What Happens at the Edges
Co-producing research with children.
Introduction
Led by Professor Kate Pahl and Steve Pool, What Happens at the Edges explores ideas about oddness and difference through storytelling and filmmaking.
Kate and Steve worked with the same year group of children for over three years to understand the children’s lived experiences through co-produced research.
They drew on the idea of ‘research-creation’ from Manning and Massumi (2014) to explore the children’s work as researchers, which allowed improvisation and the unfolding of knowledge. An ethical stance was entwined in their work with the children.
research Methods
Kate and Steve devised forms with the children that reflected their understanding of ‘research conferences’ and articles.
Once the children realised what these might be, it was possible to decide whether to say yes or no to these things.
Kate and Steve encouraged presentations at conferences to help create a shared understanding of what the practice of doing research was. This then influenced what they did with the children.
Presenting the research
The children, alongside Kate and Steve, presented their work at a number of conferences, including the ‘Collaboration, Creativity and Complexities’ conference at Manchester Metropolitan University in June 2019 and the British Educational Research Association conference at the University of Manchester in September 2019.
Their work has been shared as part of one of the Odd Labs, as well as at school for two events, in which the film works were projected onto the school.
Following on from the films, Kate, Steve and the children opened up discussions. This analytical process was guided by some key questions:
- How was doing the films different to normal?
- What did they tell us about the idea of feeling Odd?
- Are there any times in school when you feel different to normal?
- What is the Odd project all about and what does it mean to you?
Quote
In the group discussions we were interested in the complexity of meaning making for young people and how a text-artwork can be ‘read’ in many different ways. We were clear that the responses were not necessarily about the work, but were held within the situation of the discussion. Our work was guided by a kind of anticipatory muddle – a sense that if we collapsed the idea of ‘research’ together with the idea of meaning-making the focus would be on listening in to what the children might be saying – a glimpse of another world.
Conclusion
Kate and Steve are currently writing an article that explores the children’s films-as-research, and what they tell us about the experience of school, and of the idea of Odd.
In response to her experiences during the Odd Project and to the COVID-19 ‘lockdown’, Kate has written an opinion piece about the importance of day-dreaming, messing about and unstructured play, inspired by the children’s comments.
Contact us
Contact us
If you have any questions about What Happens at the Edges, please contact Professor Rachel Holmes.