In Erben’s (1998) book on biographical methods, he submits that it is necessary to interpret the complexity of an individual’s narrative using as wide a range of methods as possible owing to the suggestion that 'man is an animal suspended in webs of significance he himself has spun'(Geertz, 1973 in Erben, 1998: 5). That is to say that the complexity of human
constructions such as culture, society or politics and the experiences and perspectives of the individuals within them cannot be unpicked by using any single method alone. In modelling the narrative approach of this study upon an ecosystem, this chapter has shown that data will need to be collected from a range of different sources in order to build up a full picture of the cultivation of creativity in each early years system. Different sources will naturally call for different methods: the full range of which, their implementations, implications and how they were analysed will be explored throughout this section.
Beginning from the outer layer of the ecosystem, the narrative of the historical context of early years education in both countries was explored, investigating the presence of creativity within those systems over time. This was achieved via analysis of a range of documents, from
historical accounts and reports to more recent books and articles. Next, the study examined the cultural beliefs and values in each country that might impact upon creativity, using a similar range of documents. This was followed by analysis of policy and politics influencing early years provision, including the statutory frameworks in England and Catalonia regarding education in the early years. As this category varies slightly between the two countries, focus is maintained on the requirements which apply to 3-4 year olds. Regarding how these
frameworks are put into practice and how they impact on the fostering of creativity in young children, several methods were implemented in early years settings in each country. The practitioners’ views and experiences concerning creativity and education were captured through interviews and the writing of reflective stories. Narrative observations were conducted to see whether the practice is adequate to foster creativity. Finally, this study
73 endeavoured to capture the children’s voice on the matter, using techniques taken from the Mosaic Approach (Clark & Moss, 2001) – a walking tour and map-making - in order to establish whether the children themselves felt able to exercise their creativity.
The first of these methods, documentary analysis, is a method that may traditionally have been overlooked in educational research (Robinson, 2010). Documentary analysis may also be called content analysis, and its applications may range from inferring meaning from the
content of the text, to reconstructing a history (Robson, 1993). In fact, this last application may be viewed as one of its greatest assets: documentary analysis can help to firmly contextualise the research, to set the scene for the story as many of its methods are derived from historical methods (Robinson, 2010). This is helpful to a study such as this that seeks to understand not just what the impacts on fostering creativity are, but how they arose. Though an
understanding of history in this way may be helpful, history should also be treated with caution. Williams (1983) writes that in early English use the words history and story were both used interchangeably for narratives of real or imaginary events. This is root is reflected in modern Spanish use, where the one word historia may signify both meanings. Henry Ford’s declaration that 'History is bunk' has entered the public consciousness to such an extent that it no longer appears to be a quote, more a proverb. It is important to maintain this sense of suspicion towards history, not because it should be dismissed as nonsense or outright fiction – not all historians share Herodotus’ love of a tall tale – but because of the process of writing it. History is written by people and people are fallible: to quote another well-known saying 'don’t believe everything that you read'.
Within documentary research, there is an occasionally contentious hierarchy applied to the types of documents to be analysed. Primary sources, made close to the time of interest, can be viewed as more important than secondary sources, which are documents made about the primary sources (Robinson, 2010). These may well have been written some time later or indeed filtered through the lens of the writer’s own values and beliefs. In truth, however, no document can be relied upon for honesty and transparency: it has been written for a reason. As a result, it has been suggested that the premise of documentary research is that no document should be taken at face value (Hammond & Wellington, 2012). Robson (1993) highlights the importance of taking into account both witting and unwitting evidence from a text; the former being the information that the writer intended to convey, the latter being everything else that can be ascertained. This last category may include clues within the text to the writer’s views or experiences such as turns of phrase or styles of writing, or the format the
74 text appears in such as a newspaper opinion piece or a journal article. There are several approaches that may be used within documentary analysis including: hermeneutics, linguistic analysis, discourse analysis, semiotic analysis, quantitative content analysis and grounded theory (Robinson, 2010).
Documentary analysis was chosen not only for the reasons highlighted above, but also because it is indicated as being complementary to other types of data collection in a mixed-method approach (Robinson, 2010), such as narrative methodology. The affinity between history and narrative suggested that it would suit the outer systems of each educational approach: chronological context, culture and policy development. In order to address the issues around reliability with regard to the 'truthfulness' of texts, this study has endeavoured to triangulate information from historical accounts with policy and official documentation, such as
curriculums and their supporting material. These documents have been analysed using grounded theory: though this has traditionally been thought of as a methodology, Cho & Lee (2014) argue that its philosophical basis means that it can work equally well as a method. It is most appropriate for when no theory exists or requires proving and the researcher is aiming to simply explain the phenomenon (Cho & Lee, 2014), thus it seems ideally suited to the process of narrating the context and development of attitudes towards early years education and creativity. The philosophy behind the grounded theory method reflects the pragmatic
epistemological basis of this study, as it seeks to explore what is there as opposed to trying to fit the data into a priori categories (see Hammond & Wellington, 2012).
Grounded theory involves data collection and analysis taking place in tandem (Cho & Lee, 2014), meaning that in this study; the processing of one document pointed the way to the next: was further depth required on the subject; what was the next event chronologically? Data for grounded theory should be compared and contrasted and selected in such a way as to provide different perspectives on the phenomena under study (Cho & Lee, 2014). It has not always been possible to look at primary resources, particularly those around the history of early years education owing to time and geographical constraints, though the study has endeavoured to use the work of several writers of secondary sources around each area in order to attempt to mitigate bias in the overall account. The use of this method not only shows how policy and practice have developed, but also the socio-cultural factors in existence that may affect the individuals: how is creativity collectively thought of? Is it viewed as the preserve of the talented? Is it a luxury, a waste of time? Owing to the difficulties highlighted in the previous chapter in pinpointing what creativity is and indeed the fact that it is not always
75 explicitly identified as an outcome, this method also referred to the core features of learners’ and teacher’s engagement (Cremin et al., 2006 in Craft, 2008) where necessary in order to identify whether or not creativity was valued by the perspectives explored. These features consist of Posing Questions, Play, Immersion in a Loving Environment, Innovation, Being Imaginative, Self-determination and Risk-taking.
Having used documentary analysis to try to set the scene of the narrative, the methods that follow focus upon the characters appearing in the story: the professionals who work directly with children in early years settings and the children themselves. For each group, it was
decided to use two different methods and one to look at the interaction between the two. This would hopefully, if not triangulate the data in the truest sense of the word, at least try to corroborate the findings. This decision was taken in light of Robson’s (1993) view that multiple methods can help to reduce 'inappropriate certainty' about data that may occur when only one method is used. This is particularly important in a study like this one, which is interested in the whole story around early years education and creativity: an interview may yield one set of data that may be entirely contradicted by the actions of the same participant during an observation. Such an approach is not without its pitfalls: Robson (1993) cautions that the potential for differences in the data may also lead to uncertainty or even confusion. In terms of this project, however, differences (should they occur) might in themselves offer valuable clues about the overall narrative. A possible difference between interview data and observed behaviour should be probed in light of the questions raised in the previous chapter regarding the 'gap between theory and practice' (Carr, 1980).
In trying to establish the effect of varying factors such as history, culture, training, experience and values upon a professional’s practice, it is necessary to look at both the witting and unwitting information that they might supply. Thus a person would certainly know what they had learnt about creativity, but owing to their experience of their culture as normal, they might not be conscious of how culture has affected their disposition. The researcher would need to find a way to unlock that unwitting information. Consequently, using a balance of methods that favoured the collection of each type of information would be helpful to the project. In the case of the methods used with the young children, the rationale of using multiple methods would also help to respect the 'hundred languages of children' (Malaguzzi, 1997 in Thornton & Brunton, 2005): the notion that children may communicate in myriad ways, not necessarily connected to their speaking abilities. Differing methods would hopefully widen the ways in which each child would be able to communicate with the researcher. This
76 idea was also extended to the adults in the study on the basis that they too might find it easier or more comfortable to express themselves using one method rather than another.
With the practitioners, the methods used were face-to-face interviews and writing short, anonymous reflective stories. The interviews, barring some closed questions at the beginning, consisted of questions that allowed the practitioner to tell their own stories regarding early years education and creativity, asking questions about their experience, knowledge and opinions (see Appendix D), which could then be themed and compared against the data from the other methods. Hobson & Townsend (2010) support this intention, pointing out that this method is very useful for covering a wide range of topics at a time and for addressing issues that would not be possible through observation alone. However, they do highlight that it is not a neutral method, it is coloured by the very presence of the researcher who may be considered a 'co-producer' of the data (Hobson & Townsend, 2010). This means that the answers to the questions may have been affected by the participants’ reactions to me: they knew at least a little about me and my background, that I am interested in both education and creativity, they may have felt affinity or antipathy towards me, all of which may have controlled how they answered.
To try to mitigate this, and bearing in mind Erben’s (1998) statement that capturing the complexity of experience requires a complexity of methods, the second method was developed. This approach sought to capture practitioners’ views and experiences about creativity in early years education in a more oblique manner than the interviews, which risked telling me what I wanted to hear. Practitioners were given a sheet of paper with the
instruction to write a reflective story about one memorable event, either from their practice or own education, regarding creativity and education in the hope of turning up some of Webster & Mertova's (2007) 'critical incidents'. Such documents have the benefit of being primary documents with clear authenticity, as they will be received directly from the authors (see Robinson, 2010). Interestingly, documentary research cautions greatly against the biases that may be found within documents (Robinson, 2010), yet it is precisely those biases that this method hoped to tease out. As opposed to the grounded theory approach taken by the documentary analysis in the wider systems, this method was more concerned with linguistic and discourse content. It would focus on the language used in the text and what it conveyed about the meaning of the subject matter (e.g. creativity) to the participant (see Bazeley, 2013). This meant analysis for themes and keywords to help flesh out what creativity meant to these
77 practitioners, examining their witting or unwitting indications and then triangulating them with the interview data and the observations.
The use of the narrative model shows that the progress of the protagonist is influenced by the setting and the external mechanisms in the story: no forest means no wolf, and no wolf means a very different conclusion for Little Red Riding Hood. Accordingly, it is important to look at the path that links the inner world of the protagonist with the outer world. In the case of
educational approaches, this path is the practice taking place in the early years settings, linking the child’s microsystem with the exo- and macrosystems of legislation, curriculum, governance and culture. As was established in the previous chapter, to say whether practice is producing creativity is too subjective, therefore the study was looking for certain features which indicate whether or not creativity is being fostered: the core features of learners’ and teacher’s engagement (Cremin et al., 2006 in Craft, 2008) once again. The following table shows how those features might manifest in practice, using the descriptions supplied by Craft (2008):
Figure 3 - Criteria for the core features (adapted from: Craft, 2008). •Children's questions spoken aloud or implied through behaviour
•Staff modelling out loud questioning and respecting children's questions •'As if' scenarios.