When I started working as a teacher in adult literacy classrooms, I finally found the place that grounded my flighty work roots. I had many jobs before, but here was a place that had meaning for me. Even though I never had problems with literacy, I had friends and family members who did, and I witnessed the stigma they had grown up with.
This blog is all about adult literacy and another passion I have discovered in the last 18 months or so - Interpersonal Neuroscience (IPNB)! WOW! So happy to have discovered this worldwide phenomena based on psychological theories to do with brain plasticity - how our brains can actually change for the better with some work.
I am very fortunate to have been awarded an International Specialised Skills Foundation (http://www.issinstitute.org.au/) fellowship, which allows me to do some action research (international!!), combining working with adult literacy learners and IPNB, and the various theories I have been learning about. I'll list them here and then as I go on, I'll write more about how I understand them to have an impact or potential impact on how I (we) work with adult learners.
I acknowledge there already is a lot of work done in learning and trauma - mostly with youth and children and some too, with adults.
My interest in this area was sparked via a series of separate events - I'd been very attracted to transformative teaching and learning theories when I studied under Audrey Grant at LaTrobe University in the early 90s. She introduced me to some terrific thought leaders theorists. Don't we all love the ZPD and Friere?? Classic!
I will be sharing my blog with Jenny Horsman, author of Too Scared To Learn, Take on the Challenge and Something in my Mind Besides the Everyday.
Jenny has written and worked extensively on the impact violence has on women learners. I am very excited to say that I will be meeting up with her as part of my fellowship when I visit her in Toronto in April.
Dr Jenny Horsman is a community based researcher and educator - she has worked extensivly around the world. learning and teaching on and about the impact violence has on learning and promoting organsiational change. You can find her at Jennyhorsman.com
Jenny is a keynote speaker for the ACAL (Australian Council of Adult Literacy) in September and will attend other events as a guest speaker...watch this space or visit the ACAL & VALBEC websites. https://acal.edu.au/2018conference/ & www.valbec.org.au
acal.edu.au/2018conference/call-for-presentations/ Call for presentations now open.
Jenny and I are planning to have a collaborative space in our individual blogs where we riff on each other's writing and ideas. I hope that you dear reader feel free to join in.
So, some areas I have been inspired by or will be diving deeper into...
- Knowing that trauma is widespread and comes in many forms. Knowing that the impact trauma has also is widespread and comes in many forms. And just knowing.
- Finding PODCASTS...especially Therapist Uncensored - this podcast has introduced me to all concepts of neuroplasticity and psychology and relational sciences. If you're interested in this topic and you are in to podcasts - give it a go, I found it to be really accessible and totally exciting learning - and that is coming from a non-sciency person.
- Reading Learning Trajectories, Violence and Empowerment amongst Adult Basic Skills Learners, by Vicky Duckworth, and then having the pleasure of meeting Vicky at the ACAL (Australian Council of Adult Literacies) conference in Perth 2017.
(and other learners with multiple and complex needs - or a history of trauma - in fact it could be any one of us, right?) - An encounter with a student, J, who came to me and complained that her teacher was trying to make her leave the learning centre to get a job. When I spoke with the teacher concerned, she explained how she was trying to encourage J to lift her thinking about her abilities and that if she wanted to work, she had the skills. I later understood that J heard that message as 'the teacher doesn't like me/want me in the class anymore/thinks I am not able to do the work/ or any other critical message her amygdala was giving her. The amygdala controls the part of our brain where our flight/fight/freeze response is triggered. For adults who have grown up in a traumatic situation, or who are living with trauma - the amygdala is going to be ON all the time - actually it is on for all of us all the time - every couple of seconds that part of our brain is scanning the environment and looking for signs of safety/trouble. From what I know about J, she is someone who has a very strong inner critic so when she heard the teacher tell her she was capable of working, her threat antenna was pinging off the walls. This set me wondering - what do teachers need to know about the way we communicate with adult literacy learners to create a safe learning environment which will enable our adult learners, who often have been in the same classroom for multiple years, a chance to transform their self image and become successful learners? Learners who can see a future for themselves outside of the classroom, and teachers who can really reach the learners by showing compassion, empathy and understanding of who the individual is and what their strengths and barriers are.
- Has anyone else read The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog: And Other Stories from a Child Pschiatrist's Notebook by Bruce Perry & Maia Szalavitz? It is really easy to read, but harrowing - be warned. (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/129909.The_Boy_Who_Was_Raised_as_a_Dog) This is what he says about trauma and learning: "The achievement gap in schools has a lot to do with the child’s home and community life. If the family is concerned about not having money for food or rent or a doctor’s visit, that creates a pervasive sense of anxiety and unpredictability. The longer the child is in that environment, the worse the vicious cycle at school becomes. Eventually the kid says to himself, “There’s something wrong with me. I’m stupid.” And he drops out as soon as he can."
- We know this is true for children - those children grow into adults and those adults sometimes find their way to the adult literacy classroom. We know that trauma can arrest learning - that school can be a wholly traumatising experience for many children who have learning difficultlies or are 'different' or who are dealing with so many other external issues that learning becomes very low down the ladder in terms of what the brain can take in.
I am going to Wellington NZ next weekend as part of the New Zealand Festival to see Betroffenheit, by the Canadian Electric Company Theatre "Betroffenheit touches on themes of loss, addiction and recovery. With unflinching honesty, Pite and Young explore what happens to a person in the wake of trauma."
So, welcome to the first of my entries...I look forward to sharing my learning with you and exploring the way that learning is a wonderful opportunity to grow.
Linno.
Great stuff.
ReplyDeleteYour thoughts about j and her teacher brought to mind transference and countertransference and I wondered if anyone has done work on the role of mirror neurones and trasference/ct. does anyone know of anything?
Looking forward to hearing more Linno
Thanks Eliza, that’s a really interesting observation and reflection. I hadn’t thought of the transference, counter-transference dimension – or the mirror neurons with regard to J, but they are perfect to apply to this situation.
Delete• Transference/counter-transference are usually terms reserved for the therapy setting referring to the therapist/client dyad, but they’re just as easily understood in the teacher/student dyad when we apply that lens.
• Transference occurs when the learner transfers or transposes their feelings about a previous teacher (or other person) on to their current teacher because they have been reminded of them in some way.
• Their feelings about the current teacher are mixed up with another person and time – hence J in the anecdote above, may have (unconsciously) thought or felt that her teacher was kicking her out like another teacher had done at high school, or her mother who told her to get a job or else…
• J is probably not aware she’s doing this.
• ‘Counter-transference’ refers to when a teacher transferring their feelings or thoughts from a different student (or other) onto the current student.
• With the J anecdote, maybe it was a student who needed some support or encouragement to look for a job.
• It’s a tricky area, but one to be aware of when we are relating to our students.
• Maybe J really would like to work but is unsure about how to do that – are there programs around that may help? – in Melbourne we have Fitted For Work which supports women with clothing for job interviews and runs work-ready programs.
• J did actually enrol in a course with Fitted For Work, which has given her an idea of what she needs to do to start out on the employment path.
Mirror Neurons: There’s so much work on mirror neurons – and it's all so interesting. Have you ever fed a baby with a spoon and as you’re taking the spoon to their mouth you find yours has opened? That’s mirror neurons at work. Same as the contagious yawn that goes around the room like a Mexican Wave. Mirror Neurons also work on an emotional level, and for teachers and learners – you can see them at work by observing relationships in the classroom.
• Our mirror neurons are responsible for compassion and empathy.
• They are located in the pre-frontal cortex, the part of the brain that is responsible for relationships and is the most modern part of our brains.
• It is important to be aware of our own emotional state – this can have an impact on others around us.
• Adult learners who enter the classroom with entrenched expectations about the classrooms as a hostile learning (?) environment, will perhaps be looking for hostility from the teacher, and can easily misinterpret constructive or well-meaning advice as “that teacher hates me/wants me to leave/thinks I’m stupid and so on.
• The teacher – maybe she was off in her delivery – maybe she had an argument with someone before she left home, or the traffic was bad. Who knows, but the way the message is received can be controlled to some extent if:
o We check our feelings before speaking (am I cranky, sad, excited etc)
o Tune in to the student’s mood – do they look frightened or worried that you want to talk to them? Are they seeking you out? How is the eye contact? Have they brought this topic up themselves?
o Do you know what their prior experience is of employment?
Compassion, empathy and really tuning in to where the student is emotionally - we don't have to have an in-depth conversation, but we can notice by observation - emotions, attentiveness, where they are sitting, whether they are engaged... they are bits of key information – and can inform the way we conduct our relationships with students – well, everyone really.
Linno, this is such a rich, generous first offering of where you're at and where you're going. So many insights into your research and interests! Thank you.
ReplyDeleteAll I know is that the work you're doing here, delving into critical dimensions of the student-teacher relationship, is so often central to how teachers see themselves achieving the best outcomes for students. As you know, I get very frustrated when I see teachers' attention being diverted away from nuanced, qualitative understandings of human relationships, and instead channelled towards those decontextualised, arbitrary, quantifiable ‘forms’ that seem to overshadow all sorts of human considerations, not least human relationships, in spaces of adult education.
I’m so glad that ISSI has deemed you and your topic worthy of support. Your sensitivity and intelligence obviously captured the judges’ imaginations. Good on them and you! And hopefully your research, through your exploration and understanding of human relationships in adult literacy education, will bring tangible changes for practitioners to support us in creating the best possible learning environments for students in Victoria.
Oh, and I can't wait to hear Jenny's keynote at the ACAL conference in Melbourne, in September this year.
Deletewow, thanks so much Liz...I am heartened by your response.
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