EL CORREO Y LA COMUNICACIÓN EN RED

A system’s extraction of three contexts was used for the analysis framework, as discussed on page 44. Context 1 was the participant; context 2 was the collective of learner; and context 3 was BGU. The twelve individual cases studies were analysed as twelve contexts respectively, and then when viewed as a whole (context 2) permitted different layers of analysis that captured the heterogeneity and dynamics of the complex systems.

3.6.1 Analysis Framework for Context 1

For each of the twelve participants, analysis was undertaken of the four transcripts from the feedforward tutorials across the two years of data collection. The first tutorial used pre-set semi-structured questions across the sample which focused on investigating the learners’ biographical details, their views on writing and exploring the strategies and processes they had used to undertake the first two module written assignments. The pre-set questions were generated from the findings of the pilot study and were informed by the literature. The tutorial data were transcribed and analysed to draw out key individual themes. These have been presented as a discussion (in chapter four) where attention has focused on the individual differences and peculiarities in accordance with a complexity framework and which enables the participants’ histories and multiplicities to be foregrounded. For tutorials 2, 3 and 4,

118 each transcript from the learner’s first tutorial were used to formulate largely bespoke questions for each participant for the next tutorial. These focused on drawing out discussion that centered on six key areas; planning, translating, reviewing, evidence of the central executive, professional confidence, academic confidence and assignment grades as discussed in chapter four.

Further to the narrative discussion, a radar graph was constructed for each participant. A radar graph has multiple scales and generally with related variables (Kaczynski, Wood & Harding, 2008) (Appendix E). Six related variables or categories (planning, translating, reviewing, evidence of the central executive, professional confidence, academic confidence) were generated from the literature and were seen as interconnected. Planning, translating, reviewing, and evidence of the central executive are all processes involved in writing as discussed in chapter two. I chose to include assignment grades in the radar graph as an additional influence which could be seen in relation to the other interconnected categories. Professional confidence and academic confidence were categories as enablers/disablers as they strongly influenced the processes from writing. A radar graph represents a graded web and offers a diagrammatic way to observe the shifts and changes from one tutorial to another, to make visible any incidents of emergence. Evidence of transformational learning was observed in all seven categories. The selection and use of a radar graph may be perceived as reductionist of the data which potentially contradicts the epistemology of complexity theory. The presentation of data when using a complexity framework is challenging in terms of capturing all of the multi-variants and dynamic interactions of each CAS. As such the radar graph, for the purposes of this study, serves as an additional layer to the data to visually expose the qualitative changes over time alongside any evident emergence:

An analysis [within complexity framework] examines histories, traces and emergencies in relation to the multiple contexts within which ‘a sense of self’ emerges, still, of course, employs various forms of ‘reduction’ and abstraction’ (Haggis, 2008, p. 173).

119 The radar graph required interpretation of the identified categories where evident within the transcripts against a graded scale of 0 - 8 with 8 being the highest, and 0 where no reference was made during the tutorial to the criteria. It was critical to establish identified criteria in relation to the graded scale for each variable (Appendix F). The scaled criteria were generated from the literature and theoretical perspectives on academic writing and then scoring allocated through listening to the audiotapes and reading the transcripts simultaneously in an iterative way to check and re-check understandings. Qualitative decisions were made and these were underpinned with extracts from the transcripts against the identified variables (Appendix G). A scoring profile across all of the categories was then generated and entered into the radar graph. Each tutorial is represented by different coloured lines in the graph (Appendix E). The visual representation of the coloured lines allowed for shifts and changes to be visible across the two years of the learner’s programme for each participant.

The learners were asked, once all four transcripts were collected, to review the data and approve their authenticity. It became increasingly important for the participants to validate the transcripts and they were offered the opportunity to add anything or to remove any of the data as they saw fit. None of the participants chose to amend the transcripts. In seeking confirmation of the data as a true representation of the tutorials was to recognise the close involvement of the participants with the data and their ownership of it.

3.6.2 Analysis Framework for Context 2

Using the radar graph data (Appendix E) from all 48 tutorials, analysis across the participants in the varied categories was undertaken to ascertain whether patterns of self-organisation across the sample were visible. The balance of order and disorder, and the regulation of these was discussed in chapter two. Davis (2005, p. 87) describes the dynamic system of the ‘collective learner’ as having a coherence and evolving

120 identity all of its own ‘through the ‘ongoing process of recursively elaborative adaptation’ (Fenwick et al., 2011, p. 26). The analysis of context 2 provided evidence of emergence, self-organisation and regulation. The early sharing of these collective themes with the participant group was undertaken and sought to generate further consent and the rehearsal of the overall arguments from the study.

3.6.3 Analysis Framework for Context 3

The purpose for analysing the final context of BGU was to generate a form of rubric or taxonomy for supporting future practice in academic writing pedagogies within this context. As such an architype tutor has been devised to represent an ideal pedagogue who can manage the CAS learner throughout the states of change that are experienced, along with the collective learner as a whole where constituting parts maintain surprising self-similarity in their patterns. Fenwick et al. (2011, p. 29) make clear that ‘human beings are nested within… larger systems that are continuously learning and, as participants in these systems, they bear their characteristics in the ways that a single fern leaf resembles the whole fern plant’. The tensions between order and disorder are determined by emergence and the implications for how a HE institution responds to these new understandings which are discussed in the following chapters of this thesis, is important both at programme and institutional levels.

3.7 Summary

This chapter has provided a transparent account of the research design process. It has discussed the study’s framework of complexity as a conceptual and methodological lens for observing and analysing data. A key aspect of this research is the dual role I hold as practitioner and researcher and I have endeavoured to position this relationship with the participant learners as centre stage in order that it was

121 acknowledged at each stage of the research process. These relationships have, I argue, enriched the data. Drake and Heath (2011, p. 20) state that the fluid position of the practitioner researcher ‘is the inevitable trade- off that comes from researching things in situations that one already knows quite a lot about. Being able to take existing knowledge and build theory through research design and analytical explanation characterises successful doctoral practice.’

122 CHAPTER FOUR: PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS OF FINDINGS

4.1 Introduction

This study explored the learning of twelve participants on a Foundation Degree in Applied Studies at BGU. The metacognitive strategies and the conditions for learning when undertaking written assignments for the learners on the programme were analysed. Each of the participants in the sample was viewed as a CAS, or unique case study, which enabled discrete, and in many cases, different themes to emerge for each individual. These themes have been identified as points of difference, and cross sectional analysis resisted, using a complexity theory frame of reference as identified in chapter two (see page 43-44). In turn, during the process of the analysis of the transcripts and in keeping with a complexity theory framework, a dynamic systems extraction (Haggis, 2008) of the collective of case studies has been undertaken allowing for patterns to emerge across the sample as a whole. The analysis and discussion of the data from the forty eight feedforward tutorials are presented with three overarching themes and relate specifically to the research questions (see page 24): capturing the struggle towards the transformation of knowledge for the participants; metacognition and the role of the central executive (Galbraith, 2009) in the writing process; and finally, the strategies used for the three key processes of writing; planning, translating and reviewing.