dilemmas+and+issues

this page records our thinking about how we should present our work

I'm temporarily using it for an account of the 21st's meeting as I managed to lose some info on the other page - I'm hoping wikispaces help will be able to retrieve it! I also lost the first version of this - which I hadn't saved properly - and now I'm really dissatisfied with how it's coming out!

We met - at least those of us the snow permitted - Elaine, Ian, Joyce and Joan plus me (Chris).

We did some work on understanding how to use the wiki better and then looked at how we wanted to proceed and how we could communicate that to those of you that couldn't make it.

We wondered if we should just share our original essays - we thought not, as we wanted to check they were appropriate - this involved thinking about
 * who were we writing for and what was the purpose of sharing our essays
 * how we protect the privacy of the people we had written about
 * how we avoid any critcisms we had made of systems or people being taken as unjustified or unfair - or just generally getting us into sticky situations

To tackle this we agreed we were writing for literacies practitioners and others with an interest in literacies as the strong point of the essays was that they all related to real practice at a particular point in time. We agreed each essay should stay under the control of its author and that our role as a group was to support each other to make the essay as suitable as possible for its intended audience by pointing out But we did not want to lose the content of our ideas, even if they were critical of systems or people.
 * where it might not be clear to them (literacies practitioners and others with an interest in literacies) or
 * where it risked identifying individuals (especially learners) or
 * where it made a critcism in terms that were 'whiny' or not founded on any kind of evidence.

We felt vulnerable putting up our writing for others to comment and felt it could be uncomfortable commenting on others' writing, so we felt everyone should have another chance to opt out or to say on what terms they were prepared to collaborate. We also talked about whether it would be useful to write as a group but our preference so far was to write as individuals but have the support of the group. I'll finish writing this up and put up photos of our flip charts tomorrow!

Well it's not tomorrow but almost a month later! Here is the typed up content of the posters

 · A point in time – tensions, change etc · Comments were only true at a moment · Point of essay publication is not academic – current practice that is interesting · Group background – Principles By
 * Our discussions (Elaine Ian Joan Joyce Mary and Chris) **
 * Why not just publish the original essays?
 * Check appropriate for practitioner audience (anonymity of those mentioned, pointing the finger, rephrasing or putting under Chris’s name?)
 * Check for language, sentences, understanding/clarity, are we/ am I making the point we/I think we’re/I’m making?
 * Is everyone going to participate? Opt out clause?
 * Time – TQAL need for February, have January to do this
 * Trying to make it comprehensible for literacies practitioners/people interested in literacies
 * Summary of each essay? Overview/introduction
 * Issues to emphasise **
 * North/NE Scotland
 * Variety of experiences
 *  Variety of circumstances
 * change in circumstances – new situations
 * Questions to consider when reading and reviewing others’ work **
 * Do I understand this? Would someone else understand this?
 * Is there a better way to phrase this? (eg change ‘complained’ to ‘…concerned about’) Can individuals be identified? (have we permission/due care for confidentiality)
 * Is there evidence to back up opinions (as a freestanding piece of work which readers don’t have to pursue in detail)
 * Points to communicate to others in the group **
 * Trust and honesty
 * Not changing content/ ideas
 * Trying to make publication comprehensible to others interested in/working in literacies
 * Making comments on wiki – use different text colour (in body of text) or by adding a comment