Journal Writing and Learning: reading between the

Studies in Continuing Education

ISSN: 0158-037X (Print) 1470-126X (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/csce20

Journal Writing and Learning: Reading between the structural, holistic, and post-structural lines Greg Mannion To cite this article: Greg Mannion (2001) Journal Writing and Learning: Reading between the structural, holistic, and post-structural lines, Studies in Continuing Education, 23:1, 95-115, DOI: 10.1080/01580370120043268 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01580370120043268

Published online: 25 Aug 2010.

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Date: 26 June 2017, At: 03:46

Studies in Continuing Education, Vol. 23, No. 1, 2001

Journal Writing and Learning: reading between the structural, holistic, and post-structural lines GREG MANNION University of Stirling, Scotland

This paper explores the use of journal writing for providing adults with the opportunity of re¯ ecting on their learning. The article examines the author’ s own experiences teaching students on an undergraduate part-time degree evening course where journal writing was an important component. Three understandings of journal writing are compared using examples from students’ journal entries. They are characterised as structural, holistic, and post-structural positions, respectively. Structural approaches to journal writing claim bene® ts in enabling the learner to manage her/his own subjectivity with a view to ® nding an ª objective truthº . An holistic approach, while ª usefulº , attempts to synthesise multiple ways of knowing and presents a false sense of completion and inclusion. The post-structural view positions the learner intertextually in a processual learning context where the text the student writes is driven by other discourses. Here, the student/journal writer is constituted by discourse but not necessarily determined by it because the strategies of re¯ exivity and deconstruction are available. This last position draws on the sociology of interpretative biography and narrative theory. The implications for assessment and the ethical dimensions of privacy and disclosure of student journals are examined also. ABSTRACT

Background to Writing the Paper This paper has been written out of the experience of teaching on a part-time modular degree programme for undergraduates on a course entitled Ènvironment and Learning’. In collaboration with a colleague, Ms K. Sankey, I used three different ways of encouraging learners in their efforts to write and submit their journal entries. We also tried out varying levels of privacy and disclosure for assessment and for discussion as part of their participation in this undergraduate course of some 30 hours over 2 years. In this paper I discuss three approaches to journal writing in learning by looking at their journal entries. I call these approaches structural, holistic, and post-structural, respectively, which broadly correspond to three paradigms that continue to compete for my understanding of journal writing as a tool for learning. These models re¯ ect the theoretical underpinnings we used to encourage journal writing, but they also act as ª signpostsº on the journey I travelled in my own thinking about journal writing as a facilitator on the course. I have not ISSN 0158-037X print; 1470-126X online/01/010095-21 Ó DOI: 10.1080/01580370120043268

2001 Taylor & Francis Ltd

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set out to describe all approaches to journal writing in a comprehensive rubric. Noticeably absent is a critical approach to analyse any form of ª raised consciousnessº , although evidence can be read in that way. Instead, I have attempted to draw three caricatures that might demonstrate how journal writing and assessment can be construed in different and, perhaps, con¯ icting ways because of their differing epistemological attitudes to what counts as ª writingº , ª genreº , ª knowledgeº and ª experienceº in learning in higher education. Narrating Re¯ ection on Practice Some authors have been willing to advance the notion that re¯ ective practice is an important part of learning for the teaching profession (Day, 1993). Others draw on the common-sense notions that teachers share about learning that are used to inspire learners to reappraise their thinking. Elbaz (1991) characterises teachers’ knowledge as having a narrative structure. There is some literature that suggests that re¯ ective practice is empowering for participants (Osterman & Kottkamp, 1993). Similarly, Schon’ s re¯ ective practice model is advocated mainly because it provides an opportunity for learners to reframe problems and draw on past experience (Schon, 1987). Elbaz (1991) encourages a process of discourse analysis to reveal the conceptual categories that inscribe institutional power. These ideas, mainly about the pre-service and in-service education of teachers in¯ uenced my desire to encourage the participants on an undergraduate course to try out journal writing. I was also keen to see if there was a valid way of using their writings as a form of assessment of learning. There were no studies that I could ® nd that advanced the idea that learners of all kinds could pro® t from the use of journal writing as a re¯ ective learning tool. My argument is premised on the notion that re¯ ection on one’s ª practiceº as a scientist, citizen, or ª lifelong learnerº is undoubtedly as important as re¯ ection on practice as a future or practising teacher. Given that this is so, journal writing may be a worthwhile component of a student’s learning experience which could facilitate this. So I advance the idea that we can begin to transfer the thinking from other ® elds (like teacher education) to inform and critique innovations in the learning methodologies we could employ in any setting. The potential of journal writing in higher education is not well conceptualised or studied, however, even within teacher education circles. The objective of this paper is to make a start at ® lling this gap. Other Studies Clegg (1995, 1996) has highlighted the potential of journals as a re¯ ective tool for doctoral students. She has used Holly’ s theory of journal, log and diary writing (Holly, 1989) to get students re¯ ecting on their own learning and supervision. Holly suggests that emotionally signi® cant events can be introduced into journals by encouraging authors to visualise, recall, recount and describe the signi® cant details. Drawing on the potential for introducing the emotional content of learning, Clegg has used her journal writing as a tool for the assessment of supervision of students.

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Like the journal writing used in this study, students were also encouraged to experiment with writing and ª ® nding a voiceº . Clegg found it worthwhile to encourage students to collaborate with others (ª mentorsº ) in their journal writing. By contrast, the learners who wrote in their journals in this study were undergraduates who received no mentorship in their efforts to write. Some of Clegg’ s participants describe the experience of journal writing as liberating: it allowed learners to transcend disciplinary boundaries. Journal writing can also allow new types of ª storyº to be legitimated in academic discourse: the personal, the intimate, the transdisciplinary. Given that environmental problems are also often interdisciplinary, I felt it would be another reason for encouraging students of environmental education to engage in re¯ ection by keeping a journal. Many other areas of study also demand a change in mindset about the rigidity of the disciplinary boundaries in order to best deal with the knowledge types with which they grapple: feminism, post-colonialism, literary criticism, and even traditional disciplines like education and history are now happier to present courses that ª blur the boundariesº between the disciplines. We may see the rise in interest in learning ª aidsº (like journal writing) which encourage the re¯ ective practice of the lifelong learner as s/he navigates between an ever more diverse range of disciplines and ever more diverse ways of interpreting knowledge. A Structural Account of Journal Writing The ® rst schema for conceptualising journal writing I present is best depicted by the word ª structuralº . By ª structuralº I mean ª explicitly theory drivenº or prescriptive in de® ning a discipline/genre/methodology for the journal writing task. Bloom’s taxonomy (1956), for example, has been used and adapted by many educationalists in many settings. It has been used to provide a framework for journal writing too: Journal entries can combine two or more of the ® ve levels of thinking known as Bloom’ s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives. Where possible, incorporate several ideas in one entry. ¼ We would prefer if the journal entries are predominantly cognitive in tone. (From an initial draft of guidelines on journal writing) Bloom’ s taxonomy of educational objectives gives us ® ve distinct ways of viewing learners’ thinking and, therefore, ® ve ways of inspiring and viewing journal entries too. Students, following or being exposed to this discourse, will be discouraged from the anecdotal, the conversational, and the deeply personal. They are encouraged, instead, to demonstrate their knowledge by displaying examples of concepts, application of a concept to a new context, analysis of concepts, synthesis of two or more concepts into a new concept, or by enacting an evaluation of a concept which uses evidence to judge its strength. Initially, the students were introduced to such a ª structural discourseº ; they were reminded that their journals would be assessed under the Bloomian headings: comprehension of knowledge, application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. They were be directed to use ª higher cognitive skillsº rather than anything personal, conversational, or metaphorical in tone.

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Students can reveal their knowledge, skills, and learning processes in a cognitiveoriented journal in a manner that is ethically acceptable, comfortable, and open to objective evaluation (Hettich, 1990, p. 36). Given that all writing is riven with power relations from somewhere, this model attempts to name explicitly what is expected from the authors; it is imposed on the writers openly. It disciplines and controls writing along predetermined and traditionally rational lines. By this model, the ª personalº was invited but only into the rational structures named by us: those in control. It left little room for the students to do any critiquing of the form of the discourse itself which inspired the structures given to them. In the same way it tended to preclude any discussion about the teaching style used in class or the discourses encountered in the literature. These aspects of learning were placed outside of acceptable argument because the model appeared to be ª sensibleº and elevated certain modes of learning over others because that is the ª naturally obvious way to proceedº . We found that this kind of genre is potentially an imposition that occludes debate about what might count as valuable ª learning experienceº and hence worthy of inclusion in a journal. It seemed to imply that a certain kind of knowledge was ª what we were afterº as teachers and that this knowledge was objectively assessable. Yet, many practitioners will feel comfortable and ª at homeº with this approach. It will ª serve their needsº for enabling learners to ª achieveº what is valued as ª learning and knowledgeº . Ethically, there is comfort in being ª self-assuredº that by encouraging a cognitive style that nothing too personal will be revealed, as if ª cognitionº is an internal process that emanates from the self but somehow separates itself from self at the same time. This epistemology is based on the assumption that subjectivity and objectivity are controllable polarities that can be successfully ª managedº for better learning. Heshusius criticises efforts to manage one’s subjectivity in re¯ ective research practices, advocating instead a more participatory approach to our involvement in knowledge generation (Heshusius, 1994). Structural approaches attempt to convert ª tacit knowledgeº (Polanyi, 1966) into objective knowledge. This conversion is dependent upon Western understandings of individuation and independent identity and a dualistic belief in self± other relationships. It is also dependent on the perceived need to create distance between the knower and the known (Heshusius, 1994, p. 17). There appears to be a dif® culty here in the opposition between the perceived ª need for objectivityº and the concurrent need to be autobiographical in journal writing as a genre. We might view this as the desire on the educator’s part to get the learner literally to ª take her/his own lifeº and, upon depersonalising it as a conceptual edi® ce, lay it on to the journal page. Being autobiographical means sourcing the raw material for writing from one’ s life experience. This sits uneasily with being ª strictly cognitiveº for some educators. From our experience, despite giving structured advice to learners, I found varied evidence that journal writers wrote ª effectivelyº using this taxonomy. In their writing they sometimes ignored the structure they were given. They resorted to much ª conversational toneº and drew mainly from what some might call their ª subjective realmº . Only one student attempted to ª stay at a conceptual levelº for only part of the journal in our


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evaluations. The rest of the cohort, initially, ª lapsedº (probably unconsciously) into narratives about the evening’ s learning experiences interspersed with judgements (largely ª unsupportedº except by their own experience) about their effectiveness. Given that journal content was initially drawn from students’ re¯ ections on their personal lives, this was hardly surprising. It was further evidence that the ª theory± practiceº divide was not easily breached. They tended to make only distant connections with any particular course content. The connections were presumably either too esoteric to write about or were too complex to present on paper. Upon reading their work, I struggled to ® nd another model for encouraging journal writing and analysing their work. To encourage greater freedom in their journal writing, I looked to an epistemologically holistic discourse to serve my needs. I use such a model here to analyse the later entries. An Holistic Model of Journal Writing and Analysis Holistic models could be described as ª semi-structuralº or simply another version of a structural theoretical position. These approaches do attempt to prescribe and delineate what counts as a ª goodº journal entry as against a less valuable one but, unlike structuralist approaches, this may be done implicitly rather than explicitly. So, while they challenge the structural models of Bloom and others for being overly ª cognitiveº they foreground other ª ways of knowingº instead. These structures are often less speci® c in their descriptions involving ª dynamic modelsº and claims for ª holisticº interpretations. Lukinsky (1990) provides three broad brush strokes for analysing the kinds of entries to be found in learners’ journals characterised by the changing focus from ª beforeº , ª duringº , and ª afterº learning: Before ¼ ª Journal writing enables students to think for themselves, to grasp a fading embryonic insight, and to trust their fragile, emerging sense of the problem before being squashed by the ¯ ow of others’ ideasº ¼ During ¼ 0 A pause in the learning activityº (provided by journal writing) ª allows the individual or group to re¯ ect upon what is now being learned. This is crystallised in the journal and may be fed back into the shared learning experienceº ¼ and After ¼ 0 Looking back upon the learning completed, the student connects to it at the level of the ìnner life’ (Ranier, 1978; Fulwiler, 1987)º (Lukinsky, 1990, p. 218). Holistic practitioners would advocate more intuitive and metaphorical ª ways of generating knowledgeº or ª personal stories of journeys of discoveryº . They characterise journal writers as people who ª go insideº to write and in doing so exteriorise their inner processes on the page from which they can then learn. Unlike the ª narrowº journals of the past, the ª newº journal is characterised as an all-embracing funnel for almost any type of personal development: The ª newº journal, then, is a tool for connecting thought feeling and actionÐ a synthesising tool that works from the inside out and the outside in. (Lukinsky, 1990, p. 214) Keeping a journal may help adults break habitual modes of thinking and change life direction through re¯ ective withdrawal and re-entry. I refer to

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G. Mannion ultimate long-range purposes but also to being able to step back from an incident, a conversation, a reading, from something heard or seen and to re¯ ect upon it and to return to it with understanding. (Lukinsky, 1990, p. 213)

Holistic practitioners hone in on the process rather than the product of journal writing. They advocate writing subjective accounts to throw up experience that can be the ª meatº of personal development and growth. For Lukinsky ª meaning is emergent, kinesthetically felt in the course of the writing. The writing, more than a means to an end, generates momentum and is, in a deeper sense, the meaning. Something happens now, as opposed to recording what has happened, and the journal becomes the objecti® cation of the inner search, an anchor from which to make further explorationsº (Lukinsky’ s emphasis) (Lukinsky, 1990, p. 214). We might imagine educators using this model to be magicians who draw the ª truthº out of the learner’ s personal journey on to the journal page. Once the text is ª downloadedº from our lost ª subjectiveº selves, there is an opportunity for seeing into what is ª reallyº going on and then new learning can take place. The binary opposition set up is between an inner and an outer world. Learning takes place by using journal writing to move between these. Mulligan, discussing experiential learning, presents a dynamic interactive interpretation of seven categories that he suggests may be useful in categorising ª internal actions, required to learn effectively from experienceº (Mulligan, 1993, p. 46). Holism, I imagine, would gladly harness such categories as these as a way of analysing journal entries. He lists reasoning, feeling, sensing, intuiting, remembering, imagining, and willing in an interrelated tri-polar structure. Three binary oppositions are set up between imagining and remembering, sensing and intuiting, and feeling and reasoning (see Figure 1). At the heart of his model is an individualistic aim of having the ability to ª willº . He says: Had my parents and teachers had some way of mapping and explaining such a concept [of ª willº to me] ¼ I believe that much of the suffering and self-doubt which I endured would have been unnecessary. (Mulligan, 1993, p. 57) So, having left Bloom aside, I took Mulligan’ s account of ª experienceº to demonstrate how journal entries could be slotted into his categories. The job is functional in that it presents a coherent description of a ª realityº . It may neglect many other meanings to be found in these texts and obscure them by its apparently seamless holism. Like Bloom’ s rational account, holism leaves little room for openness; everything can be incorporated into holistic theories. Notwithstanding this, I use his schema pragmatically to analyse more of the students’ texts. Willing: integrates and harmonises all the others ¼ ments and choices

involves our ability to make commit-

This student is addressing the need to set about ª willingº : I am a ª thinkerº not a ª doerº (my excuse for being lazy). To actively take


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FIG. 1. From Mulligan (1993, ® gure 3.1, p. 47).

part in a project is not in my nature. To become a ª doerº requires a fundamental change in my personality. Can I do it? Well, I can try but I am sure I will fail many times before I succeed. (Student’s journal) Remembering: ª the memory ¼ has its clarity and its blanks, hidden recesses and readily assessable recordingsº (Mulligan, 1993, p. 55) Here a student recalls vivid memories but recalls them in a different context. Is this as a direct and simple result of her participation in the course and her practice of journal writing or are these comments for the bene® t of the readers? When I look from my bedroom window I can see tall chimneys billowing fumes. I can recall from childhood driving past Grangemouth counting the chimneys that blasted fumes into the air. Not until now have I really thought about the consequences of what I see on a daily basis. (Student’s journal) Imagining: our ability to create images using all the senses, visual, kinesthetic, olfactory, gustatory, auditory which allows for a transcendence of ª realityº through metaphorical ª playº One student submitted many cartoons in her journal as commentary on her learning experience. A journal entry from her captures her learning style and exempli® es how some internalise or are affected by ª course contentº . On the night in question we were examining ecofeminism: While the lecture was going on I was doing something very naughty. Before the lecture started I had started to draw a tree on the front of my folder and

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G. Mannion as the lecture progressed, the tree began to look suspiciously like a woman. (Student’ s journal)

Sensing: being able to gather ª undistorted sensory data, or at least being aware of one’ s biasº (Mulligan, 1993, p. 56) ¼ requires engagement in a situation This student jots down sensations in a way that draws the reader into the experience, as if they are happening just now: When I got into the car and drove home I noticed the moon. It wasn’t quite full but it was bright and a beautiful peach colour. I enjoyed the drive home in the moonlight and what really rounded off a most enjoyable evening for me was stepping out of the car when I got home and hearing ª peep, ª peepº , ª peepº . The oystercatchers have returned: a sure herald that spring is on its way. (Student’ s journal) This student has recalled an experience (remembering) that involved his senses. Re-membering the incident with other environmentally related experiences in his ª Ecological Autobiographyº has a signi® cance ª beyond the textº : A memorable experience was getting sunburned while having a snowball ® ght in mid-summer on Ben Wyvis. (Student’s journal) Feeling: is our ability to make judgements based on our emotions which tell us if our needs are being ful® lled or not ¼ it is subjective This student reports affective responses to a particular meditative exercise. He re¯ ects on his feelings, however, and doesn’ t leave them outside of the context of learning about environmental education epistemology. Holistically speaking, he connects his inner and outer worlds out of his combined affective and reasoning sensibilities!: I found the contemplative, meditative exercise ¼ to be a very useful way of encouraging empathy with nature ¼ I found it entirely enjoyable. My own preference for artistic and emotional expression over facts and ® gures makes those types of exercise very worthwhile to me. I agree entirely with the notion of interpretivist theory ¼ mentioned in the article on the ideology of environmental education research. (Student’s journal) Reasoning: our ability to think which allows us to draw upon theories, constructs, concepts and beliefs ¼ at its best is logical and objective It is dif® cult to pick out journal entries that ® t neatly into the categories, which is the inevitable problem with ª holisticº schemas even if they are dynamic. So, here is a student who is presumably ª reasoningº while simultaneously, ª intuitingº or maybe even ª willingº ? And what about ª valuingº /ª judgingº ? We must beware of using young people to carry ideas and values, however


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sound and correct we feel those values to be. There is something fundamentally suspect about ª usingº children to ª get atº adults’ attitudes. We may begin with environmental education but could end with overtly political or spiritual/religious information or values being fed to the population through their children. A more ethical standpoint may be to allow greater community involvement in issues which deal with environmental education in a practical way. (Student’ s journal) Intuiting: our ability to get a sense of the unstated by standing back and de-focusing from a situation ¼ can be somewhat imprecise and metaphorical or symbolic in its expression ¼ guesses, hunches and hypotheses ¼ requires a distance from a situation Here a student writes about a ª realº situation. Through her text she extrapolates intuitively and symbolically about the pros and cons of planning in a linear way as against intuiting one’s way in and through experience: I was looking from my kitchen window and I noticed some ª workmenº ¼ They were digging trenches for what looked like water pipes ¼ I couldn’t help but wonder if they had planned to dig where they had dug or had they learned their way. This tied in a little with a page I had read about envisioning a sustainable society. This said that the only way to transform to a sustainable society is to learn our way (Lester W. Milbrath). Just like with these pipes the only way to dodge all the tree roots and rabbit holes is to learn your way. The problem with Mulligan’s categories is that many journal comments are harder to categorise into any of the above forms. Here, in this longer extract, a student works hard rationally (reasoning) to expose his need and commitment (willing) to new ways of learning. There is also a high affective (feeling) content and all the while he draws together (intuiting) his ª storyº from many sources. We can hardly dissect this quote into different categories without losing something of the overall sense that there is ª something happeningº for the student. We might say he has told a story about replacing one set of presuppositions with another or that there is an ª epiphanyº in his thinking (Denzin, 1989): Another thing I learned was more personal and was to do with selfcon® dence. We were talking about the ecological autobiography. When I read the article describing the process of writing the autobiography I didn’ t fully understand it and I worried that I would be the only one who had dif® culty with it. During the session it became increasingly clear that it wasn’ t relevant to my experience. I felt that my reaction to it was not what everyone else would feel. I learnt, on re¯ ection, that what I thought and felt was as valid as the next person’ s and that I must have more con® dence in my individuality . Instead of thinking that it worked for everyone else so it must work for me and if it doesn’ t then its because I’ ve got a problem, I must have con® dence that my way of working may be different from others but it is every bit as valid. It is O.K. to be like that.

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G. Mannion Finally, I learned that there are different forms of learning and that just because you don’ t sit down and learn facts it doesn’ t mean that there has been no learning. Some forms of learning are harder to equate and take re¯ ection and analysis. But this type of learning I ® nd exciting because I’ ve done the exploring and learning myself. Learning is not just acquiring facts but also about gaining insights and fundamental understandings about yourself, people, and the world in which we live. (Student’s journal)

However, holism seems to get bound up by its desire to present discourse as ª all inclusiveº , a strategy which it may not achieve successfully. Holism’ s presentation of a comprehensive form of analysis may serve to hide what is not being said about these students’ work. Alternatively, let’ s try to see the above extract as a record of a learner’s ª readingº of others’ texts: the article he refers to, the ª storyº of consensual knowledge he no longer buys into, and an embrace of relativity and difference. Can we validly/usefully see the ª journal authorº as a ª storytellerº amid the stories that interpenetrate and construct one’ s life, whether their sources are academic, popular culture, or life history? This move away from holism brings us to post-structuralism. A Post-structural Irrationale: theory as story To explore a post-structural account will bring us to a particular understanding of discourse as ª storyº . Culture provides us with a larger frame of reference out of which the particularities of discourse emerge: language itself, ideologies, understandings and stories about shared experience. Our personal story ¯ ows out from this as a particular interpretation of this body of discourse. This story is ª biasedº in its selection of certain elements and the backgrounding of others. However, by participating in culture through a ª lifeº /ª life-storyº one may impact on the larger cultural body of discourse (Denzin, 1989). The sociologist’ s task is rendered dif® cult and probably impossible to complete by the way discourse works: A discourse doesn’ t discover objects of knowledge, but through its disciplined and systematic way of seeing, thinking and acting constitutes or ª makesº them but without appearing to do so. (Usher, 1993, p. 169) This understanding places the educator, the sociologist (and the author of this article) in a dif® cult position. Furthermore, what is true for discourse in students’ journals is true for the discourse effecting the analysis of journals: To read is to interpret, to give meaning. (Usher, 1993, p. 170) We all draw from our own store of ª prejudicesº and pre-understandings when we read (Usher, 1993; Gadamer, 1975). Learners’ journals do not act as ª windowsº upon a reality. There is no intrinsic meaning waiting to be discovered that is unmediated by somebody’ s discourse. Meaning, then, is relational: it relates to a whole chain of language. We cannot ® nd the truth. Meaning is materially and linguistically contextual: when the learners write about their ª experienceº they draw


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from a bank of cultural meanings and signi® cations, and when course organisers read learners’ journals they will do the same, drawing in turn from their own experiential history.

A Post-structural Account of Journal Writing In contrast to the holistic model, a post-structural/phenomenological approach will argue that there is no escape from the so-called subjective experience. Neither is there any escape from the objective experience as text continually makes the objective out of and within the subjective. Hence the focus on the text, the textual strategies, the present in the text and the absences too. There is a difference between ª structuralismº and ª post-structuralismº which is described in differing ways by many authors. It will serve our purposes to account for the difference in approach as this. Structuralists foreground certain elements and characteristics by naming them: signs and structures. By doing so post-structuralists say they ª baptiseº these elements into being and give them prominence only by their discursive practices. Post-structuralists, not content with this unre¯ exive modus operandi, draw attention to the process of naming itself in an effort to disclose the taken-for-grantedness of the language, and languaging, inherent in the structures they use. Also, post-structuralists contend that full meaning and clarity are not achievable. Post-structuralism contends that the structures and signs that structuralism tries to name as the ª truthº are not nameable (see Fuery, 1995). Experiences are as much part of an unspoken silence as an explicit and straightforward text. Because of this, post-structuralists face a dif® cult task. Their attitude to text requires a virtually endless self-re¯ exive approach to reading and writing. In this article, a post-structural account of journal writing is employed in an attempt to allow a space for the ª unheard voicesº in texts. ª Readingº a biography, or a journal, inexorably brings one to a re¯ exive process viewing the ª subjectº of the story through one’s own life-narrative or through the narrative provided by the author. In this context, ª truthº is inherently ® ctional; it is constructed by the action of writing or telling. There is necessity for there to be a ª realityº behind the text which is the production of the author. A post-structural account will aim to reveal how students’ discursive understandings can be occluded behind or revealed in their journal entries. These ª storiesº represent the ® ctional constructions of people at particular places and times that wrote out of their phenomenological stream of consciousness, creating personal documents. This article further contends that in ª readingº these accounts we can make no successful distinction between the inner world of thought and the outer world of experience. Alternatively, it is revealing to suspend this commonly held dualism. Also, if this distinction did not exist for the author of the journal, neither does it exist for those who read them. Journals, then, are to be viewed as texts in their own right. Like all texts they refer to other texts. These texts can be revealed explicitly in the journal entry or, more interestingly, may be a silent undercurrent giving an almost imperceptible ª tidal effectº on the direction of what is said or not said. These effects may be visible to

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·

the analyst or not. Structural formulae for analysis will reveal only one aspect or another but will inevitably fail to make a comprehensive report on the ª truthº . So, a valuable way to view journals is as accounts of learners’ ª readingº . By this I don’ t just mean their exposure to the prescribed reading material but, more inclusively, the totality of discourse the students have been exposed to: a range of authors’ ideas and their textual strategies; a range of ª experiencesº and educational methodologies; the gamut of other sources of discourse prevalent in their lives (from TV, neighbours, etc.). So, journals may be viewed as intertextual pastiches of learners pre-understandings combined with perhaps:

·

·

the texts that were used by the educators in devising the learning experience; the textual forms of construction of the activity itself (sometimes called ª the learning experienceº ); and the textual strategies/body of discourse that the learner used in constructing the story about his/her learning and re¯ ecting on it in the journal. Journal writings, then, can be viewed as records of a learner’ s reading of these discourses from her/his set of pre-understandings. To read a student’s journal can be a varied activity. It can enable learners to catch discourses in the act of shaping themselves and others, or enable them to re-read the tale of how discourses were caught up in the act of shaping the author of reading materials they are prescribed (see Davies, 1997, p. 281). Yet another strategy is to see journal writing as the learner’ s act of creating a different self out of a new narrative itself constructed and driven by discourse. But, of course, none of these readings tell the full story. Derrida and others have encouraged us to see a text, by its nature, as destined to leave omissions by virtue of its necessarily limited perspective. It is impossible to say everything one would like to say about anything or to read everything one was expected to read. That there is more to be said and more to be understood is part and parcel of the way things are, the way discourses work. We need to be careful, therefore, of attempts to be ª straightforwardº or ª all inclusiveº in the way we write, read, and think about journal writing. We need to investigate the unspoken, the omitted, the absent in students’ journals and in academic writings like this one (that are inevitably glossed). Quite an amount of writing is unassumingly ª straightforwardº or deliberately unre¯ exive, as is the case with Bloom’ s taxonomy. Taxonomies are only ª limited recipesº by another classi® cation. There is no substitute for being aware of the probability of ª failureº to be complete and comprehensive. All too often the movement in academic writing is to present the reader with a journey towards ª coherence and comprehensivenessº , typi® ed by the use of titles like ª Towards a theory of ¼ º and the inclusion of ª Conclusionsº and ª Recommendationsº chapters exuding certainty in tone and style. The alternative to this kind of writing is less attractive; focusing on the omitted in texts is sometimes described as ª deconstructionº which brings with it a lot of unfortunate negative ª baggageº around themes of destruction and nihilism. Deconstruction of texts is an action to expose the necessarily excluded. In one sense, this can be seen as an ethical act: to make audible what was silent, omitted, or marginal. But it is not necessarily the ethical act of a sure-footed critical theorist. The effort is not to do away with


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exclusion by exposing it. The effort is ethical in the exposing of the ª necessity of failing to includeº which can only help us to ask the more risky questions about who we are and what we are about as differentiated authors/readers/learners. One student writes in a similar vane about environmental ideology. Here the student-author gives voice to an opinion from the ª minority-viewpointº , an unpopular position in what is seen as the prevalent discourse. We cannot assume blindly that because a number of people want something to be done, that it is the only course of action, or that it is representative of the will of most of their community. (Student journal) Deconstruction also encourages us to remember where ideas we have came from. It can, in the end, allow us to remain rooted in the status quo if the ª oldº position is accepted. Alternatively, we may be encouraged to move towards alternative theories/ epistemologies that we accept are also going to fail but perhaps fail less badly. In this way deconstruction allows us to acknowledge and value tradition while at the same time espousing a greater ethical and theoretical humility in our efforts. In giving up our hopes for a clear, distinct, complete and comprehensive text, we may playfully embrace variety, looseness, incoherence and incompleteness in our writings. Journal writing can provide the author space to do this. A worthy task of the academic and student is to encourage and engage in deconstruction that is ethically inspired for ª good reasonsº . For Derrida, the good reason is to expose the chimera of ª straightforwardnessº and completeness that acts as a pretence. If deconstruction ª worksº (i.e. if it is possible to use the theories present in the text itself to see heretofore hidden limitations) then the options for new writing are changed. We can no longer set about the project of aiming at rational coherence as we used to know it unless we work at addressing our inevitable failures as opportunities. The strategy, then, is to attempt to interrupt discourse that moves to present clarity and certainty because we cannot innocently ª know for sureº . In my experience as a tutor on the course Ènvironment and Learning’ , I tried to incorporate this need to interrupt coherence, closure and unre¯ exive teaching by trying to be openly driven by selected ideologies from current discourses in environmental education. The students’ task was to learn experientially about how environmental education might work once inspired by differing ideologies. This required that we try to teach from a number of positions from within environmental discourse. Later, in re¯ ection, we would hopefully encourage the students to use journal writing as a way in which to re¯ ect (deconstructively perhaps) on the discourses inspiring these learning experiences. Uncovering Ideology or Post-modern Manoeuvres? As tutors/facilitators on this course we attempted to place before the students the ideologies of environmental education by teaching from within these different ideologies. Perhaps this gave a disjointed feel to the evenings but may have heightened the students’ sensitivities to ª differenceº . It was never our intention to disturb the learners but it was healthy to set about making them aware of patterns of behaviour that are found in so many classrooms and lecture halls. There is often an

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effort, on students’ part, to ª double-guessº the lecturer and ® nd out her/his ª realº opinions so that a successful exam question and assignment can be written. For some, ª What makes this teacher tick?º is the appropriate question so that a carefully constructed essay can be submitted in order to ª do wellº . The strategies of students are manifold. Over coffee, one student enquired in more depth as to what the objectives of the course were. The same student later pointed out that he was intent on getting the ª best resultsº he could out of the course. To his puzzlement, he discovered the objectives of the course included ª that we explore environmental education ideologies theoretically and experientially by taking part in different forms of environmental education: e.g. positivist, interpretivist, socially critical educationº . This objective was further targeted at helping participants ® nd out, for example, ª how they might personally respond to the issues as citizens, parents, educators, etc.º . Initially, the melange of styles and the diversity of teacher input was somewhat disorientating for some. One student wrote: Perhaps I missed the point but it [the evening] seemed to be made up of a series of disjointed elements. (Student’s journal, brackets added) After experiencing different methodologies in the earlier part of the evening this student felt more at home with the ª traditionalº lecturer-type input: This [a lecture] was a method of learning which I knew and understood. I felt much happier at the end of this session. (Student’ s journal, brackets added) The ª traditionalº lectures and photocopied/referenced readings were combined with physical warm-up exercises, guided visualisations, values’ analysis exercises, teambuilding exercises in groups, etc. In their course work, in addition to journal writing, they were involved in essay writing, ª mini-action-research projectsº (to address relevant environmental issues as they saw them), visits to experience other forms of environmental education, and group presentations of their work. Ongoing and regular re¯ ection on the process as well as the content of the experiences was given time in class discussions. In this way our efforts were to ensure that content, methodology, and learning experiences were always reintegrated as new ª contentº . Learning experientially about learning was the key ingredient of each session. Then again, if all teaching is ideologically inspired, surely the students were still on the right track when they tried to work out our ª preferredº teaching style (and the inferred ideology). As educators, we found ourselves attempting to ª wear masksº on occasions in an effort to ª slip awayº from being seen to be driven by any one ideology. I felt that students were searching for the ª right answerº while we fought on to uncover discrepancies in the ª visionº of any particular method or approach: What is the purpose of education? There are many different views on this and it is hard to say that one is right or wrong. (Student’ s journal) There was an element of ª Will the real teacher please stand up?º about some student comments. There were other remarks about the difference between this course and others they experienced.


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There was some evidence that journal writing provided a space for student re¯ ection on teaching ideology which was the ª contentº of this course (and could be the ª contentº of any course in some way?). In the earlier part of the course the need for students to become involved in this re¯ exivity was an area of confusion: Although the various elements of classroom activities seem a bit diverse and unconnected at the moment, I feel that perhaps our lecturers are allowing us to experience different teaching methods so that we may experience the broader concepts of environmental education. Perhaps. (Student’ s journal) At the end of the course there was a focus group to review the course in its entirety. One student re¯ ects on the team teaching. By then the culture of the learning setting seems more acceptably diverse and disparate ideologically: I liked the co-facilitation ¼ the different dynamics ¼ ing. (Focus group report)

it broke up the even-

In a way, our broken up evening may have been a sign of our having achieved our objectives of interrupting the seductive properties of discourse and ideology. For second-round journal submissions we asked the students to submit extracts from their journals with re¯ ections on their own extracts. This was in an effort to encourage another layer of re¯ exivity into the process, to add more ª spaceº into the journal texts into which expression might be given to what was previously unspoken or unexpressed. The course (Environment and Learning) sought to provide experiential learning exercises about learning experientially. In hindsight we were trying to engage the students in a form of critical literacy (Davies, 1997). How did their own writing ª inscribeº narrative about themselves? How did they use language in their journals to account for their enchantment by the discourses of visiting speakers, by certain readings we had prescribed? Was this evidence of such critical re¯ ections? Here a student gives commentary on an earlier journal entry (italics) with a revised opinion: The ® rst warm-up gameÐ Initially the relevance of the physical exercises passed me by. It all seemed rather pointless. However, with a bit of afterthought there are the relaxation factors. Even so, I see little bene® t in it. After a couple of weeks of this exercise for a couple of minutes at the beginning it does seem to have the effect of making the atmosphere at the beginning less educational and more relaxed which I feel aids the interest to learn and contribute as opposed to the typical learning ª teacher-talk, student-listenº environment. Another student comments about an ecological autobiography exercise: [W]hen Greg [author of this article] asked for excerpts the class fell silent. I would have been happy to discuss mine but felt I had already contributed my fair share. The atmosphere was totally ¯ at for the rest of the class. I think this reluctance could have been for either of two reasons:

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the students were unsure what was required they felt their autobiographies were too personal to discuss aloud. Perhaps this was one time that Kate [co-tutor] or Greg should have forced the issue and asked an individual for their contribution. (Student’ s journal, brackets added) Ð

In the above entry, the student is involved in a real ª hall of mirrorsº in his learning. He re¯ ects on his own journal re¯ ections which in turn are the re¯ ections on his own ecological autobiographical accounts (which were re¯ ections on his own life history from an ecological perspective)! In the same way, using alternative genres for journal writing may hold out opportunities for re¯ ection on the discourses authors subscribe to. By writing his journal as a ® ctional newspaper (entitled The Daily E.G.G., Environmental Global Gazette: for those who care if an egg becomes a breakfast or a bird) this student ª playsº on the environmental ª dark greenº theme with tongue in cheek to critically examine a ª green schoolº project and to expose his own critical discourse at one remove by reporting about his own comments: Learning Through Green Glasses ¼ A critic of the school said that while the approach to learning is good it would only work where you had a small student± teacher ratio. The school is perceived as being somewhat isolated from the rest of the community and it should expand its activities and message through community involvement. It is also a concern that children are being taught constantly through ª deep green glassesº . It would be hoped that when the children leave the school they have developed a critical but balanced approach and not a fanatical one. (Extract from student’ s assignment) It is the intention of deconstruction to create openings for different thinking outside of epistemologies of certainty (Stronach & Maclure, 1997, pp. 1± 13). But, be warned, we need not hope to be in an aloof space where the differences between things and meanings behind things will be readily available. Any spaces created by deconstruction will be fraught with complications and conundrums. Journal writing using the foci described to adopt a post-structuralist position has the potential to render the ideologically driven nature of course contents, structures, and methodology more obvious. But using journal writing in this way presents problems for the assessment of journal entries. There has to be an acceptance by assessors of students’ texts that there is an ª unsaidº , and a ª sub-textº and that these are unavailable to us in any glib way. The Assessment of Journals after Post-structuralism Depending on the structure of the course work requirements, students’ journals are sometimes to be read by others besides the author. The discussion above problematises any processes of reading and writing that holds out a naive hope of a direct correspondence between a ª realityº and a ª textº in a representational way. Readers


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of students’ journals will seriously have to ask pertinent questions before assessing journals using a taxonomy (e.g. Mulligan’s above, or Bloom’ s). They also face barriers when making appropriate assessments about a learner’ s ª developmentº when judged by the texts before them. These readers usually include ª the educatorº or ª teacherº , ª the examinerº , and ª the external examinerº . They all approach the text with their own pre-understandings which may be ª openº or ª closedº ; they may be unaware of the presence of satire, or tongue-in-cheek styles of writing, being unaware of the culture among the students or between the students and teacher; they will, inevitably, be working in a void (or at least a partial vacuum!) that excludes the richness of learning the student-author experienced while writing or rereading their own journals. The unspoken and the hidden silences in the text may be unavailable. As one student prepares to submit his work for assessment s/he looks re¯ exively at the exercise itself and is speculative. His question is rhetorical, possibly pointing to all of his unwritten ª entriesº and the frustration felt by any author attempting to construct a ª goodº journal that would achieve a high grade. Class discussions (and, perhaps, chats over coffee with the tutors and colleagues) about assessment of journals pointed to the realisation that assessment was going to be a nebulous task. Finally, the students decided ª cooperativelyº with tutors on the general procedures. The power relations in the group were far from being irrelevant in these discussions and far from being happily resolved. One student commented: First hand-in of journals ¼

I do wonder how exactly these will be assessed.

Some Questions Penultimately, I give ® ve provocative questions for practitioners wishing to think in greater detail about the potential of using journal writing for learning. Some comments from my own experience are given to enlarge the debate.

Q1: When, if ever, and in what form, should journal writing be submitted for assessment? Who was going to ® nd it? ¼ Who was going to read it? Someone might get offended by it. I felt it was a book you had to bring to school. I didn’ t bring it. (Student response during focus group) For a ® nal submission I suggested they employ some different textual strategies using a mixed-genre approach (for example, using a newspaper format or a dramatic dialogue/conversational style). The idea here was to make more obvious how language can be used to enchant the reader. They were encouraged to playfully advance the cause of any preferred discourse on environmental education. Written feedback (and, optionally, one-to-one feedback) was available after the journal submissions.

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Q2: What are the ethical implications for dealing with journals once submitted? Would it have been more ethically sound to have co-authored this article with the student involved? Or, could the students at least have been invited to respond to this text before it was made public? Q3: Should learners’ journals be graded or given a ª standard markº once submitted? After class discussions about this we, the tutors, were asked to give a graded mark. Any journal, once submitted, was given a basic ª honoursº grade. This ª agreementº is later shown to be a chimera that hid their uncertainty about the ª validityº of this for at least a couple of students. One student didn’ t bring it to university in case it would offend someone. The likelihood is that there was as much ª un-submitted journal writingº as was submitted. Aside from the many unwritten thoughts that never made it on to the paper, there is an ª implied readerº (Iser, 1974, 1978) that we may never access through the opaque windows of journal entries. For example, when students’ critical re¯ ections involve showing up tutors in a bad light they are unlikely to be submitted. Q4: In which situations should there be a prescribed ª genreº appropriate to the textual construction of a ª goodº journal? For example, it was important in our learning context that the students look at the process of learning they were going through themselves because the focus for the learning was environmental education practices and ideologies which we attempted to typify in course work. ª Goodº journal entries could easily be characterised by us as those that addressed the operational in¯ uence of different environmental education discourses on learning and on the environment. ª Goodº entries also addressed the ideologies underpinning course content and methodology as well as the facilitator’ s role in structuring the evening. There are many ways of constructing different styles of journal writing. We need to be aware of our judgements about, for example, elevating cognitive/analytical ways of knowing above affective ones. Is it valid to talk about encouraging a ª high level of cognitive engagementº and to discourage any ª lapse into more conversational descriptive reportingº ? (Bloom, 1956, p. 43). Similarly, we may notice how other structural approaches (Ballantyne & Packer, 1995) locate the ª problemº of ® nding ª valueº in journal writing: It is considered signi® cant that the two students who were most negative about the journal exercise were those who had focused a large proportion of their journal entries on evaluating course design and teaching approaches rather than exploring and critically analysing the concepts and content presented. (p. 40) Students who adopted a ª course feedback styleº are construed as receiving little bene® t from the exercise. It is not construed that perhaps (as PhD students in this


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case) their thinking about course design was itself a valid critical re¯ ection! Re¯ exive post-structuralist approaches to journal writing problematise and place more centrally issues about course feedback and instructional and discursive style. Q5: What are we to assess when reading the journals of learners? ¼ critical re¯ ections? ¼ higher cognitive processes? ¼ affective responses? ¼ synthesising comments? ¼ deconstructive strategies? How will we really know a ª critical re¯ ectionº or an ª affective commentº should we come across one? Should we regard journal writing as ª worthwhileº only when the author attempts to be self-re¯ ectively aware of textual strategies used by others or her/himself in the writing process? Are there viable criteria that would be applicable in numerous situations? [L]earning from experience is a kind of ª writingº that creates a world, a ® ctional text, in which we are the central character in the story. A text is woven, creating the self as a character in its own story, from the ª raw materialº of our experience, our ª being-in-the-worldº . In effect, learning from experience is a process where we textually create and recreate ourselves but without being con® ned to one textual strategy. (Usher, 1993, p. 175) Final Comments From our small survey of one class group using questionnaires and one focus group discussion before class (where half the class attended) we found students to be mixed in their opinions. From the questionnaires, three commented positively about how journal writing helped them make connections with their own lives or ª helped make them thinkº . Another student noted how it does contribute to the workload. Other comments from students at a focus group (below) are all positive, possibly because of the focus group methodology that requires group involvement; people in groups often tend to construct a ª coherentº story that is ª socially acceptableº . (That said, the anonymous questionnaires were almost as positive, with only one negative comment about having to undertake journal writing.) The comments from the students do recall the story of change in how they viewed the journal writing process: I did it originally for assessment purposes but I enjoyed doing it so much that I actually did it `cos I wanted to in the end. Basically, I enjoyed doing it `cos I could draw cartoons ¼ I found that drawing pictures and cartoons was better than actually writing something down. I did it because it had to be done ¼ then I got Kate’ s [other tutor] feedback ¼ I thought that was quite good and then I put more into it.

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G. Mannion [Aside:] I did a diary about other courses. It does help. [It was] quite personal ¼ [although] I couldn’t hand it to the lecturer. (Brackets added) The journal writing helped me re¯ ect on what I was thinking. Class doesn’t stop at the classroom door.

On the whole it helped make us, as tutors, think about the workings of ideologies, power structures in adult learning and what we were looking for in student learning. How students wrote about their learning experiences will affect how we approach the subject matter again so it has been another form of feedback and student± tutor communication. Some parameters worth considering for those thinking about including journal writing as a course work component are coded below as to how ª controlledº or ª freeº the process can be in terms of the: (a) amount of contentÐ e.g. demanding a word count; (b) genreÐ e.g. employing certain structural or semi-structural taxonomies; allowing alternative genres like newspaper reportage, satirical cartoon drawings, dialogical ® ctions or dream analysis; (c) structureÐ e.g. providing certain kinds of writing pads; demanding submissions after certain periods of course work; (d) surveillanceÐ e.g. having all journal writing go under the ª examiners’ eyeº ; asking for selections or distillations from journals; leaving all writing unmarked and unobserved; (e) assessmentÐ e.g. using structured approaches (like those described above as ª structuralº or ª holisticº or looking for ª post-structural re¯ exivityº ); having a group appraisal of journal selections; (f) supportÐ e.g. providing certain kinds of examples of ª goodº journal writing; giving regular feedback from the tutors (written or oral or both); allowing co-operative re¯ ections in the group on each other’ s journal writing (e.g. by using computer-mediated conferencing or e-mail subscription lists); having ª mentorsº help learners with journal writing. I leave you with a journal entry of my own: a poem about words: Textophilia? And our ¯ esh is made text and lives among us. Experience, ¯ eshed-out, is ensouled in stories: their words return, their spirits enfold us. What was The Word ¼ in the beginning ¼ ¼ before us? (from G. Mannion’ s journal, August 1997) Address for correspondence: Greg Mannion, University of Stirling, Stirling FK9 4LA, Scotland. E-mail: [email protected] k


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