Today I would like to commence with an extreme close-up of a word string from my doctoral thesis then slowly zoom out. The scene opens with the title of Figure A3 filling the screen:
Conceiving the genesis of collective understanding and intent in course team practice of an emergent curriculum of becoming
Unlike the reader of the thesis you may not know a lot about what meaning I invest in these terms, but let’s see how useful my slow zoom out method of description works as a communication device.
Here is the figure:
Uncertainty – a fester of our time, or lure? The diagram is called an uncertainty efflorescence metaphor. While uncertainty is often seen as something to be overcome, replaced by something more tangible and dependable as soon as the situation allows, within a curriculum of becoming, indeed, within an individual’s hermeneutic journey of living, we do well to feel at home in the muddy waters of uncertainty because ‘lack of clarity is the prior state of growth in understanding’ (McKenzie, 2014, p. 111). This principle applies equally whether the subject of inquiry is some facet of the world of the senses, out there, or about ourselves in situ, as we struggle to make sense of the totality of our experience. Our stance in relation to – on the precipice of – being uncertain in this increasingly unpredictable world changes according to our uncertainty threshold, which is related to our ontological–epistemological maturity.
For Stewart (2005), ‘Personal epistemology is the study of how the individual develops a conception of knowledge and how that individual uses that to understand the world.’ My reference above to an individual’s ontological–epistemological maturity seeks to locate personal epistemology within his/her (zher) lifelong journey of becoming, to recognise the imprint of our epistemological beliefs on the life decisions we make. For me personal epistemology is concerned with the individual’s way of judging what counts as valid or true, of judging how she/he (zhe) will live in the light of what zhe takes to be real, or worth the trouble, or both. From the theoretical standpoint of holistic understanding, I want to contemplate the nexus between epistemological development and lived experience; this leaning helps account for my proposition that life is a hermeneutic journey.
"Just as we can only form new meanings for ourselves out of our previous experience of meaning, so, I will speculate, the range of our epistemological doubts will be governed by our existing level of reflective judgment. The black hole is only as deep as I perceive it to be, from where I stand. It’s as if the inner eye adjusts progressively to darkness, as the outer eye adjusts to light […]
"There is no time like the present. The potential I aspire to may still be fuzzy or beyond imagining; but […] if my calling is to create a personal world of thought, then the thought, the mindfulness I cultivate today flows into, forms the substance of my final mature world order: goal-responsive thought can be self-fulfilling" (McKenzie, 2014, pp. 303-304).
Darkness inviting cascades of echoing plugged up of sense dense darkness velvetless untexture.
The phial of unknowing is forever. If it should well up, do not refuse. In pores of openness the spores of entreaty are burgeoning. (McKenzie, 2014, p. 115)
Here the poet is caught pondering on an interior black hole, not with disquiet but equanimity. Could it be – as the poet in question I want to suggest – that trying to express one’s relationship with the unknown can be not only therapeutic and transformative, but also a way of taking one’s ontological–epistemological growth into one’s own hands. Little did my six year old self imagine what he might end up ruminating upon!
Conceiving the genesis of collective understanding and intent in course team practice of an emergent curriculum of becoming
No sooner had I opened this scene with my extreme close-up text string than I widened the subject of this post. My concern here is about the educational challenge of designing a curriculum of becoming on the one hand, and about wider applications of the uncertainty efflorescence metaphor on the other. A teaching team challenged with the possibility of enacting a curriculum of becoming may use the arum lily aura model to explore the fluid understandings, views, worldviews and goals among team members as they ask themselves how to craft and deliver a curriculum of becoming within a given disciplinary or professional setting; however the model is flexible enough to have much wider application. The following extract is from an educational designer professional development workshop handout.
"Scenario. You are dreaming. An arum lily is growing, and as you gaze you begin to think it has an aura. Figure A3 might help you visualise this mental image, but perhaps you can also conceive continuous incremental transition from solid form to diaphanous, ever-blurring, dimming insubstantial glow …
"The arum lily and its aura allow us to contemplate degrees of certainty in our conception of curriculum. Figure A3 depicts the lily dream in a two dimensional space. The horizontal axis of this ‘graph’ represents the duration of a course offering as experienced by students and staff, while the vertical axis calibrates ‘greater’ to ‘lesser’ ‘observability’ – the 'tangible-ephemeral continuum' of the learning environment, represented by the ever-fading aura of the lily. In such a view, principles and practices that are observable, readily, consensually definable, are close to the lily's golden spadix. Much of the ‘constructive alignment’ thinking commonly applied to subject and course design coincides with the tangible end of the observability continuum. Beyond the persuasive logic of that discourse, consensus becomes harder to realise. Mulling and discourse turn to notions of curriculum coherence, and beyond these lie gossamer promises of curriculum integrity. They are harder to agree on because they are less easily recognised. 'Integrity' features are more ephemeral, diaphanous auras, emergent, yet no less important from a curriculum design viewpoint if we are serious about Barnett and Coate's curriculum mantra of 'knowing, acting, being' (Barnett & Coate, 2005)" (McKenzie, 2010).
The aura in the lily dream is, perhaps surprisingly, described in positive terms as an ‘efflorescence’. This is a higher self, ‘glass half-full’, Utopian way of conceiving increasing uncertainty. It aligns with the philosophical hermeneutic view that the open-ended and innately unpredictable journey to understanding takes us to in-between spaces that invite/provoke hermeneutic transcendence.
Could this tool be used to help overcome any problems or obstacles in professional education curriculum practice today? Educators and academics generally are highly adept at analysing and arguing matters on which ground rules and definitions are agreed, but, as my workshop handout argues, are less sure-footed as uncertainty spreads its fog and renders agreement on concept and even problem definitions elusive. At the further reaches of the lily’s aura, root definitions of self whisp into air. The uncertainty efflorescence chart is a tool that could help course teams, in their unique disciplinary/professional contexts, problematise – and seek shared understanding of – the gradient of uncertainty in what they are attempting, in terms of the curriculum WHAT and HOW. By changing its title, the chart could also conceivably be used with students, supporting their conceptualising of their own private meaning making journeys; or again, with course teams, as they try to conceptualise their metamorphosis into course communities of belonging. (McKenzie, 2014, pp. 355-356)
I invite you to draw your own conclusion! (Note: see my next post, Where do we stand? Soundings in learning for uncertain times, for further discussion on the lily metaphor.)
References
Barnett, R., & Coate, K. (2005). Engaging the curriculum in higher education. Maidenhead, UK: Society for Research into Higher Education and Open University Press.
McKenzie, A. (2014). Meaning making: A university curriculum framework for the twenty-first century. Saarbrucken: LAP Lambert Academic Publishing. ISBN 978-3-659-52667-1. Available here https://www.morebooks.de/store/gb/book/meaning-making:-a-university-curriculum-framework-for-the-21st-century/isbn/978-3-659-52667-1
Stewart, L. S. (2005). Personal epistemology: The psychology of beliefs about knowledge and knowing (review). Journal of College Student Development 46(2), 217-218. https://doi.org/10.1353/csd.2005.0021
Image: Don Quixote by Dario Rivarossa – http://iltassista.deviantart.com/art/Paradise-Lost-Unrewarded-Deeds-284988893 | Restrictions on use apply; see Creative Commons licence – http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/