Course work (60)
• Task 1 A 500-1000 word reflection setting out
  initial inquiry questions, how you came to be
  interested in them, and how you intend to
  research them. (10)
• Task 2 Group story board presentation and
  commentary. (30)
• Task 3 a 2000 word essay exploring a set
  question, to be based on the research carried out
  for the story board. (60)
• Exam (40)

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Staff Reactions

• I feel satisfaction if they the students
  seem engaged, even if they dont do it the way I
  would or I asked them to.
• What do they see as learning? Being spoon-fed?
• If you respond to the groups emotion, you know
  what will work and what wont.
• There are times of year, when students and tutors
  are totally wiped out.

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Student Reactions

• The reflection on the learning helps ideas and
  theories to stick in the memory for the long
  term.
• I like the encouragement to build my own
  opinion on things.
• Good way of making me think about practical work
  experiences useful for theory and practice.
• I didnt like any of the module.
• You cant be taught experiential learning it
  happens naturally. Everybody uses their
  experience differently.
• Liked most Freedom to ask questions. Liked
  least There are no definitive answers.

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A Hybrid model of IBL

• Encouragement of student curiosity and desire for
  deep learning, and staff desire to engage with
  student curiosity, as a driver for teaching and
  learning.
• Students and staff engage as reflective
  practitioners.
• Focus on extended epistemology, multiple ways of
  knowing.
• Developing a dialogic approach to enhance the
  quality of student/ staff engagement as teachers
  and learners.
• Working with critical approaches to learning and
  teaching, where learning involves sense making
  and sense giving.
• Recognising teaching and learning as embodied,
  situated processes.

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Outputs

• Grisoni, L., Jarvis, C. and Page, M. (2009) Case
  study on inquiry based approaches to teaching and
  learning in P. Kemp, J.Buswell and N.Becket
  (eds) Student Centred Learning. Oxford Brookes.
• Grisoni, L. Exploring the power of metaphor in
  Sensemaking for Teambased Leadership. 7th
  International Studying Leadership Conference.
  Auckland, New Zealand. December 2008
• Workshop at BMAF conference, Edinburgh. June 2008
• Grisoni, L. The Beauty of Nature in Management.
  Art of Management conference, Banff. September
  2008
• Grisoni, L. Questioning Learning. Unitec
  Teaching and Learning conference, Unitec New
  Zealand. December 2008

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Maori and Pasifika Kaupapa (collective
philosophy principle)
Whanaungatanga (common vision)
Mana (integrity)
Honesty
Consensus
Reciprocity
Collaboration
Titiro whakarango korero (way to be)
Relationship
Mannakitanga (care)
Respect
Collective ownership
Kia tupato (caution)
Tika pono aroha (ethics)
Empowerment
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Maori and Pasifika Kaupapa Methodology

• Whanau extended family structure
• Malie social relations
• Tino Ranatiranatanga self determination
  principle
• Taonga Tuku Iho cultural aspirations principle
• Ako Maori cultural preferred pedagogy principle
• Kia piki ake i nga raruraru o nga kainga
  mediation of socio-economic and home
  difficulties principle