DIRECTION FOR CREATIVE WRITING TEACHERS—

A HERMENEUTIC PHENOMENOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE

(MONOGRAPH NUMBER ONE) Ó

 

by

Dan Lukiv

B.Sc. (mathematics), The University of British Columbia (UBC), 1976;

Teacher Training (kindergarten to grade three), UBC, 1977;

Humber School for Writers’ Creative Writing Program (poetry), 1996;

Writer’s Digest’s Advanced Novel Writing Program, 1997;

M.Ed. (creative writing), The University of Northern British Columbia (UNBC), 2003

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ÓDan Lukiv, 2006.  All rights reserved. This work may not be reproduced in whole or in part, by photocopy or other means, without the permission of the author.

Credits

Various chapters, sections, and research in this publication have appeared in one or more of the following publications: 

 

Connected Magazine Online (Canada); Mentor: The Online Publication for Nova Scotia’s Educators (Canada); The Journal of Secondary Alternate Education (Canada), Arts North (Canada); canadian content (Canada); The Alberta Teachers’ Association Magazine (Canada); A Career Counselling Symposium (BCTF Lesson Aids, 2002: Canada); The Germans From Dortmund (y press, 1999: Canada); Academic Exchange Extra (USA); Teachers.Net Gazette (USA); The Online Writer (USA); The Journal (England); SchoolNet Africa (South Africa); The English Teachers’ Online Network of South Africa; and, Students On The Net (Singapore).   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Table of Contents

 

Acknowledgements   

§   Chapter One: An Overview

§   Chapter Two: The Participants

§   Chapter Three: What Is Creative Writing and What Is a Creative Writer?

§   Chapter Four: A Few Words about Qualitative Research

§   Chapter Five: Phenomenology—the Abstract and the Concrete

§   Chapter Six: Qualitative Interview Data Is like a Poem

§   Chapter Seven: A Suspended Literature Review           

§   Chapter Eight: Creative Writers Who Were Encouraged in School—a Literature Review

§   Chapter Nine: The Nature of Encouragement

§   Chapter Ten: Narrative Style and the Research Question

§   Chapter Eleven: Literature Related to the Teaching of Creative Writing

§   Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology

§   Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases

§   Chapter Fourteen: Methodology

§   Chapter Fifteen: Conclusions—What the Participants Did Not Say

§   Chapter Sixteen: Conclusions—Arthur’s Themes

§   Chapter Seventeen: Conclusions—Thomas’ Theme

§   Chapter Eighteen: Conclusions—Elizabeth’s Themes

§   Chapter Nineteen: Recommendations with Respect to Arthur’s Themes

§   Chapter Twenty: Recommendations with Respect to Thomas’ Theme

§   Chapter Twenty-One: Recommendations with Respect to Elizabeth’s Themes

§   Chapter Twenty-Two: Further Research—Hermeneutic Phenomenology

§   Chapter Twenty-Three: Further Research—Covering Theory

§   Chapter Twenty-Four: Further Research—Survey Research

§   Chapter Twenty-Five: A Checklist for Creative Writing Teachers

§   Chapter Twenty-Six: A Last Word

References

Appendix A: Ethics Information

Appendix B: An Interview Guide

Endnotes

Acknowledgements

I want to thank my wife, Julie, and our daughters, Kim, Christine, Melissa, and Heather, for their patience with me as I tried to add yet another ball—the writing of this monograph—into an already tricky juggling act. As a husband, father, teacher, researcher, creative writer, and elder in a congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses, that juggling act required all the patience, as I word processed word processed word processed, that my family could muster. I also want to thank Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth, the participants of my three hermeneutic phenomenological studies. Their time and patience enabled me to complete studies that “found” editors committed to publishing them. To Professor Max van Manen, Department of Secondary Education, Faculty of Education, University of Alberta, I say thank you for your many, many articles and insight about phenomenology. They helped me find my way and make necessary “course” corrections as a researcher. Van Manen speaks of “Dutch scholars who worked in the phenomenological tradition. ...  [Their] work was either very good or very bad” (van Manen, 1990, p. 3). I hope that Direction for Creative Writing Teachers—A Hermeneutic Phenomenological Perspective is very good.   

            I’d say thank you to my Compaq Notebook laptop, a much-visited companion during my writing of this manuscript, but that seems silly, don’t you think?

Chapter One: An Overview

In the hermeneutic phenomenological tradition, I explored through interviews with each of three creative writers (respectively: Arthur, a poet, Study I [MEd research], 2002b, 2003b, or 2003c; Thomas, a poet, Study II, 2004b; and Elizabeth, a fiction writer, Study II [1], 2005b, 2005c, & 2005d) this research question: What, if any, experiences in school encouraged [the participant] to become an adult creative writer? Many literature and curriculum guides for Language Arts address how to teach poetry and fiction writing (not surprising in view of many individuals’ thirst for reading creative works [e.g., poetry, fiction]). If creative writing, therefore, stands as a formal Language Arts ingredient, then direction for teachers about what sorts of activities can encourage students to view creative writing seriously merits attention.

            One might logically wonder: Do creative writing activities in school stand as examples of lived school experiences[2] that encouraged the participants? Consider “yes” to that question as a possibility. As a poet, novelist, and short story writer, I naturally have thoughts and beliefs about what activities or events in school encouraged me to become a creative writer; therefore, I attempted, prior to each interview, to bracket out my biases related to those thoughts and beliefs. I also attempted to bracket out themes I had discovered in my template study (Study I) before my beginning Study II. Likewise, I attempted to bracket out themes I had discovered in Studies I and II before I began Study III.  Thus, prior to each interview, I attempted to bracket out possibilities—possibilities that I had inadvertently come up with based on general reading, conversations with colleagues, and deductive, inductive, and analogy-type reasoning that suggested certain events in school could encourage students to take up writing.

            Eight themes emerged from the data of Study I, one theme from Study II, and five themes from Study III about what lived school experiences encouraged each respective participant. By emerged from the data I mean that “the researcher [does not] try to enforce the excerpts into categories, and the categories into themes that he or she already has in mind, [but] rather…let[s] them develop from experience of the participants as represented in the interviews” (Seidman quoted in Bennet, 1998, Uncovering Thematic Statements, para. 2). Bracketing helps themes emerge, and recommendations based on those themes provide direction for educators.

 

 

Chapter Two: The Participants

            I conducted interviews (McMillan & Shumacher, 1997; Madjidi, n.d.; Patton, 1987; and van Manen, 1990) with three Canadian writers. All three studies discovered school experiences that had encouraged the participants to become creative writers, and the exploratory nature of the studies (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997; Patton, 1987; and van Manen, 1990) sought to describe, in the hermeneutic phenomenological sense (Myers, 1997), themes that emerged (Bennet, 1998) from those experiences (van Manen, 1990, and 2000p).

            In Study I, I interviewed a poet. His work has appeared in many of Canada’s elite literary journals, and he has written a regular poetry column for an established publication. He lives and works in a small Canadian city and has obtained a formal university education at the bachelor and graduate levels. In conversation, this witty individual repeatedly plays with words, “concoct[ing new ones]…for deliberate humorous effect” (Portmanteau Words, 1993, p. 151), speaking jabberwocky seemingly without effort, and yet his wordplays often conclude with the emotional weight of a good poem. His impish smile and twinkling eyes remind me that mischief and language sometime form a delightful marriage. I call him Arthur to protect his anonymity.

            In Study II, I conducted interviews with another successful Canadian poet. To date, he has had poetry collections published by major Canadian houses and, as would be expected, many poems published in literary journals. He was awarded, but declined, a Canada Arts Council grant to write and recite poetry. He lives and works in a northern Canadian community, and he has obtained a formal university education at the bachelor level. He is a perfectionist as a poet; his work does not enter the public domain until he feels completely sure it is worthy and substantial. His poetry possesses a definitive clarity that reflects passionate, focused thought. As I spent time with him, however, I found other passions quickly surfaced: his family and his horses. I call him Thomas to protect his anonymity.

            I also interviewed a successful Canadian fiction writer (Study III). Canada’s most prominent houses have published her work, and one of her books ranks as a Canadian classic. Her poetry and non-fiction have appeared in several magazines, journals, and newspapers, but she sees herself predominantly as a writer of fiction.  She lives in a rural Canadian setting, surrounded by pine, spruce, poplar, and birch, where the summer days are often hot and the winter days often cold. Her living-room window overlooks a pristine lake, home of many ducks and trout. This nature lover, this lady of many international hiking adventures, has a sparkle in her eye and a warmth in her heart. She writes deeply humanistic fiction.  She completed grades one through eight in a one-room log school located in a small, northern, Canadian community. Directly after her completion of grade eight, she commenced grades nine through eleven through a provincial correspondence program and completed grade twelve over three decades later as a grandma among adolescents at a modern high school. Since that time, she has completed tertiary courses through BC’s Open Learning Institute. I call her Elizabeth to protect her anonymity.

            If I am to call Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth creative writers, however, readers may ask what I mean by that statement. They may want to know: 1) What is creative writing?; and, 2) What is a creative writer?

 

 

Chapter Three: What is Creative Writing and

What Is a Creative Writer?

            Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth provided me with rich interviews filled with memories of relevant school experiences—relevant with respect to my research question, that is. I speak of these experiences in terms of elementary and high school as opposed to college and university. I speak of these participants as creative writers, as individuals who produce what I will shortly define as creative writing. Although somewhat circular in logic, that last sentence answers: “What is a creative writer?” Mathematicians produce mathematics. Physicists produce physics. Music composers produce musical scores. Dancers produce dancing. These individuals stand defined by what they do.  So, then, what is creative writing?

Although I believe that generally all writing is creative—in fact, I believe that generally all thinking is creative (Smith, 1990)—I do not want to dwell on those ontological premises. I define creative writing of poets, fiction writers, and dramatists in the same way many others define it:

Creative writing is writing that expresses the writer’s thoughts and feelings in an imaginative, often unique, and poetic way. Creative writing is guided more by the writer’s need to express feelings and ideas than by restrictive demands of factual and logical progression of expository writing. (What is Creative Writing?, 1999)

In the words of distinguished novelist Ernest J. Gaines, creative writing is “imaginative writing. ... Though the creative writer draws from factual sources, sociology, psychology, politics, religion, etc., ... he should use all of that information imaginatively—never factually” (Gaines, n.d.). Creative writing, then, conveys feelings and personal ideas more than information, as opposed to expository writing, which conveys information more than feelings and personal ideas (What is Expository Writing?, 1999).

            Now that I have established what the participants have written as creative writers, I will discuss the qualitative paradigm I applied to study them.

 

 

Chapter Four: A Few Words about Qualitative Research

            Generally, research in the human sciences (Davis, 1997b)—referring to “the human as [a] psychological being: What is he, what does he bring about, how does he understand himself and the others and the world” (Institutes of the Human Science Research, n.d., para. 1)—has proceeded on a structured, quantitative course of experimentation, statistics, and “hard, real” (Cohen & Manion, 1994, p. 6) knowledge. Quantitative researchers consider this “hard” knowledge as “objective and [statistically] tangible” (p. 6). This epistemological assumption gives the researcher “an observer role” (p. 6). My qualitative studies, however, focussed on knowledge as “a softer, more subjective ... kind, based on experience and insight of a unique and essentially personal nature” (p. 6; and Haig-Brown, 1993). 

            Rather than choosing “from a range of traditional options—surveys, experiments, and the like” (Cohen & Manion, 1994, p. 7), for the three methodologically identical studies I chose “from a comparable range of recent and emerging techniques—accounts, participant observation and personal constructs, for example” (p. 7). I looked at “personal constructs” in terms of phenomenology, in particular in terms of “the phenomena of experience rather than by external, objective and physically described reality” (p. 20), as found in traditional, quantitative research. My choices stood logically affixed to the phenomenological nature of my research question.

            What, then, do I mean by phenomenology?

 

 

Chapter Five: Phenomenology—the Abstract and the Concrete (2003f)

            In terms of the human experience, phenomenology attempts to describe phenomena, which could include a perspective, various perspectives, appearances, events, actions, changes, or any occurrence, really, but generally does not attempt to describe forces that produce such phenomena. Phenomenology attempts to describe a phenomenon in terms of its essence with regard to the human experience at hand. Phenomenological descriptions could include data from one or a variety of individuals, or from other appropriate, non-fleshly sources, which could include literary and philosophy texts, art, science, and research.  

Phenomenology differs from ontology. Phenomenologists concern themselves with what is the essence of lived experience; ontologists concern themselves with what is reality for the individual (Halliday, 1999; Ontology, n.d.). For example, ontologically, how does the individual see the world (what is his or her reality?), or parts thereof? Answers to that question could describe why some researchers tend to do qualitative research (see, e.g., Chalip, Marshall, Thomas, & White, 1998; Graham, 1997; Wilcke, 2002; and Studies I, II, and III), whereas others tend to do quantitative research (see, e.g., Savicki, 2000). One researcher may ask a research question best investigated through statistical (quantitative) analysis (see, e.g., Boss & Taylor, 1989). Another researcher may ask a different question best investigated through hermeneutic phenomenological (qualitative) analysis (e.g., Studies I, II, and III). Doesn’t each research question say something about the researcher who dreamed it up (Siegle, n.d.b)?   

            Phenomenology, expressed in the form of an article, explores phenomena through whatever information seems appropriate (e.g., interviews, documents, literature, philosophy, experience: this may refer to concrete sensory details and to time, place, physiology, spirituality, and relationships). Often, methodology is not systematically described (see, e.g., Altrows, 2000; Baldursson, 2000b; Bergum, 2000; Bottorff, 2000; Brooks, 2000; Burton, 2000; Clark, 2000b; Connolly, 2000; Davies, 2000; Davis, 2000; Devine, 2000; Evans, 2000; Fahlman, 2000; Field, 2000; Flickinger, 2000; Godkin, 2000; and Hawley, 2000).

Phenomenological research, on the other hand, although it also explores phenomena through whatever information seems appropriate, should follow a systematic methodology (see, e.g., Baldursson, 2000a; Clark, 2000a; Cull-Wilby, 2000; Ford, 2000; Hagedorn, 2000; James, 2000; Lukiv, 2002b, 2003b, 2003c, 2004b, 2005b, 2005c, and 2005d; Maeda-Fujita, 2000; Montgomery-Whicher, 2000; and Winning, 2000) that, described fully, addresses bias, gathering of data, analysis, interpretation, and, if necessary, ethical concerns and sampling procedures (Studies I, II, and III). A systematic methodology can establish a study’s validity (Lukiv, 2003e).

            Traditional quantitative research has attempted to establish validity through systematic, rigid methodology (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997). Sometimes in phenomenological research, however, the exploration of a phenomenon alters or defines methodology needed along the way (Burch, 1991). In this circumstance, methodology altered or formulated along the way can still be explicitly described, thereby establishing its level of validity; however, when it is not explicitly described, it does not, in my mind, merit the necessary labels of valid and systematic.

            Hermeneutic phenomenology (van Manen, 1990), a marriage between interpretation and essence, attempts, through explicit research methodology, to reduce data to its essence as described in themes. But themes can form two categories: essential and incidental (van Manen, 1990). The essential themes become the essence of the phenomenon. In my hermeneutic phenomenological studies (I, II, and III), I discovered 14 essential themes and eight incidental ones. Incidental themes are generally discarded. Analysis investigates what the themes are; interpretation defines which ones are essential through a process some refer to as free imaginative variation (Chapter Fourteen: Methodology; Lukiv, 2005a; and van Manen, 1990).    

            Philosophy from a phenomenological point of view, however, attempts to describe phenomena through reason/logic, conceptualization. Some influential phenomenological philosophers include: F. J. J. Buytendijk, Jacques Derrida, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Edmund Husserl, Jan Martinus Langeveld, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Paul Ricoeur, Max Scheler, Alfred Schutz, and Stephan Strasser. Abstractions often abound in philosophers’ works (Kline, 1967), sometimes at levels that, for many, defy comprehension (Trejo, 1993).

            Philosophers of this phenomenological camp, although diverse in their approach to their disciplines, often try to answer questions such as what is lived experience?; what is consciousness?; what does the essence of something mean?; can there ever be an essence?; for an individual, what is the experience of space, of his or her body, of time, and of relationships? Perhaps you immediately see why philosophical abstractions accumulate in the rhetoric of what some would call answers to these questions. But when philosophers’ arguments include statements such as: if x, then y; if x, then not y; if not x, then not y; if not x, then y; x if and only if y; not x if and only if not y; not x if and only if y; if x, then only y; and if x = y and y is the opposite of z, then x and z are opposites (a Socratic favourite of Plato; see, e.g., The Dialogues, 2003), in which x or y really amount to nothing more than personal opinion or even a so-called axiom (Kline, 1967), which may turn out to be an incorrect assumption or a true statement only in unique circumstances, then, frankly, the arguments might deserve space in the libraries of Laputa (Swift, 1726/1985).

            Plato, for example, wrote philosophically about the immortality of the soul (Singer, 1999; and You Can Believe, 2003). Let x = the soul is immortal. But from a Biblical point of view, according to Genesis 2:7 and Ezekiel 18:4, 20 (New World Translation), a man or a woman is himself or herself a soul that can die (You Can Believe, 2003). Therefore, I could follow with not x = the soul is mortal. Anybody, then, who accepts x as true, and engages his or her mind in if x, then y and likewise arguments could step into a world of nonsense-rhetoric (New World Translation, 2 Timothy 6:4), no matter how eloquent or creative or ingenious his or her thinking or writing.                

            The phenomenological researcher may explore, rather than philosophical arguments or constructs or premises or rhetoric, the lived experiences of people such as I did through my research question when I asked Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth what, if any, experiences in school encouraged them to became a creative writers? I defined concretely, I should add, a lived experience through establishing an interview guide2 (Appendix B: Interview Guide).

            I did not, then, trip into the coliseum of diverse philosophers expressing diverse thoughts or theories about what is a lived experience. Does that seem appropriate, to borrow a term from philosophy, but to define it according to my own purpose? Yes, that does seem appropriate, to me, providing that my definition presents useful data with regard to my research question. If you believe, then, that my interview guide questions establish a useful sense of “what happened” in events relative to my research question, then I have likely satisfied your demand for an appropriate definition of lived experience, but without an avalanche of abstract words. If you accept my description of essence in terms of essential, not incidental, themes that are established through free imaginative variation (see Chapter Fourteen: Methodology), then, likewise, I have established a useful definition of essence without the abstraction dog pile.     

            Interestingly, poets, themselves phenomenologists of a sort, who also search for essences, generally avoid abstract words—often  Latinated versions of root words (Saul, 1995)—in the hope of creating an emotional or intellectual understanding or experience of a phenomenon for the reader. That kind of understanding or experience usually comes surest with the most concrete, the most non-Latinated words the poet can gather (Drury, 1991). Concrete words tend to ground the reader in the five senses, whereas abstract words tend to unground the reader. Anybody preoccupied with abstract words could become the Duffy of my following poem:

 

                        THE ALPHABET (1999, p. 197)

                       

                        In Dubliners,

                        Duffy “lived a little distance

                        From his body,”

                        Like a plucked brain,

                        Like a leaping Antaeus.

 

                        The touch of her hand

                        On his cheek

                        Might have cured him,

 

                        But he’d neither learned the alphabet

                        Of simple somersaults

                        Nor held the Roman torch:

                        Mens sana in corpore sano

                        (A sound mind in a sound body).

 

                        O Duffy Descartes:

                        “I think; therefore,

                        I am

                        [What?]”

 

            As the poem highlights, there can exist a certain ironic ungrounding in the unnecessarily abstract. Studies I, II, and III avoided this irony by concretely stating what I was looking for in terms of a lived experience and defining the essence of the phenomenon as essential themes of my participants’ lived experience. My studies, then, borrowed terms from philosophy, but grounded them by defining them within an explicit, systematic methodology that produced themes that are concrete in the sense of their being of practical value for creative writing teachers.

            The language, then, of my phenomenology, is concrete, or as concrete as possible, just as the language of much poetry is concrete. Just as meanings in my studies lie implicitly in interviews and could lie in other data (e.g., relics [van Manen, 1990]), meanings in much poetry lie implicitly in their texts. Therefore, I can reasonably say qualitative interview data is like a poem. I discuss that statement in some detail in the following chapter.

 

 

Chapter Six: Qualitative Interview Data Is like a Poem (2003d)

            Perhaps you find the question how is qualitative interview data like a poem? peculiar. Clearly, interview data, for qualitative research, is not “characterized by the imaginative treatment of experience and a heightened use of language more intensive than ordinary speech” ([Webster’s:] Poem, 1992, p. 749), nor by “composition characterized by intensity and beauty of language or thought” (p. 749). Outside the domain of human science, freelance writers, reporters, and journalists may interview informants (Adamec, 2000; and Cool, 1987), and talk show hosts (e.g., Johnny Carson, from days past) may interview guests, and these interviews, no matter how biased the interviewers, may provide the information or entertainment sought. Some of these interviews may actually possess poetic characteristics as just mentioned from Webster’s. On a talk show, have you heard manic Robin Williams’ “imaginative treatment of experience and ... heightened use of language more intensive than ordinary speech”? Some might call his “interview” performances strangely poetic. But the question remains: In the world of human science research, how is qualitative interview data like a poem?

            The implicit nature of the data relates to the implicit nature of the poem. Whether the poem is metaphysical, extranatural, narrative, lyric, dramatic, metrical, rhyming, or free verse (Bugeja, 1994), generally the reader must analyse and interpret the poem to find understanding. Meaning is generally not explicit, whereas it often is in expository writing (van Manen, 1990). In poetry, the explicit often bores the reader. He wants to figure the poem out for himself. In other words, the poet must “show, not tell” (Drury, 1991, p. 30). Likewise in fiction, generally the reader wants the author to show him meaning, to show, not tell, what the characters, for example, are like (Knott, 1997). In this sense, often fiction, like poetry, has implicit, not explicit, quality. Meaning is usually not explicit in qualitative data either (van Manen, 1990). The researcher must analyze and interpret the data to find understanding (Studies I, II, and III; McMillan & Schumacher, 1997; Patton, 1987; and van Manen, 1990).

            Just as a Professor of Literature could analyze and interpret W. B. Yeats’ famous poem “The Second Coming” (1922/n.d.), using tools his “trade” has taught him (Leggo, 1997), a qualitative researcher could analyze and interpret data using tools his studies in research have taught him. In my phenomenological studies about what events in school had encouraged established writers to take up creative writing seriously in adulthood, I applied rigorous procedures in the name of validity (Arminio, 2002; Guba & Lincoln, 1982; McMillan & Schumacher, 1997; Morse, Barrett, Mayan, Olson, & Spiers, 2002; and Siegle, n.d.c) to analyze and interpret the data (van Manen, 1990), producing themes as an end result.

            The data speaks, in the same sense that a poem speaks, about meaning, about thematic statements. The researcher must find these, as they exist embedded in the transcribed lines, perhaps related to categories, concepts, or other understandings (Calloway & Knapp, 1995; Glaser, 2002; and Introduction to Qualitative Tools, 1998). We recognize “that a text can ‘speak’ to us” (van Manen, 2000u, para. 1). Logically, “the more vocative a text, the more strongly the meaning is embedded within it” (para. 1). In some cases, the more “difficulty that this [vocative text] presents ... [for the researcher] to articulate or address this implicit [meaning, the more difficulty he or she will have to express it] in explicit, reflective and cognitive terms” (para. 2). The above statement relates to poetry. Van Manen asks, “How is meaning captured by or embedded in poetic language? These concerns are methodologically relevant since they help us become attentive to what can o[f]ten [sic] be important in phenomenological inquiry and phenomenological writing” (para. 3).

            The qualitative researcher, or the person studying a poem, may consider methods that “enhance the ... ‘lived sense’ communicated by a text. To achieve this, begin by asking: What tone belongs to this text? ... Sober? Contemplative? Ceremonial? Respectful? and so forth” (van Manen, 2000s, para. 2). These methods may bring textual meaning, even interview data, “vividly into presence, making it immediately or unreflectively recognizable” (van Manen, 2000r, para. 1). As van Manen, a phenomenological researcher, tells us:

There is no limit to the range of approaches that one can use in bringing experience [as found in interview data] vividly into presence. But the main aim of evocative inquiry is to listen to the things that are before us, that have a hold on us through the mediating function of the evocative text. (2000m, para. 1).

            The search for meaning can be fascinating, exhilarating: “When concrete things are named in text ... a peculiar effect may occur: its textual meaning begins to address us. We say: ‘this poem, [or] this text [qualitative data], speaks to me!’” (van Manen, 2000o, para. 1). When I analyzed and interpreted my phenomenological interviews, I found myself somewhat dizzy with excitement as I actually found themes embedded in concrete statements (experiences/stories), themes that through participant review (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997; and van Manen, 1990, and 2000b) were verified as valid. I felt as if I were entering the life experience of another, learning how school, in specific ways, had encouraged each of my participants to become writers. I relate to van Manen’s statement that

human science can not only increase our understandings of the human world, it can also humanize this world by transforming us and deepening our humanity. This sense of life meaning is not necessarily found by looking more deeply into the innerness of our “selves.” Meaningfulness is more likely found in the space that lies outside the self, in the communal realm of the “other” [in the case of my studies, in the realm of my participants]. (200l, para. 1)

            The interview data, as a text, speaks to the researcher about meaning, themes, humanistic insights, just as a poem speaks to the reader. Humanistic insights become a subset in “the realm of the ethical” (van Manen, 2000q, para. 2). The data speaks implicitly about what is so, or what is humanistic; the poem often does too. Some call this poetic truth (Bugeja, 1994). Some speak of truth through research (Ewing, 2003; and Leggo, 2003). Philosophers also speak about truth (Vanderstraeten & Biesta, 1998). In either of the three cases—poetry, research, or philosophy—I find that the term truth can be misleading, because it requires a ruler that measures truth according to a universal standard, but people tend to describe truth according to personal, not universal, standards (Answering The Roman Governor’s Question, 1965). One person calls the Theory of Evolution a fact (Gould, Luria, & Singer, 1981), another calls it by its name—a theory (Lukiv, 2001c, Chapter Five). One person believes the soul is immortal, another believes it’s mortal (see Chapter Five: Phenomenology—The Abstract and the Concrete).

            I circumvent this subject about truth. I don’t want the philosopher’s What is truth? labyrinth. Philosophical answers to such questions quickly become abstraction dog piles (see Chapter Five: Phenomenology—The Abstract and the Concrete). I prefer to speak of meanings and themes (call them humanistic insights, if you like) that implicitly lie within both poems and qualitative data. Those meanings and themes answer how qualitative data is like a poem.

             In the next chapter, A Suspended Literature Review, I discuss how meanings and themes from studies as found in phenomenological or other qualitative or even quantitative work can bias a researcher. Certainly bias threatens internal validity (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997). The chapter describes one method I used as a new researcher to reduce this threat.

 

 

Chapter Seven: A Suspended Literature Review

            At the proposal stage of Study I, I planned not to conduct a comprehensive literature review of sources that describe school experiences that had encouraged people to become creative writers until after my completing an analysis and interpretation of Study I’s data. I referred to this review as a suspended literature review. I did not want, especially as a new researcher, to inadvertently bias myself. In view of the hermeneutic phenomenological nature of my study, I was following van Manen’s (1990) advice: “If one examines existing human science texts [including their meanings and themes] at the very outset then it may be more difficult to suspend one’s interpretive understanding of the phenomenon. It is sound practice to attempt to address the phenomenological meaning of a phenomenon on one’s own first” (p. 76). Some qualitative researchers, on the other hand, conduct literature reviews “to establish a ‘foreshadowed problem’ ... [to] provide direction and purpose” (Qualitative Research Methods, n.d.), whereas I, as a hermeneutic phenomenological researcher, established direction and purpose through my defining the research question in my aforementioned proposal. (Note: That proposal passed the University of Northern British Columbia’s Ethics Committee.1)      

To not “suspend one’s interpretive understanding” could increase the possibility of researcher bias, thereby compromising internal validity, casting doubt on the truth of themes that emerge from the data through researcher analysis and interpretation. Any qualitative or quantitative study that told me what sorts of school events had encouraged some people to become creative writers could have biased me as I conducted Study I. Van Manen argues:

The problem of phenomenological inquiry is not always that we know too little about the phenomenon we wish to investigate, but that we know too much. Or, more accurately, the problem is that our “common sense” pre-understandings, our suppositions, assumptions, and the existing bodies of scientific knowledge, predispose us to interpret the nature of the phenomenon before we have even come to grips with the significance of the phenomenological question. (1990, p. 46)

            Any suspended literature review that I would conduct later in Study I that might support or contradict relevant themes in the lived experience of the participant, I decided, would appear throughout the completed study’s conclusions and recommendations sections. That is common qualitative structure. Often, qualitative researchers “present literature discussions and integrate criticism of the literature into the text of a study” (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997, p. 119) rather than present a literature-review-only section “because the traditional format of qualitative research is that of a narrative” (p. 147); however, my suspended literature review during Study I revealed no hermeneutic phenomenological studies that relate to my research question.

              To date (2006), I have yet to discover other qualitative or any quantitative studies that relate to my research question, and yet, after completing Study III, I did locate sources that discuss or make reference to experiences in school that writers remember as sources of encouragement. I present these sources in the following chapter, Creative Writers Who Were Encouraged in School, but not as phenomenological examples. They lack the rigor (Morse et al., 2002) of empirical research, and yet I do present those sources as evidence that the phenomenon I have investigated in my three studies may exist at a widespread level amongst writers. Although, admittedly, one Canadian novelist thought about my research question for about three months, concluding that absolutely no experiences in school had encouraged him to become a creative writer, I suspect rather than conclude that he and others like him are anomalies, or, to use a statistical term, outliers.

 

 

Chapter Eight: Creative Writers Who Were Encouraged in School

—a Literature Review

Please note that although there exists many comments in articles, interviews, and biographies about creative writers who were encouraged in school, few of these comments, according to my literature searches, provide concrete details about particular ways these writers were encouraged. S. Maxx Mahaffey’s high school teacher, Mrs. Laborde, encouraged her to become a writer (About S. Maxx Mahaffey, n.d.). She grew up to become a poet and fiction writer. But in what ways did Mrs. Laborde encourage her? She apparently “saw [Mahaffey] as unique” (n.d., para. 1). What does that mean in terms of encouragement? Only S. Maxx Mahaffey can say for sure. Actually, doesn’t encouragement require a highly personal context, and hermeneutic phenomenological interviews (Studies I, II, and III; and van Manen, 1990), quite frankly, provide a way to explore encouragement in that context.

I do not mean to say, however, that encouragement requires a context so personal that what encourages one person will not encourage another. The very premise of my research assumes that what encourages one may encourage others.

Just as Mrs. Laborde’s encouraged Mahaffey, Barbie Perkins-Cooper, playwright and screenwriter, received encouragement to become a writer from a high school teacher (Barbie Perkins-Cooper, n.d.).  In what way(s)? Rukhsana Khan, a Muslim from Pakistan who grew up from age three in Canada, had an “eighth grade teacher who first discovered her creative abilities and encouraged her to become a writer” (Khan, 2001, para. 2). Khan says, “My English teacher told me I was a ‘poet’ and should become an author when I grew up. The idea appealed to me because I absolutely loved books” (para. 5). If I interviewed Khan, as I interviewed Arthur the poet, Thomas the poet, and Elizabeth the fiction writer, using hermeneutic phenomenological methodology (van Manen, 1990), perhaps a valid and reliable theme, or themes, describing Khan’s teacher’s comments/influence/classroom events would emerge. If the theme(s) proved to be essential (see Chapter Fourteen: Methodology), then it/they would stand as part of or define all of the phenomenon of what lived school experiences encouraged Khan to become a creative writer.

            To give the reader a clear sense of what I mean by essential themes that describe the phenomenon, consider Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth’s themes as detailed respectively in Chapters Sixteen, Seventeen, and Eighteen. These themes were endorsed, through free imaginative variation, as essential to the phenomenon for each participant. In a sense, essential themes relate to hermeneutic phenomenology as core categories relate to grounded theory (Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Glaser, 1992; Glaser, 1995; Strauss & Corbin, 1998 [I do no refer here to the controversially diametric views of Glaser and Strauss]). Free imaginative variation in a context of participant review, within the methodological premises of hermeneutic phenomenology, helps establish essential themes as valid and reliable; likewise, saturation (Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Glaser, 1992; Glaser, 1995; Strauss & Corbin, 1998), within the methodological premises of grounded theory, helps establish core or significant-other categories as valid and reliable.

            I could, from a phenomenological point of view, speculate what one theme might be for the aforementioned Khan with respect to my research question of Studies I, II, and III: Khan’s eighth grade English teacher told her that she was already a poet and that she should become a writer; that teacher’s belief in her abilities encouraged Khan to become a creative writer. If I were to meet with Khan, she, as a participant reviewer, could help me determine the validity of that statement. Perhaps the theme is somewhat sound (or valid) according to her experience, but needs some altering (in the spirit of reliability). Participant review enables researcher and participant to establish validity and reliability. Free imaginative variation enables researcher and participant to establish a theme’s essentiality. Non-essential, or incidental, themes are discarded as themes outside the phenomenon in question.      

Another writer, a poet by the name of Barbara Juster Esbensen, found encouragement at school to become a writer:

In the fall of 1939, ... Miss Eulalie Beffel, at that time Barbara’s 10th-grade journalism, English, and creative writing teacher, introduced her to the poets of the 1920s and 1930s. Esbensen was surprised to discover that poems didn’t have to rhyme and that she was free to put together incredible combinations of words. Miss Beffel took time to respond to poems and other writing that Esbensen put on the teacher’s desk day after day. Her little notes on the margins, especially “Barbara, you are a writer!” encouraged and strengthened the young student’s progress. Miss Beffel, herself a poet and former journalist, was the perfect mentor. (Rasmussen, 1994, Beginnings as a Writer, para. 4-5)

In the name of speculation, here is a theme based on this quote: One 10th-grade journalism, English, and creative writing teacher encouraged Esbensen to become a poet by introducing her to avante guarde poetry of the 1920s and 30s, and by praising her writing efforts with comments such as, ‘Barbara, you are a writer!’” Esbensen passed away in 1996; therefore, I cannot through interviewing her and through participant review verify this theme’s validity; likewise, I cannot find precise wording that truly reflects her experience, thereby establishing reliability; I cannot through free imaginative variation determine the theme’s essentiality. The rigorous, systematic nature of hermeneutic phenomenology requires participant review and free imaginative variation, not to mention bracketing researcher bias (see Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology; and van Manen, 1990). The reader can understand, then, that good phenomenological research requires more than researcher speculation.

            Phenomenological research, such as found in my Studies I, II, and III, must “ground” itself in data, not speculation; grounded theory must do the same. Grounded theorists look for confirmation or dis-confirmation of categories, especially a core category (Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Glaser, 1992; Glaser, 1995; Strauss & Corbin, 1998) that is “grounded” not in speculation/conceptualization but in data from a variety of sources. The confirmation or dis-confirmation of a core category that also comes from a variety of sources may suggest its modification or rejection. I do not, however, criticize the use of speculation in some types of research; for example, action research can be “a sort of [theoretical] speculation, a form of playing with possibilities, of recognising and working with uncertainty” (Winter, 1997, para. 3). Rather than criticize, I simply assert phenomenology’s need to establish what is essential, not what is speculative.

            Given this phenomenological need does not, however, mean I cannot speculate or that I cannot consider what writers say, or what others say about them, with respect to experiences in school that encouraged them to become writers. As a literature review, this chapter refers to such experiences as one proof that school can be a place that encourages some students to choose creative writing as a vocation. This review, then, adds weight for my conducting further methodologically identical hermeneutic phenomenological studies based on my research question, and for my conducting a study that will synthesize the findings of these studies into theoretical direction for teachers (see Chapter Twenty-Three: Further Research—Covering Theory). In Chapter Twenty-Three, I call the method for synthesizing the findings Theory from Phenomenology.    

So many teachers, I have discovered, have directly encouraged some of their students to become writers! Carol Ann Duffy, a poet, was encouraged at St. Joseph’s convent school in Stafford, UK, by a teacher named June Scriven, and by another teacher, James Walker, at the Stafford High School for girls (Koymasky & Koymasky, 2005). A nun encouraged French-Canadian Robert Cormier to become a writer while he attended a Catholic school (The Chocolate War, 2005). He became a novelist. So did Elmer Kelton of San Angelo, TX, encouraged to become a writer by Paul Patterson, his teacher, who was a also a novelist (Novelist Still Telling His Stories, 1999). Romaine Moreton, a performance poet from New South Wales, was encouraged by several high school teachers (Romaine Moreton, 2002). A seventh grade teacher encouraged Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston, who was raised in the USA by her Japanese parents, to become a writer (From Farewell to Manzanar, n.d.). Mr. Stolee, a grade nine English teacher, praised a poem by Regis Auffray. Mr. Stolee told Regis he should become a writer (Auffray, n.d.). He became a poet. Mary Anne Huddleston, who became a poet, says a high school English teacher encouraged her to write poetry (Sister Mary Anne, 2005).

One commonality in the previous paragraph: with regard to Duffy, Cormier, Kelton, Moreton, Houston, Aufrray, and Huddleston, each person’s becoming a writer is apparently a result, at least to some degree, of some sort of encouragement that he or she received from one or more teachers. The life story of each writer in the following list reflects that same commonality:

1.   Fred D’Agular, poet (Hyppolite, 2004)

2.   Charles Griffith, poet (Charles Griffith, 2003)

3.   Tracy Wilson, playwright (Walker, 2004)

4.   Jesse Stuart, novelist, short story writer, poet (Jesse Stuart, n.d.)

5.   Dave Roskos, poet (How it all Started, 2001)

6.   Elizabeth Jennings, poet (Elizabeth Jennings, n.d.)

7.   Kobayashi Yataro, haiku writer (Cool Melons, 2005)

8.   Priscilla Lee, poet (Travis-Murphree, 2000)

9.   Nan Witcomb, poet (Australian Poet, 1999)

10. Arthur Rimbaud, poet (Deese, 1999)

11. Sandra Cisneros, poet (Talent Development, n.d.)

12. Journey Light, poet (Journey Light, n.d.)

13. Dennis Kim, spoken word poet, (Banerjee, 2001)

14. Laurence Yep, novelist (Laurence Yep, n.d.)

15. Walter Satterthwait, novelist (Heller, 1998)  

16. George Lamming, novelist (George Lamming, 2002)

17. Ron Terpening, novelist (My Life as a Writer, n.d.)

18. James Welch, novelist (Mclellan, 2003)

19. Robert J. Sawyer, short story writer, novelist (King, 1993)

20. Terry Bisson, short story writer, novelist (Gevers, 2004)

The question, for me: In what ways did teacher-student interaction encourage these people as students to become creative writers later in life? To encourage means “to inspire with courage and hope” (Encourage, 1994, p. 251). But, again, in what concrete sense? One concrete sense could be a set of themes that emerge from (Bennet, 1998) interviews with the 20 writers listed above—interviews phenomenologically driven by my research question, “What, if any, lived school experiences encouraged [each participant] to become a creative writer?”

            So many possible themes could exist. Rita Dove, poet, says in an interview:

I loved to write when I was a child. I wrote, but I always thought it was something that you did as a child, then you put away childish things. I thought it was something I would do for fun. I didn’t know writers could be real live people, because I never knew any writers.

The first inkling that maybe it was a possible thing happened in my last year of high school. I had a high school teacher who took me to a book-signing by an author, John Ciardi, and that’s when I saw my first live author.

Here was a living, breathing, walking, joking person, who wrote books. And for me, it was that I loved to read but I always thought that the dream was too far away. The person who had written the book was a god, it wasn’t a person. To have someone actually in the same room with me, talking, and you realize he gets up and walks his dog the same as everybody else, was a way of saying, “It is possible. You can really walk through that door too.” That was the important thing. (Rita Dove, 1994, para. 3-6)

A possible theme: In grade 12, a teacher took Rita Dove to see a book signing by an established writer (John Ciardi), and that experience taught her that writers are real people like herself, and that if John Ciardi could be a writer, then she could be one too. That experience encouraged her to become a poet.

            The truth, of course, of how valid and reliable this theme is would require systematic rigor in the context of my chosen qualitative methodology. Bracketing, peer debriefing (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997; and State of the Art, 1998), participant review, free imaginative variation, objectivity, which refers to the researcher’s remaining true to the research question (van Manen, 1990) and the whole interview guide, and subjectivity, which refers to him or her remaining true to the meaning in the data (1990), must take their places in the research.

            Frances Dowell, novelist and poet, also relates in an interview experiences that could be turned into a theme. He says, “I had a wonderful English teacher in sixth grade, Mr. Lee, and another one in eighth grade, Mr. Pierce, who praised my writing and gave me confidence as a writer” (Reichard, 2004, Section 2: Interview). With regard to other experiences that could be turned into a theme, consider what Spencer Reece, a poet, interviewed in The New Yorker, says,

I had an amazing English teacher, and I’ve been calling her recently; we’re still friends. She introduced me to Chaucer. I said, “Isn’t it funny that after all these years this should come back in such a specific and important way?” And I have her to thank for that. Writing poetry, I guess, goes back to when I was seventeen or so….I did love Chaucer in prep school. I also loved Sylvia Plath’s “Ariel” and J. D. Salinger and F. Scott Fitzgerald and Shakespeare. Those were the first people. (Quinn, 2003)

Is there a theme here? If so, does it relate to Arthur’s Themes One (events in school that promoted the joy and wonder of silent reading of poetry and fiction) and Two (events that promoted the exhilarating freedom of choice of reading material [see Chapter Sixteen: Conclusions—Arthur’s Themes])? Without my interviewing Reece, how can I say for sure? How can I step beyond speculation to a more desirable foundation of validity and reliability?

Speculative themes stand as curiosities (my previous comments about speculative theory and action research, however, still stand). During my empirical, rigorous, systematic research, I could not indulge myself by entertaining curiosities, just as I could not indulge myself by allowing my biases to turn interviews into curiosities. From a research point of view, interviews must be free of interviewer bias if the participant’s comments are going to be useful. If I or my peer reviewer found I had asked a biased question or made a biased comment in any interview I had conducted with a participant (see Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology), then all his or her comments related to that bias would have been deleted from the data, in the name of protecting internal validity.

 Therefore, the kind of themes I try to formulate in my studies, bolstered by respectable degrees of validity and reliability (acceptable degrees of internal validity), should arm teachers with considerable trustworthy, credible, direction about how to interact with students and what sorts of activities to create in the hopes of encouraging some of them to grow up to become creative writers. If certain lived school experiences encouraged Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth, then the same experiences may encourage others, even though each of the three is, of course, uniquely individual (Zunker, 1998). Rather than speak in terms of generalization (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997), then, I speak in terms of extrapolation (1997), or, if you prefer, an extension of findings (1997). These extrapolations or extensions would reflect the nature of encouragement as found in my phenomenological themes. In a more general sense, I discuss the nature of encouragement in the next chapter.

 

 

Chapter Nine: The Nature of Encouragement

            I could speculate from a conceptual point of view, as opposed to my conducting phenomenological research that “allows” themes to emerge from data, about the nature of encouragement. I could attempt to answer the question: Encouragement is what? I could attempt to avoid sinking into a philosophical quagmire filled with abstraction (see Chapter Five: Phenomenology—the Abstract and the Concrete). The reader will find, in Chapters Sixteen, Seventeen, and Eighteen, that Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth concretely answer that question in specific ways through their themes. But, conceptually, what is the answer? I could refer to the literature. Lance (n.d.) says:

Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (1993) defines “encourage” as “to inspire with courage, spirit or hope; to spur on” (p. 381). Every day teachers at all levels encourage their students with words of praise, hope, direction, and courage. They communicate to students belief in the students’ abilities and progress. (Chapter One: An Introduction to Encouragement, para. 1)

This does not, however, define what encouragement is. At least, not really.

            Lance (n.d.) also says:

Carl Rogers (1961) promotes this concept of unconditional positive regard. He states, “It is an atmosphere which simply demonstrates ‘I care’: not ‘I care for you if you behave thus and so’” (p. 283). The focus is on the welfare of the student. It is an approach which recognizes the student as an individual, as a “separate person” with his or her own feelings and experiences. (Chapter One: An Introduction to Encouragement, para. 3)

Lance (n.d.), in his discussion about encouragement, adds: 1) “Teachers and leaders encourage students by providing opportunities for individual growth” (para. 4); 2) “Educators must value their students. They must know them, care about them, and communicate with them” (para. 5); and, 3) “The teacher believes in the fundamental and inherent worth of the student” (Chapter Two: Fundamental Principles of Encouragement, Strategies for Individuality, para. 2).

            Do the quotes in the two previous paragraphs help us define what encouragement is? Could they mislead a person sincere about his or her desire to encourage students but who tries to “not according to accurate knowledge” (New World Translation, Romans 10:2)? For example, could a person, a teacher, get the sense from the comment that “every day teachers at all levels encourage their students with words of praise” that praise in general encourages students?

 

Praise and Encouragement

            Praise may in some instances encourage, yet not in others (see, e.g., Teacher as a Researcher, n.d.). Lance (n.d.) says that Nathanial Branden, in his 1994 book entitled The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem, warns us with regard to praise and encouragement:

Praise used inappropriately is as damaging as praise used not at all. There are two fundamental mistakes people often make in utilizing praise. The first is that people often use a blanket approach. They praise everything another individual does, regardless of its merit or difficulty. This results in a feeling of invisibility and decreases the value of praise. The second is that many people attach judgment to their praise. For instance, an instructor may say “keep up the good work,” when a student paints a beautiful picture. However, this can create in the artist a sense of anxiety, dependence and ... defensiveness. Instead, the instructor should be specific in his or her praise. For instance, the teacher may instead say, “The detail in this painting is wonderful. It is obvious you put much of yourself into it. I enjoyed it immensely.” The student knows then that the praise is specific and genuine, because it can be immediately traced to his or her work. (Brandon, quoted in Lance, n.d., Chapter Four: Learning and Encouragement, The Individual Person: Self-Esteem, para. 4)

My experience as a teacher tells me that is good advice. Now, taking that advice one step further: Even well-meaning staff who praise students through award days, honour rolls, and principal rolls, may find their praise discourages rather than encourages.

 

Awards Days, Principal’s Roll, And Honour Roll

            Alfie Kohn, in Beyond Discipline: From Compliance to Community, says:

When administrators proudly tell me how caring their teachers are, I am apt to reply, “That’s great. But do you have awards assemblies?” If things have been set up so that ... the school sets children against each other in a race for artificially scarce recognition [praise], then nice teachers can accomplish only so much. (1996, pp. 105-106).

If students are presented with awards, a form of praise, for achievement, based on genetically-endowed gifts they possess to a greater degree than other students, “then nice teachers can accomplish only so much.”

            A sperm unites with an egg, each with its own ladle of DNA, to create an individual with, say, a genetically-endowed gift in art, creative writing, or mathematics. The zygote grows into a student. Should a teacher praise a student by giving him or her an award for inheriting such a genetic force? If a teacher does, won’t this award, given before the watchful eyes of other students, for special recognition divide a class into Those With versus Those Without? Could the award discourage Those Without? Could the award teach Those With that their worth as human beings depends on the awards or praise others in authority deem they are worthy of receiving? Is such teaching encouraging?

            Add to the genetic forces in children’s circumstances. One child has a private, Pentium-equipped study area at home, whereas another shares a mouldy bedroom (study centre) with four screaming siblings and urine-stained mattresses. Should a teacher reward or praise the child with the “good” genes and the right circumstances through Principal’s Roll recognition? Again, would that praise discourage Those Without, even discouraging Those With by teaching them that praise and worth come synonymously and only “come” if an authority figure says that worth = praise is warranted? In the spirit of conjecture, you be the judge, but first consider more of Kohn:

Here’s a[n] ... exercise worth trying out at a faculty meeting:…ask everyone to think of the most effective ways by which a community can be destroyed [or people can be discouraged]….Don’t be surprised if participants nominate competition [praise through recognition is implied herein] as the number one community destroyer [or force for discouragement]—not only awards assemblies but spelling bees, charts that rank students against each other [Those With the praise versus Those Without], grading on a curve, and other things that teach each person to regard everyone else as obstacles to his or her own success. (1996, p. 106; see, also, Lewis, 2003)

            John Taylor Gatto (1992), in his Dumbing us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling, speaks similarly:

If ... [obtaining] an A average is accounted the central purpose of adolescent life [rather than acquiring “community” (humanistic) values of friendship, loyalty, integrity, compassion, and empathy]—the requirements for which take most of the time and attention of the aspirant—and the worth of the individual is reckoned by victory or defeat in this abstract pursuit, then a social machine [our traditional system of scholastic achievement (again, praise through recognition is implied)] has been constructed which, by attaching purpose and meaning to essentially meaningless and fantastic behaviour, will certainly dehumanize [and discourage many] students. (1992, p. 62)

            Is the word “dehumanize” too strong? Not if we realise that our advertising this traditional system of scholastic achievement, or concept of praise, especially at high-profile awards days, reinforces that a student’s worth stands directly proportional to the merit someone else (a teacher) bestows on him or her. Self-worth (W) = Merit Bestowed (M). W = M. Not even “nice teachers” who work hard to make students feel good about themselves because of their humanistic qualities can completely erase this equation from those students’ concepts of self-esteem or from their psyches. No wonder Gatto calls traditional grading a system of “one-upmanship” (1992, p. 70).

            This machinelike system divides students just as the Rocky Mountains divides southern British Columbia from southern Alberta. Consider some divisions: Principal’s Roll, Honour Roll, nothing (i.e., no praise). First, second, third, nothing (i.e., no praise). I remember teaching grade two class in 1978. Sports Day had ended, and although some chests boasted many ribbons (another form of praise), others had none or very few. The class had returned to my classroom before they could leave for the day. Those with few or no ribbons (about seven students, I recall) cried. I still feel sick as I remember that day, as I visualise those sad faces.

            I asked the unhappy seven, “Do your parents love you because of who you are, or because of how many ribbons you have?” They didn’t seem to know the answer. I told them, “Your parents love you because of who you are, not because of how many ribbons you have.” I’m not sure they believed me. I wonder, too, if the children with ribbons were left with the sense that their ribbons were a direct reflection of their personal worth in the eyes of the Sports Day judges.  

If you don’t believe that competition, with its praise for those who shine (for Those With), divides, or, as Gatto says, that such competition “dehumanize[s]” (1992, p. 62), then ask yourselves—honestly—how students who receive no awards (Those Without) on awards day feel, and ask yourselves—honestly—if Those With the praise, the awards, do not feel that in some ways or in many ways their personal worth has been judged? If you’re the principal of a school staff and you don’t believe that praise based on competition divides, at the next staff meeting give out a Principal’s Roll award (praise) for the “top” teacher and give out an Honour Roll award (further praise) for the next-best teacher. Then ask Those Without to tell you how they feel. You might want to wear armour before you ask. Ask Those With if they feel personally judged. If they say no, will you believe them? If you’re a husband eating lasagne that your loving wife has prepared for you, you probably shouldn’t tell her that it’s not a good as Aunt Martha’s, unless, of course, you firmly believe that praise and even criticism based on competition unites people.

            First Nations (in North America) have long understood that praise based on competition divides and dehumanises.

Solidarity and loyalty to the group is likely to be contradicted by learning practices which encourage competition [along with its praise for Those With and its lack of praise for Those Without] rather than cooperation. Any demonstration of individual superiority is avoided because it is seen as demonstrating the inferiority of others. A competitive classroom atmosphere therefore produces conflict in [many] First Nations students who are disposed to learn cooperatively in groups rather than competitively as individuals. (Maina, 1997, p. 304).

Traditional First Nations don’t like to divide people into Those With versus Those Without. Neither do I, actually.

In this discussion, basically conceptual (I don’t claim it is based on, or grounded in, data as are my Studies I, II, and III), I have explored, in part, the possible adverse effects of some forms of praise along the theme of sometimes those praised feel personally judged in terms of their worth as human beings and those not praised don’t feel good about themselves. Praise, given by well-meaning adults to children, may actually discourage rather than encourage. I am brought back, logically, then, to that question I already asked:

 

What is Encouragement?

            Isn’t encouragement that which encourages? I could further conceptualise, arguing that encouragement differs from motivation. For example, if to encourage means “to inspire with courage and hope” (Encourage, 1994, p. 251), and to motivate means “to provide with a motive” or to “impel” (Motivate, 1994, p. 480), then doesn’t that imply that often encouragement refers more to personal attention than motivation. Don’t people often inspire people, whereas stimuli often impel them?

            A phenomenological article (see Chapter Five: Phenomenology—the Abstract and the Concrete) could evaluate this previous paragraph in light of the themes of Studies I, II, and III. For example, Arthur, the reader will discover (see Chapter Sixteen: Conclusions—Arthur’s Themes), found teachers as sources of encouragement with respect to his Themes Two, Four, Five, Six, Seven, and Eight. Thomas (see Chapter Seventeen: Conclusions—Thomas’ Theme) found one teacher a paramount a source of encouragement. Elizabeth (see Chapter Eighteen: Conclusions—Elizabeth’s Themes) found teachers as sources of encouragement with respect to her Themes One, Two, and Three. That amounts to 10/14 = 71% of themes relate directly to people as sources of encouragement. Does that surprise you? Probably not.

            I could consider encouragement theory. Evans (2005) says:

Encouragement is founded in Third Force Psychology and Adlerian principles, a hopeful, phenomenological, humanistic, perceptual, and purposive psychology (Evans, 1989; Evans, 1997; Meredith & Evans, 1990). Adlerian psychology has been demonstrating and using the principles and practices of encouragement for more than 55 years. According to Adlerian psychology, encouragement is the process of developing a child’s inner resources and providing courage to make positive choices. (What is Encouragement, para. 3)

I could also consider motivation theory. For example: cognitive theories such as Atkinson’s expectancy x value theory; Rotter’s locus of control theory; Weiner’s attribution theory (Stipek, 1998); extrinsic and intrinsic motivation theory (1998); and Eccles’ expectancy x value theory (1998). I could, from the literature, compare and contrast encouragement and motivation theory. Conceptualizing for all my grey matter is worth, I could assemble an answer to the question,

 

What is encouragement?

            But such a process betrays the grounded (interview) data research approach of my hermeneutic phenomenological studies (Glaser, 1992; Glaser, 1995; Glaser & Strauss, 1967; and van Manen, 1990), which define encouragement from the point of view of the participants (Bennet, 1998) rather than from my conceptual—and no doubt biased—logistics. Perhaps you have noticed some of my biases in this chapter. The valid and reliable themes of Studies I, II, and III will prepare me to use my Theory From Phenomenology (see Chapter Twenty-Three: Further Research—Covering Theory) methodology to synthesize the grounded data of my studies into a theory that teachers can use to encourage some students to become creative writers. A further study (see Chapter Twenty-Four: Further Research—Survey Research) could survey a sample of established writers about experiences, if any exist, that encouraged them to become creative writers. Themes that describe those experiences may modify or extend the theory (Glaser, 1992; Glaser, 1995; and Glaser & Strauss, 1967).  

            Although Studies I, II, and III don’t provide generalizations, partly due to purposive sampling (Patton, 1987; see, e.g., Arnold & Ketter, n.d.) (note, too, the nonrandom sampling for the survey I propose in Chapter Twenty-Four will eliminate the future possibility of my forming generalizations), nevertheless, my series of studies (Stebbins, 1995) presently provide a foundation of information in terms of what experiences (lived experiences) in elementary and high school encouraged the participants to become creative writers. My research series, termed “concatenated exploration” (p. 21), consists of a “set of field studies that are linked together [like] a chain leading to…inductively generated theory” (p. 21) that will be based on that foundation.

That foundation of information, by the way, does not offer “generalizability” (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997, p. 18) for another reason. Stated succinctly, in each study the theme or themes do not stand as a tool or tools “to predict” (p. 18) because of the sample size of n = 1 (Patton, 1987). In terms of “population external validity” (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997, p. 190), each study can not “be generalized ... to other people who have the same, or at least similar, characteristics” (p. 190) as its respective participant because the “psychological, sociological, educational, physical, economic” (Zunker, 1998, p. 7) and spiritual sides of each participant are unique. That said, the themes of Studies I, II, and III can nevertheless be extrapolated, which I will discuss shortly.

For now, let me says that the trustworthiness (Guba & Lincoln, 1982) or validity (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997) of the studies ranks high due to many thorough participant review sessions, peer debriefing, and my bracketing in possibilities and bias (Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology). Therefore, the themes of Studies I, II, and III define a valid starting place. That said, educators could reason, in view of “the accuracy” (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997, p. 584) of the studies’ themes, that certain events in school might encourage some students to become creative writers. As I said already, if certain lived school experiences encouraged Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth, then the same experiences may encourage others.

            That is not a generalization, rather it serves as direction for extrapolations already referred to, which “extend known experience ... to arrive at a useful [mode of practise]” (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997, p. 7). Some researchers prefer the term extension of findings over extrapolation. An “extension of findings…enables [teachers] to understand [or create] similar situations [classroom activities]” (p. 411). These activities would stand on “logical ... [but] not statistical ... extensions” (p. 412).

 

A Last Word on Encouragement 

       My phenomenological studies define through data—grounded (i.e., interview) data—rather than through conceptualizations—such as if x, then y and related reasonings—the answer to the question what encourages some people to become writers? Teachers, in the business of teaching, are likewise, or should likewise be, in the business of encouraging. No doubt teachers or a teacher encouraged you at one time. Perhaps you “appreciate[d] [an encouraging] word of appreciation or an [encouraging] expression that [gave you] hope” (Strength Imparted Through Encouragement, 1963, p. 424). Perhaps you agree that “timely encouragement can fortify ... and comfort” (Have You Encouraged Anyone Lately, 1995, p. 21).

You may even agree that “encouragement is founded on love” (Giving Encouragement to Others, 1963, p. 430). I know that Thomas (Study II; see Chapter Seventeen: Conclusions—Thomas’ Theme) would agree with that comment, perhaps even with encouragement “imparts confidence” (Gaining Strength by Mutual Encouragement, 1964, p. 414). Do you feel as I do, that encouragement is a gem (Comfort and Encouragement—Gems of Many Facets, 1996)? I consider the themes from my studies as gems, and I suspect the participants views their theme(s) similarly. Do you also, like me, feel that if we are to encourage students to become writers, or encourage students in other ways, then we need to “give serious thought to our way of dealing with [them]” (Would You Extinguish a Smoldering Wick?, 1995, p. 22).

My studies should provide direction, or substance, for “serious thought” about how to encourage students. I hope the narrative style of reporting the phenomenological studies provides for readers a sense of immediacy that they would find while reading a good story. I refer to that narrative style, and my research question, in the next chapter.

 

 

Chapter Ten: Narrative Style and the Research Question

That narrative, or narrative river, as found in the conclusions for Studies I, II, and III (see Chapters Sixteen, Seventeen, and Eighteen), does not travel between the banks of a foreshadowed problem that forks into the specific, a narrower trough—a condensed problem statement. Many qualitative researchers “begin with foreshadowed problems ... , anticipated research problems that will be reformulated during data collection” (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997, p. 102; see also, e.g., Latterell, n.d.; and Tobin, 2003). Some call foreshadowed problems general goals (see, e.g., Interactive Lecture, n.d). Reformulated research problems may become a condensed problem statement that “focuses the entire report” (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997, p. 103). Hermeneutic phenomenology, however, allows for no forks in the narrative river. That means that I did not ask other valid research questions such as “Were there any lived school experiences that discouraged you from taking up creative writing later in life?” My research question helped me focus on a concept, or phenomenon, not multiple ones.

            McMillan and Schumacher (1997) tell us that phenomenology, given birth to by Husserl (van Manen, 1990), “provides an understanding of a concept from the participants’ views of their social realities” (p. 395). I wished to study “a concept,” the possibility that lived school experiences had encouraged individuals to take up creative writing later in life. The reader likely readily sees that “phenomenological questions are meaning questions. They ask for the meaning and significance of certain [italics added] phenomena” (van Manen, 1990, p. 23). The research question became my study’s foundation in the sense that I selected “appropriate research methods, techniques, and procedures for a particular problem or question” (p. 30). My selections helped protect me from “temptations to get side-tracked or to wander aimlessly and indulge in wishy-washy speculations, to settle for preconceived opinions and conceptions, to become enchanted with narcissistic reflections or self-indulgent preoccupations” (van Manen, 1990, p. 33).

My goal to get to the essence of the research question became a matter of my methodological security. I had to stand “constantly mindful of [the] original question and thus to be steadfastly oriented to the lived experience[s]” (van Manen, 1990, p. 42) of the participants. Methodology and the research question became, in a sense, congruent. In other words, “it is methodologically important to keep one’s fundamental research question foremost in mind” (p. 166 [emphasis added]).

            Sometimes, the topic of research “formulates a problem” (McIntyre, n.d., Topic and Problematic, para. 1) that merits investigation, and that problem is “turned into a question” (Gerbner, n.d., para. 1); however, the exploratory nature (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997) of my studies did not require the existence of a problem. In terms of hermeneutic phenomenology, the studies explored and interpreted “how things appear[ed]” (van Manen, 1990, p. 180). I explored, “became familiar with[,] the basic facts [(participants’ lived school experiences)]” (Neuman, 2006, p. 32), leading to “a detailed, highly accurate picture [a thematic picture]” (p. 32).  The studies took me on an intellectual journey from exploration to description, a common journey for researchers (2006). The very nature of this kind of phenomenology created suspense, or wonder, for me. I hope it creates the same for the reader:

In his or her phenomenological description the researcher/writer must “pull” the reader into the question in such a way that the reader cannot help but wonder about the nature of the phenomenon ... .One might say that a phenomenological questioning teaches the reader to wonder, to question deeply the very thing that is being questioned by the question. (van Manen, 1990, p. 44) 

This phenomenological questioning describes “the more subjectivist ... approach” (Cohen & Manion, 1994, p. 7), from which the researcher sees “the social world as being of a much softer, personal and humanly-created kind” (p, 7), whereas traditional social science describes “an objectivist ... approach” (p. 7), from which the researcher sees “the social world ... as being hard, real and external to the individual” (p. 7). Davis (1997b) explains the difference this way: “Psychological research based on a natural science [objectivist/positivist] model focuses more on behavior while human science focuses more on [subjectivist/personal] experience” (para. 1).

            As a teacher of creative writing, I have tended to see the world through a subjectivist lens. In view of a review of the literature on hermeneutic phenomenology that has turned up nothing about creative writing, I believe that interviewing participants, a subjectivist approach, has enabled me to establish first-hand a body of useful direction for teachers. That direction relates to activities in school that may encourage some students to become poets and fiction writers. I discuss that direction and pedagogical implications in my recommendations (see Chapters Nineteen, Twenty, and Twenty-One), but first I wish to report my review of literature that establishes traditional direction for students and teachers of creative writing.

 

 

Chapter Eleven: Literature Related to the Teaching of Creative Writing

            The British Columbia Ministry of Education (hereafter, The Ministry) deems the teaching of creative writing a relevant topic to which it refers repeatedly, either implicitly or explicitly, in three of its Language Arts curriculum guides (1996a, 1996b, 1996c). For example, The Ministry (1996a) implies relevance when it states, “It is expected that [kindergarten and grade one] students will enhance the precision, clarity, and artistry of their communications by using processes that professional authors ... use to appraise and improve their communications” (p. 24), and The Ministry (1996b) explicates relevance when, for grade nine students, it states “students will ... create a variety of personal [and] literary ... communications, including poems [and] stories” (p. 48).

            With implicit and explicit ministry directives in mind, publishers of Language Arts programs, motivated by profit to sell their texts, produce teachers’ handbooks. Often publishers display their wares at teachers’ district-wide professional development days. Charismatic salesmen/women, often quick to relate that they too were once teachers, set up colourful displays of texts for sale, behind which they convincingly orate to wide-eyed teachers and administrators about the great worth of their curriculum handbooks.

In Study I, I reviewed seven Language Arts curriculum handbooks, endorsed by a majority of elementary school teachers and administrators in the district in which I work, that cover Language Arts programs from grades one to seven (Best, et al., 1998; Bogusat, et al., 1999; Booth, Booth, Phenix, & Swartz, 1991; Jeroski & Dockendorf, 2000; Sterling & Toutant, 1999; Tuinman, Neuman, & Rich, 1988; Tuinman, Neuman, & Rich, 1989). All reflect ministry directives. For example, the Nelson Language Arts: Teacher’s Guide: Levels B and C, for grade one, directs teachers to help student writers to become “familiar with a wide variety of genres and forms” (Sterling & Toutant, 1999, p. 29), which brings to mind The Ministry’s (1996b) requirement that “students will ... create a variety of personal [and] literary ...  communications, including poems [and] stories” (p. 48). The Nelson Language Arts: Teacher’s Guide: 6, for grade six, directs teachers to help student poets to focus attention on their “thoughts, feelings, ideas, and personal experiences” (Best, et al., 1998, p. 33), which reminds me of statements such as students need to “respond to ideas, feelings and knowledge ... creatively” (The Ministry, 1996a, 1996b, 1996c, p. 5). I wondered, before starting each study, if each respective participant would describe lived school experiences that relate to this information.

Before my starting the first Study I interview, I reviewed a variety of Web sites, how-to writing books, and other sources that contain a wealth of direction for students and teachers of creative writing (see Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology), but rather than my simply synthesizing for the reader the information from these sources into a statement (e.g., traditionally, creative writing stands as a relevant topic in the world of Language Arts, and much direction exits in the literature for creative writing students and teachers), I want to offer the reader possibilities about what school experiences might encourage individuals to take up creative writing. For example, did Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth describe lived school experiences that relate to the wealth of information I reviewed?

            This type of presentation is not unusual in hermeneutic phenomenological studies. As pointed out in the previous chapter, phenomenological questioning should teach “the reader to wonder, to question ... the [research] question” (van Manen, 1990, p. 44). Van Manen adds, “sometimes this involves avoiding posing the question outright because such straightforward approach would [could] lead the reader to ... underestimate its probing nature” (p. 44). I posed the question outright (see Chapter One: An Overview), but I encourage the reader not to “underestimate its probing nature” by wondering about related questions such as this one: Do writing activities in school that motivate students to write creatively encourage some to pursue creative writing?

            In the tradition of hermeneutic phenomenology, my discussion tries to prompt the reader to wonder, then, about possibilities. To prompt the reader, however, implies that I prompt myself. Could such prompting bias a researcher, such as myself, colouring his interview questions, analyses, and interpretations? Readers familiar with qualitative research know the answer: Yes! How do researchers protect the integrity, the internal validity, the credibility, the trustworthiness (State of the Art, 1998; Lincoln & Guba, 1985; see, also, Siegle, n.d.b) of their research? One element of this protection: bracketing. I discuss this element in the next chapter.

 

 

Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology (2003a)

            People being what we are, we may find our hearts and minds great farms for cultivating how we think something might be, or, on particularly cloudless days, how we think something should be. If I translate cloudless days into days—or weeks, or even months—the researcher feels outrightly or inadvertantly cocky, then he or she could drive the study’s conclusions rather than the research question driving the research design (see Chapter Twenty-Three: Further Research—Covering Theory) driving a systematic, bias-reducing methodology driving the conclusions (Barnett, 2002). Herein lies the conscientious researcher’s worry: “In every experiment [or program of qualitative research], there is a possibility that an investigator’s bias may, in some way, skew the data” (Pilgrim, 1984, para. 12). In a nutshell, then, a foundation of bias can lead to an invalid study with faulty conclusions (Scientists, 1994); likewise, sand makes a poor foundation for a building (New World Translation, Matthew 7:26).   

If one side of a coin reads biased research and refers to problems of internal validity troubles, then the other side that reads unbiased research may have its own troubles too. For example, if some impetuous researchers/critics discredit unbiased research, erroneously charging it with non-valid results (see, e.g., Pilgrim, 1984) due to perceived but non-existent bias, then the discredited researcher may find his or her life’s work overlooked, even maligned and shelved in Neverland. The wise researcher does what he or she can to address internal validity to such a degree that bias and other confounding variables do not mess up his or her research. In such a circumstance, “loud” critics become gainsayers—albeit gainsayers who may harm the reputation of a good researcher.  

            Actual and perceived bias, then, concerns me. Aptekar (1992), no doubt, would relate to my concern. He questions the validity of his own ethnographic study about Colombian street children. Why? He regrets that in that study he hadn’t considered his own childhood experiences and how they might have biased how he saw the children he studied, especially in view of the emotional trauma he, at six, and his mother had suffered when his father had died of cancer. Given that statement, his addressing how he viewed the independence, vulnerability, strengths, and weaknesses of the street children would have added weight, or, in strictly qualitative language, trustworthiness (Guba & Lincoln, 1982), to his study’s validity,

            Looking those views, or (actual) biases, in the eye, so to speak, addresses objectivity, helping the researcher focus on the interview guide’s questions and the experiences of the participants, rather than on his own bias-generating experiences or, for that matter, conjectures. Researchers call this bracketing (see Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases). Mathematicians keep symbols, numbers, and operations within brackets; researchers attempt to keep biases inside brackets in the mind, thereby increasing the possibility for objectivity. Barritt (1992) refers to the objectivity of historians, which helps them write neutral histories, but are those histories really neutral if the writers of those texts have not addressed—bracketed—their biases with regard to peoples, cultures, causes and effects, and all the –isms, -ologies, -archies, and -cracies that inhabit their minds? Likewise, qualitative researchers need a process through which they too acquire and maintain objectivity.

             Bracketing exists as such a process, through which I explicitly listed my biases in my phenomenological studies (see Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases), a practice that other researchers do not necessarily engage (see, e.g., Barritt, Beekman, Bleeker, & Mulderij, 1983). My motive: concreteness and validity. Our biases in the public domain might at times embarrass us, but they make us, as researchers, real people, concrete individuals, with flesh-and-blood points of view, albeit points of view we need to bracket by placing them mentally in a corner to mind their own business. Wouldn’t you find explicit descriptions of bracketing, revealing the researcher’s concentrated attempts to “see” his or her own biases (van Manen, 2000e, 2000i, and 2000n), far more faith inspiring, in the name of validity, than a blanket, implicit statement such as “the researcher bracketed his biases”? Do you find that too impersonal and too general? I know I do.

            I helped my biases mind their own business (Brook, 2005; Byrne, n.d.; and van Manen, 1990). Many experiences in school had encouraged me to become a creative writer. These experiences define highlights in my education (see Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases), but, simply put, they could, during an interview, influence me to ask biased questions. Through my use of free imaginative variation (see Chapter Fourteen: Methodology), I expressed those experiences in each of my three studies in terms of one essential, broad theme (see Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases). That said, my peer debriefers3 (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997) for the studies looked for my biases in my interview questions, in my analyses, and in my interpretations that spoke of me rather than of Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth.

Bracketing bias helps prevent biased questions or probes from leaving the researcher’s lips. Bracketing helps a researcher avoid making assumptions. Assumptions may simply not reflect reality; for example, some teachers disallow students to chew gum in class, based on the premise, the bias, that gum chewing distracts students from their work, and yet recent research suggests that gum chewing may actually enhance students’ ability to focus on their work (Steffenhagen, 2004).   

            With regard to bracketing, however, I did not stop there. I went much further. If bracketing is a process for “suspending one’s various beliefs” (van Manen, 1990, p. 175) or biases, then bracketing in possibilities, a term I coined, is a process that considers possible participant responses. My readings brought to my mind possibilities—experiences that I wondered might have encouraged the participants. I referred to some of these possibilities (i.e., “I wonder if…” sorts of statements) in Chapter Eleven: Literature Related to the Teaching of Creative Writing. The great length of references later in this chapter testifies to the great volume of literature that could have biased my interview questions and comments, as well as my analyses and interpretations.

            Further still, bracketing in possibilities could also include thoughts the researcher comes up with through conversations with colleagues, through deductive, inductive, and analogy-like reasoning (Kline, 1967), through epiphanies, and through lateral-thinking ecstasy (Lukiv, 2000; 2001a, Chapter Seventeen; or 2001c, Chapter Seven). Perhaps new, although, in the long run, not necessarily ingenious, thoughts have smacked you in the psyche while you have spent a little time on the pot, or while you have sat bolt upright in bed at 2:00 a.m., saying “Aha!” Explicitly listing those thoughts—that relate to the research question—could help a researcher bracket them.  

            More about possibilities: In the previous chapter, I referred to creative writing Web sites, which contain essentially the same sorts of activities as do print materials (see, e.g., About Teens, n.d.; Horner & Khan, n.d.; Love, n.d.a; and Shiney & Shiney, n.d.). In my experience, many teachers look to the myriad number of excellent Web site activities for teaching creative writing. With regard to bracketing in possibilities, before I began each of my three studies, I respectively wondered if Arthur, Thomas, or Elizabeth would refer to the kinds of activities found on Web sites.

As for creative writing Web sites and print materials, some provide very specific examples of creative writing activities (see, e.g., Strom, Ingraham, & Dunnett, 1993 [print materials]; Creative Writing, 2005 [Web site direction]). During each pre-study stage, I respectively wondered if Arthur, Thomas, or Elizabeth would describe any creative writing activities that were very, very specific as ones that had encouraged him or her to take up creative writing.  

I, like many others, have written a creative writing course available in print (Lukiv, 1997) that presents many assignments that show students how to develop various creative writing skills. Would Arthur, Thomas, or Elizabeth refer to assignments similar to the ones in my course?

Many books for students of creative writing provide excellent suggestions about how to make characters in poetry or fiction seem “alive” (see, e.g., Leavitt, 1970, p. 15). Others present how-to-use-point-of-view exercises (see, e.g., Leavitt & Sohn, 1979). Some books create programs that work so well that many of the students “have consistently won prizes in top writing competitions and been published in national magazines and books” (Thornley, 1976, back cover). Other texts provide a wealth of excellent how-to direction for creative writing students and teachers of creative writing (see, e.g., Bates, 1980; Bickham, 1996; Block, 1979; Bryant, 1978; Bugeja, 1994; Cassil, 1975; Clark, Brohaugh, Woods, Strickland, & Blocksom, 1992; Dessner, 1979; Dickson & Smythe, 1970; Drury, 1991; Fredette, 1988; Hall, 1989; Irwin & Eyerly, 1988; Jones, 1978; Powell, 1973; Roberts, 1981; Seuling, 1991; Wakan, 1993; and Wyndham, 1972). Would Arthur, Thomas, or Elizabeth, I wondered, mention excellent how-to direction as examples of activities that had encouraged him or her to continue learning the art and craft of writing?

Jerome (1980) and Birney’s (1966) rich and deep analyses of what poetry is has kept me rereading their texts. Would Arthur, Thomas, or Elizabeth describe rich and deep analyses of creative writing in school as examples of experiences that had encouraged him or her? Hodgins (1993) describes a school experience of being read to by a teacher, thereby encouraging him to become a writer of fiction. I relate to that experience because I had similar ones (see Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases). Would Arthur, Thomas, or Elizabeth describe similar ones too?

            Birney (1966), however, suggests school discourages some potential creative writers. In some cases they feel forced, he says, to drop out of high school to learn elsewhere the art and craft of creative writing. Is it not ironic that Language Arts curricula that are supposed to teach creative writing might frustrate potential creative writers? With that question in mind, would Arthur, Thomas, or Elizabeth say that no school experiences encouraged him or her to take up creative writing later in life? Frankly, I did not think that would be the case. Before writing up my proposal for Study I, I had already approached two creative writers separately to ask, “Did any experiences in elementary and high school encourage you to become a creative writer?” Both had immediately said, “Yes!” Although one Canadian writer whom I spoke to between my completing Study II and starting Study III answered no to that question (see Chapter Seven: A Suspended Literature Review), his answer seems anomalous.  

            At any rate, I wondered what lived school experiences might have discouraged people from becoming creative writers. I wondered if The British Columbia Ministry of Education’s approved resources for senior high school students that mechanistically chop up stories into bits of escapism, interpretation, plot, theme, character, point of view, symbolism, and irony (see, e.g., Perrine, 1966; and Ball, 1969) or into bits of subject, verb, verbal, adverb, adjective, noun, pronoun, conjunction, preposition, phrase, clause, antecedent, sentence fragment, object, infinitive, and punctuation (see, e.g., Hart & Heim, 1982; and Shaw, 1986), or if teachers who likewise chop up poems into bits of literary terminology such as alliteration, assonance, caesura, dactyl, enjambment, feminine rhyme, free verse, metaphor, and onomatopoeia (to refer to only a comparatively small number of terms [see, e.g., The Virtual Classroom, 2003]), discourage students from becoming poets and fiction writers. But my wondering did not preclude Arthur, Thomas, or Elizabeth from saying that mechanistically chopping up stories, language, and poems had been just the sort of activity that had encouraged him or her to take up creative writing.

Knott (1977) discusses how to submit writing to an editor (see, also, Adamec, 2000; and Cool, 1987). I used Knott’s excellent book as a text in 1978 and 1979 to teach two adult creative writing courses through the Quesnel (BC) School District’s Continuing Education Department. I wondered, would Arthur, Thomas, or Elizabeth mention school activities that had taught him or her how to go about sending submissions to editors?

            I also wondered about classroom publishing opportunities. For example, many teachers have motivated students to write in school through publishing adventures (see, e.g., Lamb, 1984; Love, n.d.b; Lukiv, 1996, and 2002a). Would Arthur, Thomas, or Elizabeth say that classroom publication had motivated him or her to write and that that experience had encouraged him or her to further study creative writing?

            I recently developed Story Day: A Theoretical Model for Teaching Creative Writing in the Elementary Grades (Lukiv, 2002a, Chapter Two of Home-Grown Publishing) based on elements of social constructivism (McCarthy & Raphael, 1992; and Ruddell & Unrau, 1994) and Vygotskian theory (Berk & Winsler, 1995; Hicks, 1996; and Vygotsky, 1978). Twenty-eight years ago, as a primary teacher, I developed the genesis of that chapter. My primary students knew that I was a published creative writer, and although I instinctively knew that, as Jobe (1982) says, “classroom teachers can have more influence on their students’ reading habits by showing that they themselves are active readers,” I could not say with conviction, all those years ago or even at the proposal stage of Study I, that the same applies to writing. But I have learned from Spandel and Stiggins (1997) that “research shows that teachers of writing, if they wish to be effective, must write themselves” (p. 170). I wondered, was Arthur, Thomas, or Elizabeth encouraged through contact with teachers who were creative writers?

            In addition to my Story Day: A Theoretical Model for Teaching Creative Writing in the Elementary Grades, much literature attempts to motivate students to write poetry and fiction (see, e.g., Cleveland Public Schools, 1968; Dyson, 1987; Matthews, 1981; Pennsylvania State Department of Education, 1975; and Potter, McCormick, & Busching, 2001). Amabile (1985) found poetry written through extrinsic motivation is much less creative than poetry written through intrinsic motivation. I wondered, would Arthur, Thomas, or Elizabeth mention activities that had addressed intrinsic motivation (Stipek, 1998) as examples that had encouraged him or her to take up creative writing?

That question, and other questions and thoughts I refer to in this chapter, helped me bracket in possibilities. They focused my attention on participants’, not my, experiences, and they helped, in an objective sense, to highlight my research question: What, if any, lived school experiences encouraged [the participant] to become a creative writer? I listed these possibilities for my peer debriefers, and they searched for bias effects in my interviews, analysis, and interpretations.[3] I’m happy to say they found none, which means that my bracketing worked for me.

If I were to conduct the next study, say IV, to explore the lived school experiences of another successful Canadian writer, through my original research question and methodology, again, I would need again to bracket in my biases and “possibilities.” Those possibilities could arise through my conversations with colleagues, readings, or divergent (Jansen, 2002b) or convergent thinking (Jansen, 2002a), or other types of thought processes, as mentioned earlier in this chapter. If I were to complete a further succession of studies, to create an abundance of thematic statements of direction for creative writing teachers, I would have to bracket more and more themes and possibilities along the way.

Bracketing, then, and bracketing in possibilities, tools to “control” biases, so that the researcher can objectively, or as objectively as possible, study research questions and interview data/lived experience in the qualitative/phenomenological arena, allow for a disciplined subjectivity that does not allow the researcher to “step” beyond the themes, concepts, or categories of the interview data.

Whether you are a historian, ethnographer, or phenomenological researcher, this chapter should provide the reader with a method for “tying up” biases. Untied biases are somewhat like untied horses that roam about trampling that new garden. Don’t let biases trample a study or a history book. Aptekar (1992) feels he allowed that to happen in his study of Colombian street children, and that study, he says in different words, suffered for that trampling. In short, his untied biases destroyed some of his study’s validity.

 

 

Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases

            Have you wondered about what forces in your past encouraged you to pursue particular interests? Did any experiences in school encourage you to pursue your line of work, whatever that might be? I’m a poet and a fiction writer, and I have wondered about what, if any, experiences in school encouraged me to take up creative writing as a past-time and as a profession. I have discovered several in my mindscape, several that stand like great trees on a somewhat barren landscape (Lukiv, 2002c).   

            I’ll begin with an experience from primary school. I clearly remember my grade three teacher asking us, her students, to read a story that showed how much fun and how interesting looking at the world from a different perspective could be. In the story, the farmer-husband and the housekeeper-wife each complained about his or her workload and lot in life. Each decided the other had life easy, very easy, and so each traded places. The husband became the housekeeper, and the wife became the farmer. The result was hilarious, because each was hopelessly incompetent in their new positions. That farm and the home became a kind of bedlam filled with burnt food and unmilked, mooing cows. I looked at housekeeping through the eyes of the farmer, and I looked at farming through the eyes of the wife. I became hysterical with laughter.

            From the day of my reading that story, I have never forgotten how much I enjoy looking at the world from different, unusual perspectives. I believe that story has encouraged me to dream up bizarre people in fantastic circumstances. I refer to some of my characters—Hooper Quirk, Booger Jimm, Professor Hamburger, Dr. Dewknob, and Miss Snapdragon—in the time travel adventure of my Quibils and Quirks (1997, 1998, 1999).      

            Now I’ll step into grade four: I vividly recall an experience that introduced me to the joy of creative thought. I wrote of the experience in chapter seven of my The Master Teacher: A Collection (2001c) titled “How Big Is the Universe?”  I have included it here.

 

How Big Is the Universe?

            The school year: 1962/63. I was in grade four, attending Sir Wilfred Grenfell Elementary School in East-side Vancouver, BC. That formal-sounding name perfectly juxtaposed the formalistic schooling I had already experienced there for over three years. I relate perfectly to Neil Sutherland in his “The Triumph of ‘Formalism’: Elementary Schooling in Vancouver from the 1920s to the 1960s.” On school days, from 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., I lived in a world of precision, of upper case versus lower case, of names of capitals and provinces, of reading comprehension questions, of phonics reviews, of math drills, of multiplication facts, and of fact-based quizzes, quizzes, quizzes. Sutherland says, “Teachers would lead the class in chanting a ‘drill’ for the spelling, or the times table, or the number facts, or the capitals of provinces” (1995, p. 107). And what made a good teacher? “If a teacher, so parents believed, ‘drills incessantly on the formal parts of grammar and arithmetic or the facts of history and geography, he is ... a good teacher’” (p. 101). 

            I knew no other schooling system, so those hours at school actually seemed normal to me:  “It was a [normal] system based on teachers talking and pupils listening, a system that discouraged independent thought, a system that provided no opportunity to be creative” (Sutherland, 1995, p. 106). But one day in grade four, still in the clutches of a century of formalism, learning briefly changed for me. Our usually-stern, aloof, precisely-accurate teacher surprisingly said, “We’re going to do something different today. We’re going to talk about the universe. I’m going to ask you a question, but there is no right or wrong answer. Now then: How big is the universe? Does it go on forever, or does it stop? And if it does stop, how does it stop? Remember, now, there are no wrong answers.”   

            Our teacher worked hard to encourage us to allow our imaginations no limits. I (and my fellow classmates) slowly recovered from the shock of being invited to participate in such an unorthodox assignment. I believe I felt my brain turning on. Perhaps new-found numbers of neurotransmitters had jumped to life. My brain seemed to soar across a chasm filled with 5 x 4 = 20 and other apparently-for-the-moment, unimportant facts to an expanse, a landscape, on which any thinking would do.

            What a day! Fifteen years later I learned in UBC-teacher training classes that my fellow students and I were brainstorming, creatively dreaming up ideas, and about ten years after that I learned that some people call it lateral thinking. Comments leapt from our grade four-mouths:

            “Maybe it never ends.”

            “How can something never end?”

            “Maybe it starts all over again.”

            “Maybe it ends at a brick wall.”

“Could the universe be a circle? So wherever you go, like in a spaceship, you end up

back where you started?”

Our teacher, who I remember looked delighted, continued encouraging us to dream up as many possible answers to her “How big is the universe?”question, until we literally ran out of ideas. How different from lessons I had digested daily at school—lessons for which “teachers conducted individual or group drills of number facts or the times tables” (Sutherland, 1995, p. 106) or conducted arithmetic-races that determined winners and losers. I thought about those possible, and according to our teacher, anything-will-do “universe” answers for hours after that class, in which no one, that I can recall, won or lost. Each time I ran those answers through my mind, I felt exhilarated.

            Unfortunately, thereafter the daily program of formalistic schooling didn’t often offer the luxury of brainstorming—brainstorming within a framework of open-ended discussions (another term I learned about during my UBC-teacher training). Such discussions, for me the food of lateral-thinking ecstasy, or call it sublime creative thought, killed the boredom that Sutherland aptly describes:

Pupils freed themselves from the bonds of [tedious] routine as best they could. Some learned to talk to neighbors in such a way that they were rarely seen or heard, or to throw balls or wads of paper when the teacher was not looking. Some “mastered the skill of copying ... without ever needing to comprehend” and were thus able “to dream outdoor matters while rarely missing a word.” Others travelled to the pencil sharpener as frequently as they felt they could get away with the practice. This activity was especially popular in classrooms where the sharpener was on the bookcase under a window; then one “could have a look out of the window.” (Sutherland, 1995, p. 109)

This opportunity for creative thought, this total acceptance of my ideas by my teacher: The experience made me feel drunk with joy.

So did my playing the guitar for my grade five class. We had been studying about the lives of master composers like Beethoven, Mozart, Mendelssohn, and Brahms, and about the musical instruments of their day. I told my teacher I played the guitar, and she asked me to bring it to school the next day to perform for the class. The exhilaration that next day of entertaining those students was almost more than I could stand. “We’ll have to call you Elvis,” one boy teasingly said afterwards.  To look at the world from different perspectives, engage in creative thought, present ideas that are appreciated, entertain others: a pattern of what I liked was welling up inside of me.

In grade six our teacher took us to the Queen Elizabeth Theatre in Vancouver to hear the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra play fully-orchestrated pieces. I could feel the music vibrate right down to the bones of my skinny body. I said to myself, “The people who compose this kind of music are deep thinkers.” To my pattern of what I liked I added to do something that requires lots of concentration.

            Although I had no focussed direction of creative pursuit, I continued to discover what made me feel passionate. In grade seven our teacher read aloud A Christmas Carol (1843/2000) by Charles Dickens. The first page remains alive in my mind. The atmosphere of death Dickens created by referring to Scrooge’s dead friend Marley intrigued me and filled me with wonder:

Marley was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it: and Scrooge’s name was good upon ‘Change, for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail.

Mind! I don’t mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door-nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country’s done for. You will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a door-nail. (Dickens, 1843/2000, Stave 1, Marley’s ghost, para. 1-2 )

I remember saying to myself, “I don’t know who this Dickens guy is, but he sure knows what he’s doing.” I wanted to know how one goes about using the printed word to evoke emotions in others. The wonder of that grew inside me through junior high school. Teachers, and students who were good readers, read aloud The Red Pony (1945/1993) and The Pearl (1947/2000) by John Steinbeck, The Old Man and the Sea (1952/1999) by Ernest Hemmingway, and The Chrysalids (1955/2001) by John Wyndham. We students silently read Animal Farm (1945/1996) by George Orwell, Moonfleet (1896/1951) by John Meade Faulkner, and Hiroshima (1946/1989) by John Hersey. I recall how words in all those books seemed to hang like clouds in the air, clouds coloured by emotions such as grief, despair, helplessness, terror, heartache, horror, fear, sadness, confusion, joy, excitement. I wanted to know how one writes words that induce people to feel so deeply that they cannot forget the stories.

            The wonder of how to do that remained passionately alive in my blood, but it was not until grade twelve, in English 12, that I realized I wanted to write, to be a writer, to be someone who writes creatively, to be someone whose works are appreciated, to be someone who entertains others, to be someone who thinks hard, and to be someone who thinks and sees through other perspectives, other points of view. A substitute teacher for our English 12 class asked us to do something novel, like my grade four teacher who asked how big the universe might be. The substitute asked us to write a poem about absolutely anything that we wished to write about. A poem of our choice! I wrote all right. And he read it.

            He looked at me after he had finished reading the poem and smiled. He smiled! “I don’t know what it means,” he said, “but it’s interesting.”

            As I looked up at him leaning over my desk, I was spellbound by his interest. I had actually written something that although my teacher found it confusing he nevertheless found it interesting! It actually had value! I wanted to be a writer from that day forward.

            That desire grew even stronger when I, as a student creative writer, received, from a successful writer, regular, personal attention in Fiction 497 at the University of British Columbia.

I had handed in my first short story for the tutorial course, in which Professor Harlow met privately with me for about an hour each week to discuss my latest efforts (Lukiv, 2001b).  I sat before his cluttered desk, and he looked over his black-rimmed glasses, somewhat apprehensively, at me:

            “Dan,” he said, “I read your story…It’s awful, Dan. I only marked up the first three pages, because after that I couldn’t stand it any longer. I mean, I read it all, but…it was just awful.”

            I didn’t shrink like Alice. I didn’t die of humiliation, although my heart sank like a millstone in the sea. But I knew that expression of his. He was trying to help me. He was trying hard. “Awful?”

            “Yes. This isn’t a story, Dan.” He looked at me over the upheld story-pages as if they were a chasm between us that he was trying to eliminate.

            Not a story. I was definitely thinking about that. But I had lots of knowledge about the elements of fiction! Plot. Scene. Transition. Theme. Protagonist. Antagonist. Conflict. I could even write clear prose, or so my English 303 composition teacher had told me. But, somehow, according to Professor Harlow, I had not written a story.

            “Not a story?”

            “No. A story is about somebody with a problem that gets worse and worse, until some sort of resolution takes place. What you have written is not a story.” Again, he was looking over his glasses at me. He was looking for a spark of understanding. Then he made sure I understood what he meant. He provided examples of stories we both knew. He spent a lot of time reasoning with me, helping me understand those examples.

            That event was like a revelation, silly as that might sound until one reads the often-inept products of neophyte writers who don’t understand that Harlow was helping me “construct” as knowledge. That discussion enabled me to leap ahead in my progress as a creative writer. On my own, I might have taken a looooong time to gain the same understanding.

            That personal attention burned a tattoo in my psyche: I want to be a writer.

            These experiences define highlights in my education. Through my use of free imaginative variation (see Chapter Fourteen: Methodology), which has helped me root out incidental themes which I won’t bother to relate, I express those highlights in terms of one essential, broad theme: Events in school that promoted my looking at the world through “different” eyes; that promoted the wonder of creativity; that promoted the joy of my thoughts being appreciated/valued; that promoted the excitement of entertaining, or emotionally moving, others; that promoted the excitement of focussed thinking; and that promoted the joy of understanding how to write have encouraged me to become an adult creative writer.

 

 

Chapter Fourteen: Methodology

            Van Manen (1990) helps us understand hermeneutic phenomenological research as an intensive writing activity (van Manen, 2000j, and 2000v) that helps the researcher explore the unique phenomena of lived experience (see, e.g., Vandenberg, 1992). It is a method of understanding the person (van Manen, 1990). As a writer and a teacher, this methodology fits my interest in creative writing, in what people think and feel (Siegle, n.d.b), and in effective teaching methods, but, in particular, this methodology fits my interest as an education researcher in what lived experiences in school have encouraged people to become creative writers (see, e.g., Barnett, 2002; and Chalip et al., 1998). I could map my research logic as follows: The topic (creative writing) led to the research question, which led to a paradigm (qualitative research), which led to a methodology (hermeneutic phenomenology), which led to my researching the lived experiences of three creative writers over three studies. Not surprisingly, then, I employed purposeful sampling (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997) as a method to choose information-rich participants (Barnett, 2002).

            In a sense, the variety of participants—Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth—relates to multi-site qualitative studies, which establishes conclusions and recommendations through standardized interviewing, analysis, and interpretation (Firestone & Herrioit, n.d.). My studies, standardized through my phenomenological procedures (with regard to research question, interview guide, analysis, and interpretation) provide a forum for comparisons between participants as multi-site qualitative studies provide a forum for comparisons between sites (n.d.).

 

Sampling

            I studied the participants’ experiences. In view of hermeneutic phenomenology’s focus on the individual, on his or her lived experiences, purposeful sampling of one participant per study seemed sensible and appropriate. In addition, I considered Bogdan and Biklan’s (1992) comments that single-participant studies are more manageable than those with multiple-participants.

            My goal, of course, was to employ a systematic approach, a systematic methodology, to study the lived experiences of Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth.

 

A Systematic Approach

            Hermeneutic phenomenology focuses on the individual (van Manen, 1990), through the systematic (see, e.g., Baldursson, 2000a; Clark, 2000a; Cull-Wilby, 2000; Ford, 2000; Hagedorn, 2000; James, 2000; Maeda-Fujita, 2000; Montgomery-Whicher, 2000; and Winning, 2000) and the explicit; however, much phenomenological so-called research does not, from my point of view, reveal its methodology enough to merit the use of the word systematic (see, e.g., these phenomenological, so-called, research papers (I prefer to call these articles): Altrows, 2000; Baldursson, 2000b; Bergum, 2000; Bottorff, 2000; Brooks, 2000; Burton, 2000; Clark, 2000b; Connolly, 2000; Davies, 2000; Davis, 2000; Devine, 2000; Evans, 2000; Fahlman, 2000; Field, 2000; Flickinger, 2000; Godkin, 2000; and Hawley, 2000). That said, my research was systematic. It used specific modes of questioning for data collection (McLean, Myers, Smillie, & Vaillancourt, 1997), of analyzing, and of interpreting. In this chapter I discuss each of those modes and refer once again to my systematic use of bracketing (see Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology) as a fundamental means for bias control. These modes define much of my methodology. As for explicitness, hermeneutic phenomenology is explicit through its listing of discovered themes (van Manen, 1990, and 2000p). 

            Modes of questioning, analyzing, and interpreting, according to hermeneutic phenomenological tradition, must protect the researcher’s objectivity and subjectivity. In terms of objectivity, “the researcher becomes in a sense a guardian and a defender of the true nature of the object [(the participants’ lived experience)]” (van Manen, 1990, p. 20). But the researcher must remain true not only to the nature of the participants’ lived experience; he must remain true to the solitary research question.

            By subjectivity, I refer to the researcher’s remaining true to the meanings of the data (1990). Van Manen refers to subjectivity by saying it means that:

one needs to be as perceptive, insightful, and discerning as one can be in order to show or disclose the object in its full richness and in its greatest depth. Subjectivity means that we are strong in our orientation to the object of study in a unique and personal way—while avoiding the danger of becoming arbitrary, self-indulgent, or of getting captivated and carried away by our unreflected preconceptions. (p. 20)       

 

Questioning Techniques

Researchers, “primarily driven by the need for information” (Taylor, 1990, p. 83), but sometimes driven in the qualitative sense by the need for “knowledge as personal, subjective, and unique” (Cohen & Manion, 1994, p. 6) and sometimes driven in the phenomenological sense by the need for “experience taken at face value” (p. 29), often gather data through a “conversational interview” (van Manen, 1990, p. 66). My studies, designed to gather personal, face-value information, employed what I would call controlled conversational interviews (van Manen, 2000d).

They required depth interviewing and probes (Patton, 1987). To help me stay focused on the research question, I kept an interview guide (1987) at hand. Really, it contained direction that helped the participants address the reality of their experiences and avoid what some call participant-folklore (Borgatti, 1996b). Some might argue that if “our world is perceived through ... [our senses, and] is transformed through conceptualization into perception” (Pines, 1985, cited in Snively, 1995), then words like perceived/perception, transformed, and conceptualization imply that the reality of events could be called the folklore or creative construction of events.

Haig-Brown (1988) addresses what I call participant-folklore as “the possible distortion ... of memories over time” (p. 153). She admits that “selection of material presented is a problem encountered with any documentation of fact or history,” but she adds that “memories which survive over time in people’s minds are usually those of the more salient experiences” (p. 153). That sounds like a reasonable conclusion. In fact, “rather than seeing time as distorting, we might consider it as a filter which allows clearer vision of the matters of importance in a person’s life” (p. 153). That sounds reasonable too.

My comment on participant-folklore stands as follows: No research is perfect.  All research has inherent limitations (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997); therefore, the researcher does what he or she can to maximize internal validity. I did what I could. I used my interview guide as a sort of reality check (see Appendix B: An Interview Guide).

            Why did I conduct an interview as opposed to having a participant write to me? Van Manen (1990) warns that “writing forces the person into a reflective attitude—in contrast to face-to-face conversation in which people are much more immediately involved” (p. 64). I chose not to create a situation in which “this reflective attitude together with the linguistic demands of the writing process” placed “certain constraints on the free obtaining of lived-experience descriptions” (p. 64). I chose instead to use well-established interview methodology.

The foundation of my interview guide was a question: “Are there experiences in school that encouraged you to become a creative writer in your adult years?” I included probes, to be used if necessary, to draw out the experience in concrete terms of who, what, where, when, why, and how (Patton, 1987). Other questions established participants’ past and present engagement as a writer (1987), the answers of which I present in language that protects their anonymity.

Sensory questions in the interview guide were to be used, if necessary, to probe into what the participants had seen, heard, tasted, smelled, and touched (Patton, 1987). Feeling questions in the Carl Rogerian tradition (Egan, 1998) probed in order to discern participants’ emotions (Patton, 1987). For example, a Rogerian-style question would be: “Do you mean that you felt (_______) about that experience?” I wanted an empathic understanding of the participants’ emotional reaction to their experiences (Siegle, n.d.b).

All of these interview guide questions helped participants focus on facts—the facts of their lived school experiences—rather than on folklore constructions of events. In participant review, Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth told me that the interviews stayed so rigidly affixed to my interview guide that I was at times a boring interviewer. I chuckle that I sometimes came across in that way, but I remain thankful that my rigidity—in terms of my conducting controlled interviews—helped establish as much truth as possible about the participants’ lived school experiences. In short, my interview guide helped me minimize the folklore, the creative memory, of events.        

            Another word on my interview questions: I attempted to keep them singular, not confusing (Patton, 1987). One problem in interviewing is that “interviewers often throw several questions together and ask them all at once ... .This is confusing and places an unnecessary and unfair burden of interpretation on the interviewee” (Patton, 1987, p. 124). Hilbert (1998) in her article “The Pain/Pleasure of the Interviewing Process” asks several questions in succession (p. 10). This, I discovered, is a difficulty hard to avoid. In the words of E. Facey, one of my supervisors and peer debriefers for Study I, asking several questions at once is “a good example of how hard some of these dictums are to follow when one is in the live situation of interviewing, caught up in the excitement of hearing what the Other has to say” (Personal e-mail, April 18, 2002). I wanted the participant to feel at ease, to be relaxed and reflective, and not to worry about a volley of upcoming questions.  I felt impelled to establish a professional, humanistic—ethical (Cohen & Manion, 1994; McMillan & Schumacher, 1997; Patton, 1987; and van Manen, 1990)—forum for neutrality and rapport.

 

Rapport and Neutrality

Patton (1987) explains that “rapport means that I respect the person being interviewed, ... that the respondent’s knowledge, experiences, attitudes, and feelings are important” (p. 127). Patton adds that “neutrality means that the interviewer listens without passing judgment” (p. 127) and the interviewer asks questions that do not have “a built-in response bias that communicates the interviewer’s belief” (p. 129). Neutrality asserted itself through my lack of judgement, no matter what Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth said (1987). To be neutral, Patton (1987) tells us, in part means not to ask leading questions. During Study I, I coined a phrase, bracketing in possibilities (see Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology), which helped me address biases that could have affected my neutrality and interview skills. Without bracketing, any possibility I expressed in Chapter Twelve could have turned into a leading question that reflected my belief about an experience that participants should have had, thereby trading neutrality for judgement and/or bias.

 

Leading Questions

To enlarge on this problem of leading questions, I borrow language from quantitative research. McMillan and Schumacher (1997) explain that “experimenter [or qualitative researcher] effects refer to both deliberate and unintentional influences that the researcher has on the subjects [(participants)]” (p. 188). The point, according to Patton (1987), is that even unintentional influences in questions would have “a built-in response bias that communicates the interviewer’s belief” (p. 129). To borrow language from Quantum Mechanics, namely the term the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, if certainty of observation becomes a certainty of uncertainty (Guldvog, 2001; and Wassermann, 2001/2002), even in the most variable-controlled quantitative setting possible, then my biased presence as a qualitative researcher would definitely affect participant response. Bracketing in bias and possibilities, then, helped me “establish neutrality” (Patton, 1987, p. 128) as an interviewer and helped me keep leading questions at bay.

            Another tool, besides bracketing, also helped me as a researcher: tact. As I already mentioned, I wanted to establish a professional, humanistic, ethical forum for research, and tact, I believe, helped me as an interviewer to establish that “right” human touch.   

 

Tact, for the Researcher (and the Educator)

Do you (let’s say you’re a teacher) sometimes grow too concerned to get the job done? The bell will ring soon, and you need the students to complete that worksheet before that happens, but Ursula asks a question that, if you answer it fully, will rob you of time needed to explain to the whole class the last section of the worksheet, which is somewhat confusing.

            Do you say, “Ursula! Why do you always interrupt me while I’m trying to teach the class? Why don’t you ask your parents to teach you some manners?”

            Tactful? Even if Ursula does interrupt you often, would you resort to this tactless response?

            That first interview you (let’s say you’re a researcher) want to conduct for your latest qualitative study is to begin in five minutes. You scheduled an hour with the learning assistant to ask her about how she deals with a lack of resources in a school with many students who have problems in reading. Four minutes left.  The principal, to whom you introduced yourself as you met him in the hallway, keeps blabbing on about his school. Now he’s giving you a grand tour of the art room.

            “Notice how clean the room is?” he says. “The children clean it up before the end of each class, and at the end of the day—look!—the custodian has hardly a thing to do!”

            Do you, in no uncertain terms, inform him that you came to his school to conduct an important interview and he is wasting your precious time?

            I’m putting a humorous twist to this important subject of tact, which is, according to Webster’s: “A quick or intuitive appreciation of what is fit, proper, or right; fine or ready mental discernment shown in saying or doing the proper thing, or especially in avoiding what would offend or disturb” (Tact, p. 982). Therefore, a tactful person has “the ability to appreciate the delicacy of a situation and to do or say the kindest or most fitting thing” (as qtd. in Learning the Art, 2003, p. 29). You might see logic in the word tact once referring “to touch. Just as sensitive fingers can perceive if something is sticky, soft, polished, hot, or hairy, so a tactful person can sense the feelings of other people and can discern how his words or actions affect them” (p. 29). Clearly, the tactful person feels a “genuine desire to avoid hurting others” (p. 29).

            Max van Manen tells us that tact “is a particular sensitivity ... to situations, and how to behave in them” (2000h, para. 1). We might believe that “every professional practitioner (such as a teacher, nurse, physician, or a clinical psychologist) carries socially and personally constructed ‘theories’ or ‘philosophies’ in their minds” (para. 3). Cognitivists and social constructivists sometimes conduct research to “retrieve these theories in order to find out what makes a good practitioner behave in certain ways” (para. 3). As researchers they may study “the behaviors, reflections, memories, and meaning-constructs of ‘excellent’ teachers in order to determine the knowledge that underlies their exemplary practices” (para. 3). Whatever conclusions and recommendations they make, the common denominator for all tactful action is thoughtful, intuitive, intentional, perceptive, kindly action.

            As an element of tact, perceptiveness provides us with “a keen sense of what to do or say in order to maintain good relations with others” (as qtd. in van Manen, 2000g, para. 2). A tactful person, then, knows how to “act quickly ... and in an appropriate manner with quite complex or delicate circumstances” (para. 2). He or she interprets “inner thoughts, understandings, feelings, and desires from indirect clues or evidence such as gestures, demeanour, expressions, and body language” (van Manen, 2000c, para. 2). He or she would have a sense of how to deal with “shyness, hostility, frustration, rudeness, joy, anger, tenderness, grief (etc.) for particular persons in concrete situations” (para. 3).

            Tact, then, is not selfish. Some call it pathic: “It allows one to grasp the situation from the other’s point of view” (van Manen, 2000f, para. 2). The tactful person addresses individuals in “difficult” situations with a certain confidence, and “the more thoughtful and reflective a person stands in life, ... the more likely that this person will be able to act confidently in situations marked by contingency and uncertainty” (van Manen, 2000k, para. 3). Some situations may call for a social, cultural, and ethical awareness. Although “the notion of tact is inherently a factor of personal style of individuals, it is also at the same time inherently an intersubjective, social, and cultural ethical notion” (para. 2).

            The word ethical brings to my mind morality. Perhaps you agree that “tact seems to be characterized by a moral intuitiveness” (van Manen, 2000t, para. 2). The tactful teacher, researcher, or anybody, really, “seems to sense what is the good or right thing to do” (para. 2). The tactful teacher is able to “see what goes on with children, to understand the child’s experience, to sense ... pedagogical significance, ... to know ... what to do, and to actually do something right” (para. 2). Van Manen calls tact “a kind of practical normative intelligence that is governed by insight while relying on feeling” (para. 4).

            Armed with this understanding, we might realize why “as teachers, we sometimes catch ourselves about to say something but then hold back before we have completely committed ourselves to what was already ‘on our lips’” (van Manen, 1995, para. 10). Tact, in a sense, channels our thoughts, words, and actions along a route of what is best for the student—or for whomever we are dealing with. During one of my phenomenological interviews with Thomas, I sensed he was growing weary of my questions and needed a break. He did not admit this when I asked him if he needed a break, but then I asked if he minded stopping for a while because I needed to regroup my thoughts. I did not lie. That was how I felt, although I could have kept the interview going. As it turned out, he almost jumped at the chance to stop the interview for a while. Once he seemed refreshed by a general discussion about what makes a good poem, he got back to being interviewed with a newborn energy. Was I being a tactful interviewer? You be the judge.

            Tact acquires itself inside of us, one might say, through experience and reflection that focuses on the needs of others; however, I often find tact feels like a thinking, feeling entity within me that makes up its mind about what to do or say without my actually reflecting on what would be best. I relate to van Manen’s statement that “usually, the teacher does not have time to distance himself or herself from the particular moment in order to deliberate (rationally, morally, or critically) what he or she should do or say next” (1995, The Epistemology of Tact as Practical Acting, para. 4). There are, of course, situations in which speed is not of the essence. They provide us the opportunity to reflect on what tactful response or word would be best.

            The point is that when we employ tact we may find ourselves rejoicing over the good results: “A man [or woman, whether he or she be a teacher, researcher, or someone else] has rejoicing in the answer of his mouth, and a word at its right time is O how good!” (New World Translation, Proverbs 15:23). Stated differently, such a person’s words that are “apples of gold in silver carvings” (Proverbs 25:11) can encourage, inspire, strengthen. I marvel when I see that tactful teachers spur on—encourage—students to want to keep trying in spite of difficult circumstances—and many of the troubled students at my secondary alternate school, McNaughton Centre, Quesnel, BC, have difficult circumstances.

            These students need tactful teachers.

            Now then, would you call this a tactful reply?: “Ursula, that’s an interesting question [assuming it is]. After I finish helping the students with the last section of this worksheet, I’ll answer that question.” Would you call this a tactful statement to the principal who is so proud of his school?: “Thank you for the tour, but I have a meeting in a few minutes with Mrs. [    ]. After I’m finished, could you give me the rest of the tour?” Would that encourage good relations? Sometimes school staff feel animosity towards so-called “ivory tower” (Neuman, 2006, p. viii) researchers who, given to brusqueness, ask voluminous questions, do esoteric quantitative analysis, or generally take up time (McEwan, n.d.). Theresa Dallavalle, portrayed as a lawyer in the movie Erin Brockovich (Shamberg & Soderbergh, 2000) who likes to avoid “sentimental embellishments,” could stereotypically define this sort of researcher.

            How can researchers break down this animosity? Tact doesn’t hurt—no doubt not simply because we catch a lot more flies with honey than with vinegar, but because tact defines the ethically appropriate point of view. Doesn’t tact tower over brusque words and demeanour as humanistically superior?

            In the spirit of your answer to that last question, do you imagine the tactful teacher as positive? When he or she has great optimism, great energy in the classroom can result! Even given the challenges found in the poem called “An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum,” by Stephen Spender (1967, pp. 101-102), the tactful teacher tries to find the “word at its right time” for the benefit of all his or her students. Undaunted by “[the] tall girl with her  weighed-down head” (exhausted or ill?), “the paper- / seeming boy with rat’s eyes” (thin, hungry, and weak?), “the stunted unlucky heir / Of twisted bones, reciting a father’s gnarled disease” (an inherited disease or disability?), and “[a boy’s] eyes [that] live in a dream” (a mental illness?), the tactful teacher will never cease trying to encourage, inspire, and strengthen them all. The tactful teacher is pathic and selfless, with the interests of his students deep in his heart. He becomes a humanistic model for students and colleagues alike (Horwood, 2003). The tactful researcher is nothing less to those he or she meets in his or her research journeys/adventures. Also, the tactful researcher creates an ethical forum for discussion, especially when he or she establishes rapport (which “means … [to] respect the person being interviewed, … that the respondent’s knowledge, experiences, attitudes, and feelings are important” (Patton, 1987, p. 127) and neutrality (which “means that the interviewer listens without passing judgment”) (p. 127).

            Now I would like to move from these ethical concerns that relate to the researcher’s relationship with his or her participants to internal validity concerns that relate to the epistemological worth of a study. I will start first with the analysis of data.

 

Analysis of Data

Analysis immediately after data collection—i.e., after each interview (see, e.g., Galen, 1997/1998; and Lesson: Qualitative Research, 1998)—enabled me to find themes in the data, whereas interpretation, which I discuss later, enabled me to define themes as essential or incidental. Analysis grew, in part, from my study of transcribed interview data and field notes (Bloch, n.d.; Patton, 1987; and Text Analysis, 1998), and from my contact summaries (Miles & Huberman, 1994). My goal remained to truly “listen” to the data, to fully immerse my critical eye (van Manen, 2000a) in the lived experiences. The analysis also grew from memos that I had written to myself (Miles & Huberman, 1994), ongoing participant review, and synthesis of the data (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997). Themes emerged (Bennet, 1998). Van Manen (1990) refers to participant review—some researchers at the pretesting stage of their surveys employ a related process called respondent debriefing or respondent confirmability (Arminio, 2002; see, also, How to Conduct Pretesting, 1997)—as an ongoing dialogue between the researcher and participant, designed to confirm or reject the researcher’s findings. Participant review, in terms of participant-researcher agreement, relates to qualitative research, or more specifically to hermeneutic phenomenology, as reliability, in terms of a reliability quotient (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997), relates to quantitative research. 

            The analysis also included peer debriefing. My peer debriefers ensured rigor (Morse et al., 2002) along the way of the studies by their helping me to not overlook themes in the data. Although some researchers prefer other terms in place of rigor, one being goodness (see, e.g., Arminio, 2002), I like the sense of exactness that “rigor” brings with it, an exactness that my peer debriefers helped me attain.

They helped me in other ways too. They searched for examples of bias in my analyses, in my interpretations, and in my questions as found in the transcribed interview data. I found their “bias control,” if you do not mind that term, invaluable in the sense that although they found no statements of bias, their “presence,” or participation, in the study made me constantly aware that I must at all times bracket my bias.

            Each element of analysis mentioned in this sub-section helped me attain a robust level of internal validity, an acceptable level of epistemological worth. The elements of interpretation, discussed next, likewise helped me attain the same. 

 

Interpretation of Data

Interpretation relates to the word hermeneutics (Byrne, n.d.), derived from the Greek god, Hermes (Bennet, 1998), whose task it was “to communicate messages from Zeus and other gods to the ordinary mortals” (van Manen, 1990, p. 179). Hermeneutics, an intermediary of words, finds a counterpart in Cambodian cosmology in the form of the dances of Asparas. These celestial female dancers “serve as intermediaries between the sacred and the secular through their dances” (Hamera, 1996, p. 201). In other words, Asparas relates to interpretation.

            Patton (1987) says the researcher interprets qualitative data by searching for patterns and relationships. In this interpretive sense, phenomenology provides possible insights, through the wonder of exploration (van Manen, 2000j), through the critical-eye search for essential themes in lived experience (van Manen, 1990, and 2000a). This search occurs after the researcher has analyzed the data and developed, through participant review, a list of themes.

By the way, whether the researcher is at the analysis or interpretation stage, each participant review session affords the participant an opportunity to clarify the precise wording of each theme. A change of one word may alter a theme’s meaning. This opportunity is very important, helping the researcher arrive at the best truth of the participant’s experience (Geelan & Taylor, 2001).

            Interestingly, another tool of interpretation is the researcher’s writing of the themes. Van Manen (1990) tells us that “writing teaches us what we know, and in what way we know what we know” (p. 127). The researcher’s/writer’s goal is insightful writing, but this sort of writing “cannot be accomplished in one straightforward session. Rather, the process of writing and rewriting (including revising or editing) is more reminiscent of the artistic activity of creating an art object that has to be approached again and again” (p. 131). Vandenberg (1992) says:

Van Manen’s ideas about writing are corroborated by the material conditions of my own research. I do not know what I think of an educational problem until I read about it and then write a paper that includes all relevant things conceptualized in a vocabulary drawn from phenomenological discourse. Now I know why my final editing does not obviate the need to type the final draft myself: blue pencilling after the draft has gone cold objectifies it and enables one to see what it says to someone else, but this is merely rereading. Rewriting is necessary to become fully engaged in the matter, resubjectifying it so it becomes more truly disclosive of what is intended. (Significance of Writing, para. 1)

In short, in terms of interpretive precision, “writing and rewriting [of themes] is the thing” (van Manen, 1990, p. 132). But phenomenological interpretation involves more. It “involves attaching meaning and significance to the analysis” (Patton, 1987, p. 144) in a very particular way. I mean to say that although analysis determines what themes exist, interpretation determines what themes are essential. Van Manen (1990), and phenomenological researchers in general, some philosophers too, call this process free imaginative variation. This process steps far away from the methodology of researchers who consider interpretation their sole, uncollaborative responsibility (Galen, 1997/1998). 

 

Free Imaginative Variation

What change or changes to a circle make it into something else? In other words, when is a circle not a circle (Circle, 2003)? When is an ellipse not an ellipse (Ellipse, 1999)? A hyperbola not a hyperbola (Hyperbola, 1999)? A line not a line (Kline, 1967)? An elliptic (or hyperbolic) paraboloid not an elliptic (or hyperbolic) paraboloid (Paraboloid, 2005)? Is a chair still a chair if it has only three legs instead of the usual four? Polt (n.d.) discusses the form of “a triangle [that] makes it be a triangle, rather than any other sort of thing—its triangleness” (para. 3; see, also, Boeree, n.d.a, n.d.b). Polt speaks about free imaginative variation in terms of a technique, a way to “imaginatively subtract one feature, then another, discovering in the process which features are essential and which are not [i.e., which are incidental]” (para. 6). Some know about this technique through their studies of Husserl, the mathematician and phenomenologist (see, e.g., van Manen, 1990).

            Mathematicians describe the essential features of circles, ellipses, hyperbolas, lines, elliptic and hyperbolic paraboloids, and other geometric figures in their one, two, or three dimensional domains. Mathematicians even describe the essential features of figments of their imaginations, such as n-dimensional hyper-spheres defined by formulas of the form x12 + x22 + x32 + … + xn2 = r2. I invite the reader to begin listing the essential features of a chair. He or she may find this difficult. Phenomenologists, faced with similar difficulties, describe essential features that define phenomenon (van Manen, 1990). In the arena called hermeneutic phenomenology, as a research methodology, researchers often use free imaginative variation to help them determine essential versus incidental themes (1990).

            My three hermeneutic phenomenological studies explored what lived experiences in school had encouraged three different individuals to become creative writers. Free imaginative variation helped my participants and I to establish “what to disregard” (Polt, n.d., para. 28). Through hermeneutic phenomenology as a research methodology (van Manen, 1990), which included the analysis of taped interviews, the drawing up of themes, and then participant review to alter and/or verify wording of those themes, my three studies produced 22 themes; however, I was not able during the interpretation stage of free imaginative variation—a specialized form of participant review—to label all the themes of all three studies essential.

Only essential themes (Boeree, n.d.a, n.d.b; and Steiner, 1986) defined the essence of the phenomenon (Phenomenology as Method, n.d.) of what experiences in school had encouraged my participants to become creative writers. The reader unfamiliar with free imaginative variation may wonder how it helped participants and myself disregard themes, deeming them incidental, yet deeming others essential. I will show how I used it as an explicit (n.d.) and fundamental tool.

In Study I, Arthur helped me hone eight themes through several participant review sessions (see Chapter Sixteen: Conclusions—Arthur’s Themes). They are, approximately, the eight themes that I had found in the interview data. Arthur found these themes valid products of his interviews, but he changed, during participant review, a word here, and phrase or clause there, to make sure each theme correctly—or as accurately/reliably as possible—reflected his experiences in school. My peer debriefers found them valid and free (or as reasonably free as possible) of my bias.

Then, during an interpretive, specialized form of participant review that I have referred to as free imaginative variation, I helped Arthur to think about the significance of each of his eight themes. I began with Theme One:  “Arthur, can you remove this theme from the set of themes of all school experiences that encouraged you to become a creative writer—in the sense that this theme is not all that important?” In the case of each theme, he felt he absolutely could not. He felt in each case that doing so altered the phenomenon. He could not imagine the phenomenon intact with any of the eight themes removed, i.e., he could not label any of the eight incidental. What school experiences had encouraged him to become a creative writer defined, for him, eight essential themes. Not seven. Not six. If the phenomenon is defined by a set of circles, then no theme is an ellipse, triangle, square, or anything but a circle.

This discussion of Study I helps to show that essential themes remain unremoveable from the phenomenon, but a discussion of Study II helps to show why some themes, although valid products of a researcher’s analysis of interview data, stand as incidental. I found seven themes in the data in Study II. My peer debriefer found them unbiased products of my analysis. Thomas (Study II), through participant review, considered them valid in terms of the data (interview), but changed words here and there to ensure the themes reliably reflected his experiences; however, through another participant review session, using free imaginative variation as an interpretive tool, Thomas did not say those themes were all essential. On the contrary, he found six incidental, leaving only one essential. Then he felt he needed to further alter that theme over succeeding participant review sessions to ensure it, to an even greater degree, reliably reflected his experiences. Call the final draft of that theme a parallelogram. The six incidental themes, then, are of different “geometric” categories.  

            For example, consider teachers who expressly appreciated Thomas’ efforts to write encouraged him to become a creative writer (Incidental Theme One). This theme is not essential because Thomas felt that it had not mattered much what people had thought about his writing. During his school years, he decided to write whether or not people appreciated his efforts. If the essence of the phenomenon of what school experiences encouraged Thomas is a set of parallelograms, then Incidental Theme One is not one; it is simply something else.

Incidental Theme Two, which says opportunities to hear his own written words spoken aloud encouraged him to become a creative writer, is not essential because although he enjoyed hearing his own words spoken aloud, he did not need them to be. This theme is not a parallelogram. Likewise, Incidental Theme Three, exposure to great literature encouraged Thomas to become a creative writer, is not essential (not a parallelogram). Thomas would have found great literature to read if none had been presented at school. He had access to great literature at home, and through that exposure he would have found more and more.

Incidental Theme Four states: Opportunities to write, under most circumstances, even as a punishment, encouraged Thomas to become a creative writer. This is not essential because he found his own opportunities to write without looking for them in school. The irony for Thomas, however, was that writing as a punishment was in reality a reward; he loved to write! Incidental Theme Four, in short, is not a parallelogram. Neither is Incidental Theme Five: Opportunities to show off his writing ability to peers encouraged Thomas to become a creative writer. This theme is not essential because as much fun as showing off his talent to his peers was, Thomas did not require peer approval of his writing. Incidental Theme Six, opportunities to express himself freely through the use of literary techniques of his choice encouraged Thomas to become a creative writer, is also not essential because although he deeply enjoyed expressing himself freely through his choice of literary techniques, he did not require these opportunities at school. He made his own opportunities outside of school. Incidental Theme Six is not a parallelogram. One essential theme remains (see Chapter Seventeen: Conclusions—Thomas’ Theme).

In Study III, Elizabeth helped me finalize seven themes. I had analyzed the interview, discovering seven themes, which my peer debriefer had deemed unbiased. Elizabeth considered them valid products of the interview. She tinkered with these themes during participant review to ensure they were, in the final draft, reliable products of her experiences in school. Through free imaginative variation, Elizabeth labelled two of the themes incidental. My peer debriefer considered the themes after each participant review, and even after my use of free imaginative variation, to make sure that my biases were not driving researcher-participant discussions. For Studies I and II, I had followed the same process.

Not surprisingly, Elizabeth’s themes listed alongside Arthur and Thomas’ reveal her distinctiveness. Like Thomas, however, she did not believe that all the themes I discovered were essential, whereas Arthur remained convinced that all eight of his themes were definitely essential. She discarded this theme: Several teachers encouraged her to enter Federal- and Provincial-level writing contests, which she sometimes won (Incidental Theme One). She did not feel, through free imaginative variation, that this theme warranted essential status because her father, not any teacher, had been the first adult to encourage her to enter these contests. If, on the other hand, my research question had been, What, if any, experiences in school or outside of school encouraged [her] to become an adult creative writer?, likely her Incidental Theme One, modified to reflect her father’s influence, would have ranked as essential. Study III, however, remained objective, as did Studies I and II, by remaining bounded by its single research question. If the essence of the phenomenon of what school experiences had encouraged Elizabeth is a set of spheres, then Incidental Theme One is not a sphere.     

            She discarded another theme as incidental: Teachers frequently asked her to help other students with writing assignments, and also asked students to approach her about writing problems they were encountering (Incidental Theme Two). Through free imaginative variation, she believed that this theme could be removed from the “school” phenomenon. Although the theme, through my analysis, came out of the interview data, Elizabeth saw it as nonessential. Incidental Theme Two is not a sphere. With Incidental Themes One and Two discarded, then, the essence of Elizabeth’s lived school experiences, with regard to the research question, is five themes (see Chapter Eighteen: Conclusions—Elizabeth’s Themes). They are five spheres.

The 14 Essential themes define the essence of the phenomenon I explored in my three studies. In a sense, discarding incidental themes is hermeneutic phenomenology’s method of dealing with what some researchers call rival hypotheses (Miles & Huberman, 1994), negative or discrepant results (Project Methodology, n.d.), or disconfirming evidence (Lesson: Qualitative Research, 1998); however, incidental themes are discarded only if the participant, through the free imaginative variation process, labels them as nonessential to the phenomenon, whereas rival hypotheses, negative or discrepant results, or disconfirming evidence challenges conclusions or other insights a researcher comes up with. In terms of a specific example, those challenges may modify or extend grounded theory (Glaser, 1992; and Glaser & Strauss, 1967).

The process of free imaginative variation within a context of participant review ensures that the essential themes exist as a valid and reliable interpretation of the participant’s lived experience. In a nutshell, during the process each of my participants thought about this question: If he or she erased [theme x] from the list of themes, would the phenomenon of what encouraged him or her be altered? If the answer is yes, the theme stands as essential. If the answer is no, the theme is discarded as incidental. Critics of free imaginative variation might say, “But the researcher may have discarded an essential theme because the participant couldn’t engage his or her powers of concentration concretely enough to see the theme’s importance in the phenomenon.” Other critics might make an opposite argument: “The participant could have concluded that theme x is essential, when in fact, it isn’t.”

Van Manen (1990) himself admits controversy over free imaginative variation exists. My reply: 1) the researcher must exercise patience, giving the participant every opportunity to evaluate each theme’s essential or incidental relevance to the phenomenon and every opportunity to change his or her mind; and 2) no research is perfect. Every methodology has limitations (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997). At the end of any free imaginative variation session, however, the participant should feel 100% convinced, in the name of internal validity or credibility (Siegle, n.d.c), that the essential themes are indeed valid and reliable, that they define the essence of the phenomenon (van Manen, 1990). That’s the best a researcher can do.

The term interpretation, or hermeneutics, however, may still make one wonder about validity. Although free imaginative variation, bracketing, peer debriefing, participant review, objectivity, subjectivity, field notes, contact summaries, and memos addressed validity issues, a few other considerations remain.

 

Other Considerations

McMillan and Schumacher (1997) discuss validity in terms of the degree that the researcher’s discovered phenomenon match reality, i.e., the degree that the themes I discovered matched the realities of participants’ lived experience (see, e.g., Siegle, n.d.a). To that end, I needed to conduct quality interviews. Hence, I conducted the interviews in the comfort and familiarity of places participants chose (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997). Arthur chose a room at his workplace, Thomas a table on his veranda, and Elizabeth her kitchen table. Further, I spoke in the language of the participants as an indigenous-insider (Banks, 1998), as a fellow creative writer.

Not in the geographical sense, but in the intellectual sense, I am an “indigenous-insider” (Banks, 1998, p. 8) as one who “endorses the unique values, perspectives, behaviors, beliefs, and knowledge of his or her indigenous community and culture and is perceived by people within the community as a legitimate community member who can speak with authority about it” (p. 8). I am a published poet and novelist. Therefore, the use of “low-inference descriptors” (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997, p. 406) was a simple matter. By low-interference terms I refer to “those used and understood by the participant” (p. 406). Those terms stand “in contrast to the abstract language of a researcher” (p. 406). The ethical thing, in terms of respect and good communication, is to “consider your audience” (Theocratic School Guidebook, 1971, p. 112). Understandably, my studies contain “verbatim accounts of conversations and precise descriptions of actions by [the] participant[s]” (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997, p. 406).

            My efforts as referred to in the last two paragraphs resulted in good communication and understanding between the participants and me, and my efforts to use low-interference terms in this text should promote reader comprehension. Readers often find themselves confused by statistical applications and concepts in studies (see, e.g., Steel & Ovalle, 1984). These statistical descriptors can definitely cloud communication from the researcher to any reader with no formal knowledge of probability and statistics; however, even a reader with no training in quantitative or qualitative educational research should find my studies and this monograph relatively easy to understand.       

            Participants’ language, as quotes from transcribed tape recordings of interviews (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997), is an important element of this monograph and my research process. Other important elements also deserve mention. I kept field journals (containing field notes, contact summaries, and memos), which recorded my comments about the trustworthiness of the data (1997). The journals also recorded my thoughts, reactions, and questions related to the entire research process of the three studies (1997). An audibility file, however, on a far grander scale, contains more than these thoughts, reactions, and questions; such a file contains a comprehensively recorded trail of decisions (1997; and Davis 1997a). During each study, I compiled an audibility file. The three files were available to my respective peer debriefer(s), who provided frequent checks for rigor, frequent pro-active checks, designed to address threats to validity along the way (Morse et al., 2002).

            This pro-active approach addresses triangulation of a sort (Myers, 1997). If a variety of informants in action research addresses the spirit of triangulation (Arminio, 2002; and Dick, 1999), then agreement between participant, researcher, and peer debriefer in a phenomenological study addresses the same spirit. Really, if “both an interview and a survey can be used to provide convergent validity information” (Pogson, Bott, Ramakrishnan, & Levy, 2002, p. 2), then all three of researcher analysis and participant review (a sort of survey, albeit, one-to-one/researcher-to-participant) and peer debriefing can provide convergent validity, just as both researcher interpretation (another sort of survey, in the context of free imaginative variation) and peer debriefing can provide the same.

            Before I rest my argument in defense of my study’s validity, I will discuss a few ethical considerations.

 

Ethics1

            Prior to the collection of data for the studies, I printed off letters of introduction and information and Informed Consent Forms (Appendix A) that were provided to the participants (Research, n.d.). The letters of information detailed potential benefits and risks to the participants; sampling criteria; what the participants would be asked to do; who would have access to the participants’ responses; how anonymity would be addressed; how confidentiality would be addressed (Ethics, 1998); and how long data would be stored and when and how it would be destroyed. Studies that do not report how their researchers dealt with anonymity/confidentiality issues (see, e.g., Bowman, Manoogian, & Driscoll, 2002; Chairs, McDonald, Shroyer, Urbanski, & Vertin, 2002; Comer, 2002; Mark, Daniel, & Parcell, 2002; and Rohs, Stribling, & Westerfield, 2002) attract criticism from readers. Researchers who address these issues in their published studies (see, e.g., Hare & Skinner 1999) promote good research habits in the academic community.

 

 

Chapter Fifteen: Conclusions—What the Participants Did Not Say

            Many events in school encouraged Arthur to become a creative writer. Few encouraged Thomas. Quite a few encouraged Elizabeth. I describe many of these events and the themes that they support, but first I would like to discuss what the participants did not say.

 

What Arthur Did Not Say

            I wondered if Arthur would describe creative writing activities as examples of lived school experiences that had encouraged him to become a creative writer. Interestingly, he mentioned none. Does that mean teachers offered no creative writing activities? During one participant review session, Arthur said teachers had very rarely asked students to write poems or stories of fiction. In my elementary and high school experience, teachers seldom set up creative writing classes, although I do recall one of note. As I related in Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases, my grade 12 English substitute teacher asked us students to write a poem about absolutely anything that we wished to write about. My poem confused him, but his genuine interest in and validation of my work convinced me I wanted to be a writer from that day forward. Margaret Atwood also relates a grade 12 English creative writing event as significant, although in the context of finally she was beginning to shine as an English student. Her teacher said, “This must be a very good poem, dear, because I can’t understand a word of it” (Polanyi, 2002, p. 62).

            Arthur did not refer to the kinds of creative writing activities I have found on Web sites (see Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology) and did not describe any specific creative writing activities that had encouraged him. He did not refer to assignments similar to the ones in my creative writing course (Lukiv, 1997), although he did mention significant writing assignments, which I refer to later (Chapter Sixteen: Conclusions—Arthur’s Themes). He did not mention school activities about his sending submissions to editors, nor did he mention classroom publication activities that encouraged him to further study creative writing. He mentioned no encouragement through contact with a teacher who had been a creative writer.

            But Arthur did mention several examples of events in school that had encouraged him to take up creative writing later in life. I describe the themes that those events support in Chapter Sixteen: Conclusions—Arthur’s Themes.

 

What Thomas Did Not Say

            Thomas did not say that many events in elementary and high school encouraged him to take up creative writing later in life. I was, therefore, not surprised, during participant review, that he fully agreed with Birney (1966), who says school can discourage some potential creative writers. In some cases they feel forced, Birney says, to drop out of high school to learn elsewhere the art and craft of creative writing. Another study could explore events that discourage students from taking up writing seriously. Study II, however, explored the opposite.

               Unlike Arthur’s and Elizabeth’s essential themes, Thomas’ essential theme does not refer to specific Language Arts events as sources of encouragement. It does not refer to comments by teachers about his writing nor to his contact with a teacher-writer, nor to freedom of choice of reading material, nor to specialized events such as films, live plays, or Christmas concerts.

 

What Elizabeth Did Not Say

Arthur is unique. So is Thomas. So is Elizabeth, in terms of what psychological, sociological, biological, spiritual, educational, physical, genetic, economic, and other forces drove her (Zunker, 1998). Not surprisingly, her themes listed alongside Arthur’s and Thomas’ reveal her distinctiveness.

            She did not speak about events in school that had promoted the joy and wonder of silent reading of poetry and fiction (Arthur’s Theme One). She did not use words such as joy or wonder in her themes. She did not refer to events (Arthur’s Theme Two) in which teachers had read poetry and fiction or led the students in singsongs. She did not speak about events that had promoted the wonder of uninterrupted language experiences (Arthur’s Theme Three). She did not speak about events that had promoted the intrigue and wonder of flights of imagination fuelled by the connotative and imagistic value of words (Arthur’s Theme Four).

            Neither did she use the word intrigue. Her themes do not celebrate imagination in the same way Arthur’s Theme Four does. Clearly, however, she had put her imagination to work to write creatively (e.g., poems, stories, and plays). She did not use words such as connotative and imagistic. I’m not surprised. Arthur is a poet, Elizabeth, predominantly, a fiction writer. My experience tells me that poets need first a deep understanding of the connotative, evocative, and imagistic value of words (Drury, 1991), whereas fiction writers need first a deep understanding of character and drama (Block, 1979).

Elizabeth did not refer to events that had promoted the excitement of verbally punning and joking and of informing others about what she had read and learned (Arthur’s Theme Five). Arthur spoke of events that had promoted the joy and exhilarating freedom of his writing down his thoughts and feelings based on poetry and fiction read and having those thoughts and feelings valued by teachers (Arthur’s Theme Six). Elizabeth did not use words such as “joy” and “exhilarating freedom” when she spoke about her writing experiences.

Elizabeth enjoyed a variety of reading experiences, but she did not refer to events that promoted the exhilarating freedom of choice of reading material (Arthur’s Theme Seven). Neither did she refer to events that promoted the satisfaction and excitement of receiving sound direction about how to write well from compassionate teachers (Arthur’s Theme Eight); however, three of her themes imply that some of her teachers had valued her work (Themes One, Two and Four).

Like Arthur and Thomas, she did not mention school activities that had involved teachers’ sending her creative writing to editors or publishing her work in print. Neither did she mention encouragement through a teacher who had been a creative writer, although one of her themes refers to an established writer, not her teacher, who had encouraged her.   

            She did not say that any teacher had demanded the best of her as a human being (part of Thomas’ broad, single theme). She did not say that any teacher had valued her as a unique person, or had encouraged her to be the best that she could be (also part of Thomas’ theme).

 

 

Chapter Sixteen: Conclusions—Arthur’s Themes

            1) Events in school that promoted the joy and wonder of silent reading of poetry and fiction encouraged Arthur to become a creative writer. 2) Events that promoted the joy and wonder of listening to poetry and fiction fluently read aloud and of listening to songs encouraged him.  3) Events that promoted the wonder of uninterrupted language experiences and 4) that promoted the intrigue and wonder of flights of imagination fuelled by the connotative and imagistic value of words encouraged him. 5) Events that promoted the excitement of verbally punning and joking and of informing others about what he had read and learned encouraged him and 6) so did events that promoted the joy and exhilarating freedom of writing down his thoughts and feelings based on poetry and fiction read and having those thoughts and feelings valued by teachers. 7) Events that promoted the exhilarating freedom of choice of reading material and 8) that promoted the satisfaction and excitement of receiving sound direction about how to write well from compassionate teachers encouraged Arthur to become a creative writer. Words in these themes such as “joy,” “wonder,” “intrigue,” “excitement,” “exhilarating,” and “satisfaction” describe feelings Arthur had. I chose those words through my analysis of the data and through repeated participant reviews. Each of those “steps” helped establish the themes’ validity and reliability. Really, no word, including the aforementioned “feeling” words, remained in the themes unless they were Arthur’s words in the sense that in each case he could say, “Yes. That’s exactly how that theme should read.”      

            I will now discuss those themes and events that support each of those themes.

 

Theme One.

Arthur was encouraged by events in school that promoted the joy and wonder of silent reading of poetry and fiction. The words “joy” and “wonder” show he enjoyed “the benefits and pleasures of ... reading” (The Ministry, 1996a, 1996b, 1996c, p. 1). The Ministry’s three guides refer to those benefits and pleasures repeatedly. In fact, Arthur remembered “reading more than writing.” He spoke about how he had become “intrigued with literature ... .Books…were important, ... always intriguing ... because ...  people ... in literature, in writing, ... in poetry, and in adventures” were more intriguing than, he felt, himself.

            I asked if reading in one grade stood out from another. He said no. He had loved “literature. Poetry,” especially “poetics ... .Even though I was reading, say an adventure story [like Tarzan], the poetic imagery that came through was important to me.”      

            He remembered other specific reading texts. He said, “I took English 91 which I think is [now] called English 12 or Lit 12,” and he recalled reading Beowulf in class. He had loved “silent reading” opportunities of such fine works. He recalled feeling intrigued by great writing such as the work of Ralph Waldo Emerson and the fiction of D. H. Lawrence. The imagery of their texts, of a myriad of good texts, had intrigued him to the point of fascination.

            That fascination had transcended the arousal of curiosity found in intrigue. In participant review sessions, Arthur described feelings of joy and wonder rather than just intrigue as the most accurate emotions that had often filled him as he read in school. On reflection, I relate to his feelings. I too felt joy and wonder during silent reading of many texts in school. I felt such a wide and powerful range of emotions while reading that I wanted to know how people can write with such expertise (see Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases).

 

Theme Two.

Events in school that promoted the joy and wonder of listening to poetry and fiction fluently read aloud and of listening to songs encouraged Arthur to become a creative writer. Although he frequently used the word intrigued during his interviews, he substituted joy and wonder for it during participant review. He said, “I remember songs ... that we used to sing. I was intrigued with the words. ... ’Put your left foot in, put your left foot out.’ ‘I’m a little teapot.’ Things like that. I can remember the words of stories. ... I was intrigued ... by the teacher who would read to us. I loved listening to the voice.... I fell in love with the voice.... Loved listening.” Although these singsong events helped establish a “resource-rich learning environment” (The Ministry, 1996a, p. 8; 1996b, p 9; 1996c, p. 10) for Arthur, The Ministry’s three guides do not specifically encourage Language Arts teachers to consider the benefits of singsongs.   

            “The fun part of language ... was,” for Arthur, “always ... the intriguing ... .sound that words made.” Sometimes he didn’t know the meaning of a “word, but [he] was just intrigued with the sound, how it would move through [his] ear, how it would sound when [he] said it, and then putting ... words together.” Arthur distinctly recalled an early intermediate experience of his teacher reading aloud a Pauline Johnson poem and how the words had opened up “wonderful feelings” inside of him while he had been “swept along by the reading.” He had “loved the sound of the word in poetry, and he had “loved music too, but ... hearing the words really, really clearly ... was always the intriguing part for [Arthur].”             

            He did not recall participating in the singing of songs, most often sung in the primary grades; however, he did recall “listening, and being very cognizant of this.” One of the feelings he had while the students sang was “isolation, being alone, but being brought into the classroom by the sound of ... music and the words.” That made him “feel happy, ... inclusive.”

            For Arthur there was a certain musical quality to poetry read aloud.  As he said, “What came through to me was the word: the cadence, the music, ah, poetry reading, ... listening to the teacher read out loud.” But he loved to hear fiction read aloud too. He mentioned, “In grade eight the teacher read Treasure Island ... .I was intrigued by the sound of the words and the way they fit into the picture I was building. Even though the language is really difficult, I didn’t know all of the words, ... [and] that didn’t upset me.” Again Arthur referred to “the sound. It was beautiful. It was ... like ... parrots. Colourful parrots flitting about ... .That was the feeling I had with the language. Colourful parrots just flitting about. Moving. Moving. Intriguing.” [Arthur moved his hands about as if the parrots were flitting about before him.] The joy and wonder he had felt in school clearly filled him during the interview.

            I, too, had an experience in school, in grade seven, in which our teacher read fiction aloud, and that experience, like Arthur’s, encouraged me to become a writer. My grade seven teacher read aloud A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. As I mentioned in Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases, I remember saying to myself , “I don’t know who this Dickens guy is, but he sure knows what he’s doing.” I wanted to know how one goes about using the printed word to make others feel emotion. The wonder of that grew inside me through junior high school. I wanted to know how one writes words that make people feel so deeply they cannot forget the stories.

            Jack Hodgins (1993) also had a somewhat similar experience. In his A Passion for Narrative: A Guide for Writing Fiction, he describes a teacher reading to his class as an example of a school experience that encouraged him to become a writer of fiction:

Books were forms of magic, once you could read them. From the moment I’d learned to read, I wanted to be one of those people who put magic between the covers!

In high school, the young English teacher who had introduced us to the poetry of Robert Frost and the essays of Roderick Haig-Brown persuaded the school board to buy five copies of The Old Man and the Sea for the school library. Then—perhaps he wasn’t sure we’d make use of them otherwise—he read one of those copies aloud. Something during that reading—which he strung out over several days, as I recall—a longing that had been with me all my life suddenly took on sharper focus: I would devote my life to the writing of serious fiction. (1993, p. 13)

            Arthur, like Jack Hodgins and me, was encouraged to take up creative writing, in part, because of being read to in school. The Ministry says “the learning environment should ... foster enjoyment of language in all its aspects” (1996a, 1996b, 1996c, p. 2). For Arthur, his being read to fostered such enjoyment. The Ministry’s (1992) Primary Program: Resource Document says, “Resource implications emphasize ... reading to children” (p. 182).

            Because of the flowing nature of being read to, generally an uninterrupted flow of words, Theme Two relates to Theme Three.

 

Theme Three

Arthur was encouraged to become a creative writer through events in school that promoted the wonder of uninterrupted language experiences. These experiences allowed him to truly consider himself in relation to others and the environment, and to consider his own thoughts and feelings without having to step out of his considerations to answer teachers’ questions. For Arthur, these experiences were definitely beneficial and encouraging. The Ministry (1996a, 1996b, 1996c) does refer to many videos—plays and movies—and to much reading material that could serve as excellent resources for uninterrupted language experiences.

            Arthur said:

“The very first experience I had was a film, and it was in grade one, and I was five years old, and it was a film about a milkman. [Laughs.] And I was intrigued by the images on the screen, but also by the voice. I remember it almost seemed like one of those CBC announcer’s voices ... .There was a guy named Morry Westgate that used to be the voice for the NHL hockey games. I think he would sell ESSO oil or something. But I loved his voice. And I’m sure it was his voice, or someone like that, a very trained ... CBC radio voice. And I could just hear the cadence, you know, rise and fall of the language. Of course I was turned on by the visual because I am visual too, but I was also turned on by what I was hearing. And so, the voice ... describing this milkman’s ordinary day ... wasn’t mundane for me. Hearing the words and the language and the cadence and the rhythm ... .I can remember being intrigued by the sound.”

When Arthur used the word intrigued, as he often did, he often implicitly referred to wonder as part of the experience. In fact, in participant review, Arthur chose the word “wonder” as opposed to “intrigue” as the emotional element of Theme Three. Wonder takes the curiosity of intrigue and adds surprise, even astonishment.  

            When Arthur discussed Theme Two and Theme Three with me in participant review, he agreed with me that both are related through sound-based events. But he believed that Theme Three needs its own category apart from Theme Two. Theme Three does not require any sound-based events, as in the case of uninterrupted reading events. 

            Arthur created a clear picture of his grade one uninterrupted experience by filling in many other details:

“We were all taken down to this kind of basement. It was very damp ... .I was aware of dampness and ... sounds and ... people’s movement—and smells ... .It was like going down into a dungeon in a way ... .And it was a dark place. And those metal chairs ... would make that scraping sound on the cement down below ... .I was intrigued. I was very intrigued ... .I was definitely paying attention and I was into myself. Like I knew there were people around me, and I knew I was part of a crowd. But I was ... one with the film and the experience ... .I was alone in a way. I was there with other people, but I was kind of alone ... .Alone and experiencing things ... I had a feeling that other people weren’t around me because I was hearing and seeing and smelling.”

            This uninterrupted experience allowed Arthur to be swept along with the sensory information the event presented. In grade ten he watched Romeo and Juliet during a class visit to The Queen Elizabeth Theatre in Vancouver, BC, and that uninterrupted event also encouraged him to become a creative writer. He revelled in the sound of the words and the imagery. They swept him along. The wonder of the experience lives with him now. He had the same experience when his teacher read a Pauline Johnson poem, and when his grade eight teacher read aloud Treasure Island—the whole novel—over several classes. Arthur had great lengths of time to create pictures in his mind and to revel in and wonder about the imagery.

            These uninterrupted language experiences likely relate to flights of imagination fuelled by the connotative and imagistic value of words, but in Arthur’s mind, confirmed through participant review, these flights are elements of Theme Four.

 

Theme Four

Events in school that promoted the intrigue and wonder of flights of imagination fuelled by the connotative and imagistic value of words encouraged Arthur to become a creative writer. Sometimes those events were simply Arthur left alone by his teacher to “daydream,” to play with words in his head that a poem or story brought to his attention. He said, “[I] looked out the window, formed pictures in my head.” Sometimes Arthur had been left alone by the teacher to experience intrigue over the “connotative meanings and the association with the rest of the sentence and the paragraph” that the teacher and class had been considering.

            These were imaginative events for Arthur. Sometimes those events were a result of “teachers that were ... focused ... on ... imagination” who respected Arthur’s need to sit and daydream and imagine and play with the connotative and imagistic value of words in his head from poems and stories considered in class. The Ministry, in effect, supports such events through comments such as “the learning environment should stimulate students’ imaginations” (1996a, 1996b, 1996c, p. 2). Arthur’s intrigue lay in the ability of those events “to arouse and hold [his] interest or curiosity” (Intrigue, 1992, p. 514), and his wonder lay in the ability of those events to create “a feeling of mingled surprise and curiosity” (Wonder, 1992, p. 1132).

 

Theme Five

Arthur was encouraged to become a creative writer by events in school that promoted the excitement of verbally punning and joking and of informing others about what he had read and learned. The logic of placing “punning,” “joking,” and “informing others” together in this theme rests in their verbal expression. This logic states Arthur’s view as he expressed himself in participant review. Direction related to this theme from The Ministry comes from the following: Students need “to manipulate language for ... expression. ... [And] students should ... have frequent opportunities to talk ... about what they have learned ... from a variety of stories, poems, essays, documents, and other media” (1996a, 1996b, 1996c, p. 3).

            Arthur said, “I remember punning as early as grade ... two or three. ... I was twisting the language to suit myself and making jokes.” By grade six, he “was becoming the class clown.” He explained, “I was quite funny. I would play on what the teacher said, made fun of that. I would make fun of what people said. So I became a little comedian.” Teachers who had allowed him, within reason, to pun and joke, where actually furthering his “intrigue with language.”

            Arthur had been sharing a humanistic part of himself that others had showed appreciation for through laughter. His sense of the ludicrous and incongruous, his “humorous use of a word in a way that suggest[ed] two or more interpretations” (Pun, 1994, p. 591), and his celebration of “the foibles and inconsistencies of human nature” (Wit and Humor, 1993, p. 217) had brought him reinforcement that he had thoroughly enjoyed, that he had found exciting. “There was great humour,” he said about a senior English teacher’s class. “[My teacher] encouraged humour in me. She encouraged me to say things. Because I would often say weird things and get the kids laughing.” I asked, “So her validation of humour: You feel that encouraged you to become a writer?” “Yes. ... I think that writing involves a huge sense of humour. Humour is a sense of the world.”

            He broke down, emotionally overcome, when he related how in grade ten English he had shared his knowledge in class. “I was putting my hand up,” he related, “and—irrelevant information. I had just tons of it. I was reading dictionaries, encyclopaedias. Ah, ... I’m just emotional right now.” He had to stop to compose himself. The experience of informing others had created a wonderful sense of accomplishment in Arthur.

            Arthur’s punning, joking, and informing has a definite entertainment value that I relate to. In grade five, I played my guitar for my class (see Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases). The exhilaration of entertaining those students was almost more than I could stand. For me, events in school that promoted the excitement of entertaining others encouraged me to become a creative writer. This broad statement does not focus on the entertainment value of only words. For Arthur, however, Theme Five draws squarely on the excitement of punning, joking, and informing through the use of words.

 

Theme Six

Events in school that promoted the joy and exhilarating freedom of writing down his thoughts and feelings based on poetry and fiction read and having those thoughts and feelings valued by teachers encouraged Arthur to become a creative writer. This theme draws support from The Ministry through many statements. For example, “As students come to understand and use language more fully, they are able to enjoy the benefits and pleasures of ... writing. ... Students should ... feel that their ideas are valued. ... An English Language Arts program should encourage students to ... communicate effectively in written ... forms” (1996a, 1996b, 1996c, pp. 1-2).

            Many events that support Theme Six had come from Arthur’s English classes in grades 10 to 13. Arthur spoke of “writing about the poem, ... elucidation ... .paragraph work ... .some essays.” I asked, “Would you say that writing about poems encouraged you to become a writer?” “Yes. ... Because one of the things it did is it helped me to figure out my own processes in writing. ... It was a learning thing.”

            His grade 13 English teacher “was fantastic. ... We’d write,” he said, “about ... our feelings. ... It was, how did you feel about ...? What did this make you think about ...?” I added, “And to write about how you felt, to write about your thoughts—” “Encouraged my feelings,” Arthur said, “to write about me and my feelings. So that led to my writing and my poetry. My sense of writing as a writer.”

            He recalled how, in general, other students had complained about writing assignments based on their thoughts and feelings. But Arthur’s reaction had been “Yippee! ... Here is a chance to express myself, not just verbally.” He laughed. “I got A’s for saying things on paper! ... I was getting great encouragement.” He spoke about how the English teachers for grades 10 to 13 had said, “You’ve expressed this really well.” “And that encouraged me,” he said, “even further to want to go on to express myself on paper more and more. ... If I hadn’t had that encouragement, I might have become stultified as a writer. ... Perhaps only gone so far.”

            He contrasted these teachers to others who had appeared to expect only limited quality or limited depth of writing. These teachers had encouraged in Arthur an unlimited quality and depth, an unlimited exploration of “language and feelings.” They had encouraged him “to explore feelings with language. To explore poetry.  Especially poetry.” These teachers “were all lovers and proponents of poetry, and great lovers of ... literature.” “They encouraged you,” I asked, “to express your feelings and your thoughts about what you read?” “Not just orally,” he answered, “but ... on paper. ... That expression on paper as a writer began to take hold. It’s ... like ... little drops from above that nestle down and ... if they’re immediately noticed and encouraged, ... then great things come. But if I hadn’t been encouraged, those drops would have ... just evaporated. And perhaps I wouldn’t be where I am today.”

            These writing events promoted joy along with a sense of exhilarating freedom for Arthur to express himself; also, teachers valued what Arthur had to say, and he recognized that they valued it. My grade 12 poem-writing experience, described in Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases and Chapter Fifteen: Conclusions—What the Participants Did Not Say, carries, to at least some degree, joy and a sense of freedom, but I consider that experience more, much more, as one of the events that promoted the joy of my ideas being appreciated, or valued.

            In view, then, of the thorough classroom discussions Arthur had experienced that preceded his writing down his thoughts and feelings, I have to say Arthur did describe rich and deep analyses of creative writing in school as examples of experiences that had encouraged him. I referred to the possibility of such experiences in Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology. Simply put, these notable analyses of poetry had helped germinate the thoughts and feelings Arthur included in his writing—writing that his teachers had valued.

            These teachers created “frequent opportunities [for students] to talk and write about what they [had] learned about themselves and others from a variety of stories [and] poems” (The Ministry, 1996a, 1996b, 1996c, p. 3), providing their “students greater self-awareness and a deeper appreciation of the richness and complexity of human experience” (1996, p. 3; 1996b, p. 3; 1996c, p. 4).    

            Classroom discussions, however, that focus on rich and deep analyses of creative writing might prompt the reader to wonder if The Ministry’s approved resources that chop up stories into elemental scraps of escapism, interpretation, plot, theme, character, point of view, symbolism, and irony or into other scraps of subject, verb, verbal, adverb, adjective, noun, pronoun, conjunction, preposition, phrase, clause, antecedent, sentence fragment, object, infinitive, and punctuation, or if teachers who chop up poems into bits of literary terminology such as alliteration, assonance, caesura, dactyl, enjambement, feminine rhyme, free verse, metaphor, and onomatopoeia (to refer to a relatively small number of examples) were included in Arthur’s school experiences (see Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology). Arthur mentioned discussions of poetics in his senior English classes, which had included interpretations of and his personal reactions to poetry, and likely had included discussions of literary terms, but he mentioned nothing about chopping up stories, language, and poetry into elemental or grammatical (or even literary) bits. I am not surprised, in view of a place in one interview: He said, “The thing that I wasn’t good at was ... the parsing of sentences and things like that.” “The grammatical?” I asked. “The grammatical,” he said with certainty.        

 

Theme Seven

Events in school that promoted the exhilarating freedom of choice of reading material encouraged Arthur to become a creative writer. The great variety of reading sources mentioned in The Ministry’s three guides (1996a, 1996b, 1996c) provide ample freedom of choice for today’s students.

            Arthur experienced Theme Seven’s exhilarating freedom of choice one day after school when he was allowed to stay in his grade ten English classroom and read whatever he wished from his teacher’s class library. “Four o’clock in the afternoon, and I’m sitting there. I’d been sitting there ... since the end of the bell for an hour. And on [my teacher’s] shelf there were a whole series of books that I’d never heard of. I picked off the shelf Biccaccio’s Decameron. ... It was written in the ... plague years, and considered a bit of a naughty book. ... [My teacher] was a very liberal lady. And that’s part of my intrigue here.”

            He continued:

“The story is that [this] group of people trying to escape the plague went up to a villa in Italy, where ... there were no rats that carried the plague. ... It was a thick book. I’d never heard of it before and it’s sitting on the shelf there. I ... was intrigued by the title. I’ve always been intrigued by titles. This was ... the Decameron. I thought, ‘Decameron? What could that be?’ So I picked it up and turned to the middle, and I was reading a passage that was a bit naughty. ... Each of these people in this village had to tell a story to keep themselves entertained. So I think there’s ten times ten days, a hundred stories or something like that. Each of them three or four pages long. At any rate, I’m getting right into this. A ... boy with testosterone.”

The experience had allowed him to revel in and wonder about the sexuality of male-female relationships, and to wonder about his own adolescent sexuality. “I’m reading the stuff. I’m right into it. I’m totally oblivious. I ... couldn’t even hear a sound. There was nobody else in the world. And all of a sudden I looked up and there was [my teacher].”

             I was captivated by his story and his intensity. He said, “Now I’d expected because of my deep conservative religious upbringing to be berated. That’s what my dad would have done. Or my mum ... .But she just smiled and she sat down and she said, ‘What are you reading?’” Arthur grew too emotional to continue. He needed time to “collect himself.” “It was ... a pivotal point for me. A really important point. My appreciation of not just the word, but the freedom that comes with me and the word. ... It’s me and the word and the word and me ... and it’s very inclusive.”

            I wondered: “Do you mean that you learned something in that experience about language that you didn’t know before?”

“Oh, phenomenal. Phenomenal. Not so much language, but, ... the freedom. This is the feeling I have. The freedom to explore words and associations and thoughts and processes. Unbidden. Completely free. Completely free to associate. To think. To read a word, to understand it, to put words together. No constrictors. Nobody saying, ‘That’s bad. You can’t do that. You can’t think that.’ I found that freedom in literature. I didn’t find it at home. I didn’t find it in the…Church. I didn’t find it in school generally because school generally was very logical, linear. But I found that freedom that day. Well, many days, you know. There were experiences before that, but that was a pivotal day for me. And I tell you, I thank [my teacher]. ... That was just phenomenal. ... I’m ... still emotional today about it. It was just mind-blowing.”

            For Arthur, the exhilarating freedom of his choosing Biccaccio’s Decameron to read had translated into a Joycean epiphany—”the sudden awareness ... caused by a simple, casual event that takes on a new and intense meaning” (Epiphany, 1993, p. 70). During one participant review session, Arthur described that he believed the strictness of Catholicism, the strictness of home rules, and the logical precision of math and science had formed a backdrop for encouraging him to, in a sense, break out and enjoy the freedom of language expression, such as the “naughty” anecdotes of Biccaccio’s Decameron. His teacher had not criticized his choice of reading material. That had validated his choice. His epiphany had told him that he could reach into the universe of literature and choose what he pleased.

            He recalled his going out to buy Lady Chatterly’s Lover simply because he had not been allowed to read it according to the Church and his parents. In school, his freedom of choice of reading material became exhilarating choices that introduced him to a vast and enchanting world of language expression, some of which bore him up to question mainstream standards of morality, ethics, religion, and politics.

 

Theme Eight

Arthur was encouraged to become a creative writer through events in school that promoted the satisfaction and excitement of receiving sound direction about how to write well from compassionate teachers. He referred to English teachers from grades nine to thirteen who likely would have agreed with The Ministry’s following comments:

By reflecting on their ideas and using language to express them, students become more adept at expressive [and] artistic ... thought and broaden their foundation of written ... use ... .Feedback from others ... helps students assess their own language development. This awareness motivates students to ... manipulate language for ... expression. (1996a, pp. 2-3; 1996b, pp. 2-3; 1996c, p. 3) 

“There were times when I didn’t express things well,” Arthur said, “which of course was probably more important as a writer. To be told that this wasn’t effectively said. Or this went nowhere. They [(his teachers)] weren’t afraid to say those things. But all of that was still encouragement as a writer. Because they were encouraging me through their critiques to write better, to write more effectively, to write more cogently, to write with feelings, to write with the whole mind and heart and soul. … In other words, they weren’t Polly Anna in their encouragement. They weren’t saying oh that’s fantastic … in everything I did. No, no. They ... would take something of what I did, critique it, and then ask for something better. So there was always this directional thing happening.” Arthur had found these times of direction satisfying and exciting, but they stood out in particular because of the compassion his teachers had showed him.

            I too have had compassionate teachers who have given me sound direction. One was Canada’s Professor Harlow, who taught me fiction writing in 1976 at the University of British Columbia, another was England’s D. M. Thomas, who taught me poetry writing in 1996 at the Humber School for Writers, and another was the USA’s Paul Bogdan, who taught me novel writing in 1997 at the Writer’s Digest School of Writing. Arthur’s grade nine to thirteen English teachers encouraged him to become a creative writer. These three teachers encouraged me to continue learning my art and craft.    

            I wondered in Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology if Arthur would mention specific direction about how to write as an example of an activity that had encouraged him to learn the art and craft of writing. In view of Theme Eight, excellent direction from teachers clearly had encouraged him, but he mentioned no specific how-to-writing direction. I also wondered in Chapter Twelve if writing activities in school that motivate students to write creatively encourage some to pursue creative writing. I cannot discuss this in reference to Arthur because although his senior English teachers had encouraged him to write down his thoughts and feelings about poetry and fiction he read in class, he did not say the writing assignments had been designed to motivate him to write creatively (What is Creative Writing?, 1999).   

            I also wondered in Chapter Twelve if Arthur would mention activities that addressed intrinsic motivation as examples that had encouraged him to take up creative writing. Arthur did not explicitly mention such activities; however, they must have existed. If intrinsic motivation refers to sufficient levels of novelty, autonomy and expertise (Stipek, 1998) for the student, then the writing activities in his senior English classes must have addressed intrinsic motivation. Sound direction about how to write well from compassionate teachers must have provided him with expertise. A great variety of reading material and class discussion, all food for his writing of thoughts and feelings, must have provided novelty. The exhilarating freedom he had felt about writing down his thoughts and feelings implicitly refers to autonomy.

 

 

Chapter Seventeen: Conclusions—Thomas’ Theme  

            During the first participant review session of Study II, I presented a thematic statement that eventually became Essential Theme One. Through repeated participant review sessions, and through free imaginative variation, the theme transformed into the following: One teacher (English 9, 10, and 11) who demanded the best of Thomas as a human being, and who more than valued, but loved, saw Thomas as a unique person, encouraged him to be the best that he could be, and since he had always, going back as far he can remember, wanted to write, that encouragement translated into his wanting to be the best writer that he could be. The fact that she was a high school English teacher is not relevant. If she had been a math teacher, he feels the effect would have been the same. Her interest in him, her demanding nature, and her more than just valuing Thomas as a person made such a deep impression on him that to this day his memories of her classes remain a source of joy and motivation.

              Thomas said, “I recently wrote her a letter. ... She’s retired now. ... I felt ... after forty years [I] really ought to say thanks.” He referred to her as “a fabulous woman.” He implicitly defined what he meant by fabulous in comments such as “she was able to ... go beyond the visual. Look, I wasn’t a pleasant child [laughs]. Let’s not kid ourselves. ... I was always in trouble. ... I came close to jail two or three times. But she was not prepared to accept that.” She had expected more. Thomas said, “I was being a smart ass one day, and I remember ... she just glanced over and said you’re better than that. And that was it. And it had nothing to do with writing. It just had to do with not being a smart ass.”

            Interestingly, Thomas had appreciated her demanding nature. “Let’s call her a hard ass,” he said. “She was very strict, [a] very ... structured kind of person. And, oh!, brutally honest. Just absolutely brutally honest. And if you were being a doofus, she would tell you.” Thomas’ appreciated her as someone who had valued him as an individual, but more than that, as someone who had loved, seen Thomas as a unique individual. “I was in love with this woman, not ... from ... a romantic perspective. She was so good at drawing out what I had, and [she] had a specific interest in me as a human being, not as a writer. ... She was more interested in me and my capacity to become ... whatever.”

            Thomas had loved to write before this lady became his teacher, so her encouragement for him to be the best that he could be had translated into his wanting to be the best writer he could be. “I could write,” he said. “I cannot recall a time when I could not write.” He remembered that “when [he] got to school in grade one, [he] could read and write.” Thomas told me “[writing] was fun.” He had taken pride in his writing ability. His experiences in this English teacher’s classes had taught him to not only live up to her expectations, but to live up to his own—which had been high indeed. They still are. To this day, Thomas is a perfectionist as a poet; his work does not enter the public domain until he feels completely sure it is worthy and substantial.

           Are you surprised that this English teacher’s valuing him as a worthy person had a positive influence on Thomas? Likely not. Selma Wassermann speaks about fine teachers who hold “deep respect for the dignity of the learner—for his individuality” (1987, p. 177). Such a fine teacher “communicates a genuine prizing and valuing of [each] student” (p. 177). In Chapter Twelve: Lukiv’s Principles of Instruction of The Master Teacher: A Collection, I, too, speak about fine teachers who value and respect students and who honour their individuality (2001c). Also, fine teachers “maintain high expectations” (Kellough & Kellough, 1999, p. 45), encouraging each student to be the best that he or she can be. 

            Are you surprised that this English teacher expressed love for her students? Likely not. In the words of one experienced teacher, “Good teaching is not a matter of specific techniques or styles, plans or actions. ... Teaching is primarily a matter of love” (as qtd. in Set the Pattern for You, 2002, p. 10; see, also, Jackson, 2003; and Worboys, 2003). Thomas still appreciates his English teacher’s fine qualities as an educator, proven in the fact that , forty years after being her student, he wrote a letter thanking her. Her response, a letter that he showed me, remains a precious reminder of the past.

            Are you also surprised that Thomas referred to his English 9, 10, and 11 teacher as an individual who had encouraged him, whereas he referred to memories of her classroom as a source of motivation? In view of my comments in Chapter Nine: The Nature of Encouragement, perhaps you, like me, are not surprised at all. If, as I mentioned in that chapter, to encourage means “to inspire with courage and hope” (Encourage, 1994, p. 251), and to motivate means “to provide with a motive” or to “impel” (Motivate, 1994, p. 480), then doesn’t that imply that, at least generally, encouragement refers more to personal attention than motivation? In that sense, then, don’t people inspire people, whereas stimuli motivate them?

 

 

Chapter Eighteen: Conclusions—Elizabeth’s Themes

1) Several teachers encouraged Elizabeth to write, giving her lots of opportunities to write poetry and stories, even to write plays that were performed at Christmas concerts for the community. 2) Several teachers read her writing—even non-assigned work that she brought to school that she’d written at home—aloud, to provide students with examples of good writing, and sometimes those teachers had Elizabeth read her own work aloud, to provide the same. 3) Memories of special events—for example, Christmas concerts—encouraged her by providing a child’s (her) perspective as resource material for later writing. 4) One teacher sent her writing to author and feminist Nellie McClung, who praised her work, and later in life, when Elizabeth realized the noteworthy stature of this individual in Canadian history, she felt greatly encouraged. 5) A variety of reading experiences (poems, stories, non-fiction), which included encyclopaedias that her humble one-room school was able to inherit from an estate, helped instil a love of stories and a quest for knowledge, which gave her subjects to write about.

Phrases in these themes such as “greatly encouraged,” “instil a love,” and “a quest for knowledge” are Elizabeth’s choices, not mine. I wrote up tentative themes through my analysis. My peer debriefer found them valid products of my qualitative data; in participant review, so did Elizabeth (van Manen, 1990). She modified them through participant review at the analysis and interpretation stages. A modification for any given theme amounted to a change in a single word or many words, thereby establishing their reliability (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997). Researcher-participant agreement asserts a sort of reliability, researcher-participant-peer debriefer agreement another sort.     

 

Theme One

Several teachers encouraged Elizabeth to write, giving her lots of opportunities to write poetry and stories, even to write plays that were performed at Christmas concerts for the community. Here are excerpts from my interview with Elizabeth that support this statement:

*****

D: Were there any experiences in school…that encouraged you to become a writer?

E: Yes. …

D: Is there any place you’d like to start?

E: I’d like to say [that in] grade one, grade two, maybe even grade three, there wasn’t very much for me as far as writing went. … I wasn’t encouraged at that time because you’re learning how to write, learning how to do your phonetics. … So there wasn’t much in the first three years. But when I got into four, five to eight, … certainly every teacher I had … made a point of encouraging me.

D: Every teacher?

E: Yes. …

D: In what way did these individuals encourage you?

E: Well, they would give out a title, and ask … our English class to write about it. … And, of course, I could quite easily. I never had any trouble finding any material in my mind to put to the title.

D: You were never stuck for ideas.

E: Oh, no.

Later in the interview:

E: I was asked to write a play for the Christmas concert every year.

D: Every year.

E: Uh huh.

D: And that play would be performed for the school?

E: Uh huh.

D: And right from nine years of age and up [to 13] would you have been doing that?

E: Yes. … Well, maybe from ten years and up. …

D: Did you find that doing those sorts of things encouraged you later in life?

E: Oh, definitely.

D: Definitely.

E: Yes, because I found that I was writing poetry, I was writing plays, I was writing stories, and I found it was just as easy for me to write one as another. And, of course, if I had a little inspiration, I could write it any way I wanted.

D:  Whether poetry or fiction or drama. …

E: Oh, yes. … It made me quite eager to do it, really. I got satisfaction out of it.

D: Did that eagerness grow through those years?

E: Yes, it has.

D: What I meant was, did that eagerness grow up through grade eight?

E: Yes. …

D: And when you think back upon those events, and the eagerness, you mentioned that word—the eagerness you had—do you feel that translated into encouragement later in life?

E: Oh, yes. I feel the same eagerness now when I think of something to write. …

D: Now, is there anything in particular about those individuals that stands out in your mind that you find contributes to this encouragement you’re speaking of? For example, these three [teachers] asked you to do assignments. Was there anything about those individuals that sparked this encouragement?

E: Well, I think the fact that they were interested in the fact that I liked to write. They liked to encourage me.     

D: So they were interested in your interest.

E: Uh, huh. I think they looked at it as a learning experience for me and a teaching experience for them that they could instil this in someone, in a child at school. But, I don’t know if you could instil it in any child. You see, a lot of children don’t really have the feeling for writing, …  which I always had. But on the other hand, they couldn’t instil interest in mathematics in me. Not a bit. …

*****

            Elizabeth was the right seed in the right environment. The encouragement to write that her teachers—through grades four to eight—gave her remains, even seven decades later, an encouragement for her to continue writing.

 

Theme Two

Several teachers read her writing—even non-assigned work that she brought to school that she’d written at home—aloud, to provide students with examples of good writing, and sometimes those teachers had Elizabeth read her own work aloud, to provide the same. The following excerpt helps establish this theme:

*****

E: [In grades four through eight, teachers] would read my work out to the class and say this is the way we would like you to present your stories when you write.

D: Are you saying that teachers used your work as an example for others?

E: Yes. They seemed to [often] do that. … I think there must have been some way that I put things down that pleased them. …

D: So, having your work read, as an example, did you find that an encouragement to write?

E: Well, I think I must have had a bit of ego. … I must have got some ego [boost] from it. [Reading my work aloud] impressed me a little bit. I have to say that. … And, of course, with that sort of ego I wanted to do more and more and more all the time. So I was writing an awful lot. I was writing at home. I’d sit down and write.

D: Those were self-made assignments? …

E: That I did at home?

D: Yes.

E: Oh, yes. They would be. Mostly what I wanted to do, because I’d seen something and I would write [about] it, and if I was asked [by a teacher] if I had written anything I’d read it.

*****

            Elizabeth felt happy to read her work aloud to students when she was in grades four to eight. Such endorsement of Elizabeth’s writing abilities spawned an encouragement to write that yet drives her.

 

Theme Three

Memories of special events—for example, Christmas concerts—encouraged her by providing a child’s (her) perspective as resource material for later writing. This theme, like the other four, highlights how events in school may manifest an effect on students later in life (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997). The next excerpt provides examples of the sorts of events that Elizabeth as an adult writer could draw on while conjuring up works of fiction.

*****

E: [One teacher was] wonderful, just a wonderful girl from [   ]. And when she came into our community to teach at our school, she taught us all—what would you call it—dancing … ethnic dancing. Russian. Dutch. Scottish. I did a lot of highland dancing because of what she had instilled in us.

D: Would you perform … for the students?

E: Not for the students, but for the community and the parents. We’d have these concerts at the [  ] Hall along with [   ] School, which was south of us.

D: You enjoyed those performances?

E: Yes, very much so.

D: Do you think those experiences you mentioned have anything to do with encouraging you to become a writer?

E: I think they do. And I think the memory of them helps a lot. Once you could keep them in your memory, you could write something about them.

D: I see.  It’s encouraging to have those memories because you can write about those memories?

E: Oh, yes. It’s like going into a little encyclopaedia. … The memory is there. The story’s there. … You can pull it out and enlarge upon it.             

D: Are you saying that memories from school … [are] memories … you can use in your writing later in life?

E: Yes. … I go into that as a resource centre, to pick out things that I knew as a child, but would never know now, because I’m not in that atmosphere anymore. It’s there, and I’ve kept it there, and I can use it.

D: School provided you with those experiences?

E: I would think so. … One of the teachers we had after [   ] was [   ]. She was a marvellous piano player. And my mother insisted, quite wrongly, that I take piano lessons, which I took for three years, and I still can’t play [well], you know. But there’s a memory. And I’ll never forget that I … play[ed] at [school] Christmas concerts …

D: Are there any other examples that come to mind?

E: Funny things happen, especially at the Christmas concerts that were put on by the school. … Because I could write a few dramas, I wrote. I always remember one that I wrote for a school concert, and it was using nursery rhymes. I don’t even remember how I correlated them now. But … there was one [part] which I gave to myself because I was quite athletic, and I was Jack jumped over the candlestick. Jack be nimble, Jack be quick. Jack jump over the candlestick. I didn’t get over the candlestick. I knocked it over and set the curtains on fire. [laughs] Which is another memory that I can always draw on, if I need it.

D: That happened at the hall concert.

E: Yes, the hall emptied very quickly. [we laugh] I was dirt for a little while, but it was all right.        

D: You’ve come back a few times to these memories, experiences. … Resources, you called them.

E: Yes. …

*****

Elizabeth has written stories about children. No doubt her experiences at school, coupled with childhood experiences outside of school, have given her abundant material to help her delineate/define children’s perspectives. No doubt memories of those experiences have given her material to help her create realistic dialogue and scenes and believable characters. 

 

Theme Four

One teacher sent her writing to author and feminist Nellie McClung, who praised her work, and later in life, when Elizabeth realized the noteworthy stature of this individual in Canadian history (Cranny & Moles, 2001; and Fielding & Evans, 2000), she felt greatly encouraged. Nellie McClung had written a comic novel, entitled Sowing Seeds in Danny (1908), that sold 100,000 copies—a bestseller even today. This successful writer, this international icon for the women’s movement, endorsed young Elizabeth’s writing. Her teacher had sent her work to McClung when Elizabeth was about 12 or 13 years old. During our interview, Elizabeth had forgotten about her “contact” with McClung, but later she e-mailed me about it. Here is part of that correspondence:

It was [a teacher] who embarked me upon the idea of submitting some of my classroom writing exercises to author Nellie McClung of Manitoba. … I did get a reply from Mrs. McClung—in fact … there was more than one letter from her. At that age, I probably did not appreciate the value of such a prestigious contact, but … I do now …!

I realise that this e-mail, as data, stands outside the interview I conducted with Elizabeth. But for me to eliminate Theme Four from the list of themes that define the phenomenon that encouraged Elizabeth does not seem reasonable. Patton (1987) speaks about “document analysis … from … correspondence” (p. 7) as an acceptable type of qualitative research.

            I admit that in Study I, I defended conducting interviews with, rather than soliciting relevant text from, the participant:

Why did I conduct an interview as opposed to having the participant write to me? Van Manen (1990) warns that “writing forces the person into a reflective attitude—in contrast to face-to-face conversation in which people are much more immediately involved” (p. 64). I chose not to create a situation in which “this reflective attitude together with the linguistic demands of the writing process” (p. 64) placed “certain constraints on the free obtaining of lived-experience descriptions” (p. 64). I chose instead to use well-established interview methodology.

Elizabeth’s interview, however, brought her so emotionally and intellectually close to her childhood experiences at school that her e-mail data, unsolicited by me, was natural for her to write; likewise, it is natural for water to bubble from a fountain (New World Translation, 1984, John 4:14). Really, “the linguistic demands of the writing process” were no detriment to her telling, in relatively few words, a relevant experience simply and, in her mind, accurately.

Note, too, that Theme Four did not arise from a biased comment from me, nor did it arise from experiences outside of school that had encouraged Elizabeth to become a writer. I applied the same rigorous analysis to that e-mail as I did to the interview. Elizabeth verified, through participant review, Theme Four as valid. In terms of reliability, Elizabeth slightly altered the original theme I came up with, to make the final draft “just right.” Through free imaginative variation, she verified the theme as essential; therein, my interpretation stands as trustworthy (Guba & Lincoln, 1982; see, also, Siegle, n.d.c). My peer debriefer found the theme valid and reliable and viewed it as a natural consequence of Elizabeth’s thinking about the sorts of experiences that had encouraged her to become a creative writer. Elizabeth, my peer debriefer, and I, therefore, defined a triangle of agreement: the theme is in.         

            I relate, by the way, to Elizabeth’s feeling encouraged by Nellie McClung’s comments. The encouragement I felt through my contact with Professor Robert Harlow (see Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases) had a profound effect on me as an apprentice writer almost thirty years ago. Professor Harlow commended me for what I was doing right in my fiction, and explained what I was doing wrong. In terms of conflict, characterisation, theme, style, and other elements, he was very specific. People in my social circle had read some of my work, but I didn’t benefit much from general comments such as, “It seems pretty good.” Specific commendation and direction from an established writer meant a lot to me.

            Interestingly, McClung didn’t learn about her effect on Elizabeth; neither has Harlow learned about his effect on me. I am reminded of a comment by McMillan and Schumacher (1997, p. 26): “It is often said that we do not ultimately know the effects of schooling because these effects may occur years later outside an educational setting.” In participant review, Elizabeth confirmed that her contact with Nellie McClung had encouraged her over many years of writing, and encourages her even now, seven decades later; likewise, my contact with Professor Harlow has encouraged me throughout my career as a writer, and encourages me even now, three decades later.        

 

Theme Five

A variety of reading experiences (poems, stories, non-fiction), which included encyclopaedias that her humble one-room school was able to inherit from an estate, helped instil a love of stories and a quest for knowledge, which gave her subjects to write about. In an e-mail, Elizabeth sent me the following:

Our little school was fortunate that the school board—a Chairman, a Secretary and one or two Trustees—was far sighted enough to obtain a set of Encyclopaedia Brittanica from someone’s estate here in [   ]. We were the only school for miles around with a set of encyclopaedias. I don’t know how many of my schoolmates cracked those pages, but I know I was responsible for many of the “dog ears.” They were additional text books for me.

Although this information stood outside the interview, for the same reasons I defended Theme Four as valid and reliable, I defend Theme Five.

            I began with a theme that stated that these encyclopaedias helped instil a love of knowledge, which gave her subjects to write about. In participant review, however, Elizabeth modified the theme to present a more accurate picture—a more reliable picture. She found that reading a variety of material had instilled a love of stories and a quest for knowledge. Words such as “love” and “quest” were her words, not mine. Theme Five, through analysis, participant review, and free imaginative variation, stands as valid, reliable, and essential.

To elaborate further: My objectivity, with regard to this theme, and the others, lies in my remaining true to the research question (van Manen, 1990), and my subjectivity lies in my remaining true to Elizabeth’s lived experiences (van Manen, 1990). My peer debriefer finds Theme Five, as in the case of the other themes, untainted by my bias. Elizabeth, my peer debriefer, and I, then, define another triangle of agreement. Theme Five is in.

 

 

Chapter Nineteen: Recommendations

with Respect to Arthur’s Themes

            We may not require all our students to become creative writers, but some students, given the right environment, like a marigold seed given the appropriate combinations of soil, nutrients, water, and sunshine, might germinate into a poet or fiction writer, perhaps into a poet of the stature of Irving Layton or Morley Callahan, or a fiction writer of the stature of Earl Birney or W. O. Mitchell. Some students might germinate into great dramatists. On the other hand, some students might germinate into poets, fiction writers, and dramatists of humble ability. That is fine too. If we, as educators, want to think about what that right environment might be, the themes from Studies I, II, and III create a starting place. Let me begin with the themes of Study I.

 

Theme One—Silent Reading of Poetry and Fiction

Teachers who offer their students a variety of silent reading experiences through reading programs, literature programs, access to class libraries, visits to school libraries, visits to municipal or otherwise public libraries, visits to book fairs, and creative book displays may be encouraging some students to become creative writers. Silent reading opportunities encouraged Arthur. They encouraged me (see Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases). The Ministry lists a vast number of resources for silent reading in each of its three guides (1996a, pp. B-9 to B-126; 1996b, pp. B-9 to B-122; 1996c, B-9 to B-103).   

 

Theme Two—Listening to Poetry and Fiction Read Aloud and Listening to Songs

The Ministry’s (1996a, 1996b, 1996c) three guides do not encourage Language Arts teachers to consider the benefits of singsongs and do not address the benefits of teachers reading to students. But the International Reading Association tells teachers to “provide opportunities for students ... to be read to each school day” (Supporting Young Adolescents’ Literacy Learning, 2002; also see, e.g., Goodman, Goodman, & Flores, 1979; and Koltin, n.d.). Teachers who provide, especially in the primary grades, class singsongs, and teachers who provide quality oral reading of poetry and fiction, may be encouraging some students to become creative writers. These provisions encouraged Arthur. Jack Hodgins (1993) relates that one teacher reading fine fiction aloud encouraged him to take up fiction writing (see Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology). I had many similar experiences (see Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases).

 

Theme Three—Uninterrupted Language Experiences

Teachers who allow students blocks of time, without interrupting their sensory perceptions or their flights of fancy with questions or other assignments, to enjoy language experiences such as videos, free reading time, read-aloud poetry and fiction, and professionally-performed plays may be encouraging some students to become creative writers. The Ministry (1996a, 1996b, 1996c) refers to videos of movies and plays, novels, short story and poetry collections, scripts, and electronic media that could serve as content for uninterrupted language experiences.     

 

Theme Four—Flights of Imagination

Teachers who allow students reasonable opportunities to daydream; who openly value flights of imagination, or lateral-thinking ecstasy; who display passionate interest in the connotative and imagistic “life” of words; and who provide texts rich in connotative and imagistic words or phrases may be encouraging some students to become creative writers. Many of The Ministry’s (1996a, 1996b, 1996c) resources just referred to in Theme Three—Uninterrupted Language Experiences could serve as connotative and imagistic fuel for students’ imaginations.   

 

Theme Five—Verbally Punning and Joking and Informing Others

Teachers who allow, within the limits of reason, students in class to pun and joke and verbally inform others about what they have learned may be encouraging some of them to become creative writers. These teachers provide a classroom stage on which students “manipulate language for ... expression” (The Ministry, 1996a, 1996b, 1996c, p. 3), which refers precisely to what writers do with language.

 

Theme Six—The Freedom of Writing Down Thoughts and Having Those Thoughts Valued

Teachers who passionately discuss with their students thoughts and feelings based on poetry and fiction texts read in class, and who openly value students’ attempts to write down those thoughts and feelings may be encouraging some of them to become creative writers. The Ministry (1996a, 1996b, 1996c) speaks frequently about the benefits and pleasures of writing and the need for teachers to value their students’ efforts.

 

Theme Seven—The Freedom of Choice of Reading Material

Teachers who encourage students to explore literature through freedom of choice and through easy access to literature may be encouraging some of them to become creative writers. I refer to many avenues in the subsection Theme One—Silent Reading of Poetry and Fiction that teachers could use to provide literary freedom of choice, and The Ministry (1996a, 1996b, 1996c) lists a great library of literary resources that could also provide that freedom.

 

Theme Eight—Sound Direction from Compassionate Teachers

Teachers, notably compassionate, who provide students sound direction about how to write well may be encouraging some of them to become creative writers. The feedback these teachers provide helps students do the very work of writing: “manipulat[ing] language for ... expression” (The Ministry, 1996a, 1996b, 1996c, p. 3).

 

 

Chapter Twenty: Recommendations

with Respect to Thomas’ Theme

            Many English teachers know a great deal about the mechanics of the language. Professor Harlow, long-time head of the creative writing department at the University of British Columbia, and author of the critically-acclaimed novel Scann, made a comment to me in 1976 that helps me here (Lukiv, 2001d): “Dan, those gyze in the English department understand language. They can dissect a sentence and explain all the grammar. I can’t do that very well. But I know how to write.” He still does. But Language Arts teachers (English teachers included) who know plenty about grammar and dissecting sentences and yet do not write professionally as creative writers may find themselves wondering how to inspire students to become professional writers, let alone to reach the literary heights of D. M. Thomas, Margaret Atwood, John Hodgins, Wole Soyinka, Thomas Akare, or Lindsey Collen.

            Study II gives Language Arts teachers direction. If I break Thomas’ essential theme into its parts, the direction looks like this (confirmed through participant review):

Part One

            1. Demand, from a humanistic point of view, the best from students;

            2. Value, love, see each student as sublimely unique;

3. Encourage students to be the best that they can be, no matter what their gifts or deficits are;

            (Notice the focus on demand in “1” and encourage in “3.”)

Part Two

4. Application of “1,” “2,” and “3” may encourage a student with creative writing ability or interest to become a poet, novelist, or dramatist;

 

The next two points of direction refer to benefits in a general sense that some students may experience due to teachers’ application of Thomas’ theme in the classroom. 

 

5. Application of “1,” “2,” and “3” may encourage a student with any ability or interest—e.g., mathematics, languages, history, physics—to develop that ability or pursue that interest; and

6. Application of “1,” “2,” and “3” may encourage students to develop positive, lifelong-learning habits.

 

 

Chapter Twenty-One: Recommendations

with Respect to Elizabeth’s Themes

            If the themes of Study III define the essence of the phenomenon—namely, lived school experiences that encouraged Elizabeth to become a writer—then these themes may help teachers create classroom activities that will encourage others to seriously consider creative writing as a vocation. As I mentioned previously, that is known not as a generalization (see Chapter Nine: The Nature of Encouragement), but as an extrapolation that should help teachers establish a useful mode of practise. The same reasoning, of course, stands with to respect the themes of and Studies I and II.

 

Theme One—Opportunities to Write Poetry, Stories, and Plays

Teachers who provide students with lots of opportunities to write within a variety of genres may be encouraging some to become creative writers. Elizabeth recalled teachers’ providing titles for which she would write a story or poem. These assignments refer to specific direction that I referred to in Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology. As I mentioned in that chapter: During each pre-study stage, I respectively wondered if Arthur, Thomas, or Elizabeth would describe any creative writing activities that were very, very specific as ones that had encouraged him or her to take up creative writing.

            As for another example, although less specific: She wrote plays that her school performed at Christmas. These were writing opportunities. Certainly, multitudinous examples of creative writing exercises exist that teachers could offer students. I say “offer” because, frankly, assignments that encourage or motivate one student to write may not encourage or motivate another (Stipek, 1998).

In my experience as a creative writing teacher, I have found that one student will balk at an assignment that another embraces. Therefore, a teacher truly interested in encouraging students to write and enjoy the experience should develop a portfolio of activities. Chapter Twelve: Bracketing and Phenomenology lists a large number of creative writing textbooks that contain many creative writing activities (see, e.g., Bickham, 1996; Block, 1979; Bryant, 1978; Bugeja, 1994; Cassil, 1975; Clark, Brohaugh, Woods, Strickland, & Blocksom, 1992; Dessner, 1979; Dickson & Smythe, 1970; Drury, 1991; Fredette, 1988; Hall, 1989; Irwin & Eyerly, 1988; Jones, 1978; Powell, 1973; Roberts, 1981; Seuling, 1991; Wakan, 1993; and Wyndham, 1972; see, also, Rico, 1983). In that chapter, I also refer to creative writing Web sites, which contain essentially the same sorts of activities as do print materials (see, e.g., About Teens, n.d.; Horner & Khan, n.d.; Love, n.d.a; and Shiney & Shiney, n.d.). The BC Ministry of Education and many Language Arts curriculum guides also offer direction that should help teachers develop a portfolio. See Chapter Eleven: Literature Related to the Teaching of Creative Writing for more examples (see, e.g., Best, et al., 1998; Bogusat, et al., 1999; Booth, Booth, Phenix, & Swartz, 1991; Jeroski & Dockendorf, 2000; Sterling & Toutant, 1999; The Ministry, 1996a, 1996b, 1996c; Tuinman, Neuman, & Rich, 1988; Tuinman, Neuman, & Rich, 1989).

            Teachers who provide publishing opportunities (Lamb, 1984; Love, n.d.b.; Lukiv, 1996, and 2002a) may also be encouraging some students to become creative writers. I say this because some of Elizabeth’s plays that were performed at Christmas concerts began her lineage of publication—a lineage that has not ended seven decades later. Presently she has begun formulating a collection of short stories about rural people, composites of people dating as far back as elementary school, that she hopes to publish shortly.

 

Theme Two—Teachers Read Her Writing Aloud, as Examples for Students

This theme reminds me of one of Solomon’s inspired statements, at Ecclesiastes 2:24: “A man [or woman] … should … see good because of his [or her] hard work” (New World Translation, 1984). When teachers read Elizabeth’s work aloud as an example, she knew that she had written good work, a result of her hard work, and that at least her teachers had appreciated it. To me, these readings were a sort of publication. Do you know a writer who does not like his or her work publicized? I don’t. Some of her plays were produced. All of these “publishing” events validated her efforts to write poems, stories, and plays.

            Publication: This common denominator for Elizabeth’s play productions and her writing read aloud, reinforce, for me, that teachers should consider providing a variety of publication opportunities: display cases of students’ picture book stories; students’ stories stapled/taped to classroom walls (Lukiv, 2002a); literary journals of students’ works (Lukiv, 1996); play productions of students’ dramas; students’ writing read aloud before small-, medium-, or large-sized gatherings; collections of students’ poetry or stories; sections of students’ writing in school annuals; and even professionally bound anthologies of students’ poetry and/or fiction (Bouvier & Sorenson, 1976)—these describe a world of publishing opportunities that may encourage some students to want to become writers. Teachers who read Elizabeth’s work aloud—in one sense, then, who published it—obviously encouraged her.        

            I relate to Elizabeth’s read-aloud experiences. In my third year at UBC, a long time ago, I was majoring in mathematics and physics, but I was also interested in writing. Although the course I took, English 301 (composition), explored non-fiction as opposed to what I would call creative writing (see Chapter Three: What Is Creative Writing and What Is a Creative Writer?), my experience in that course nevertheless taught me that I had some ability to produce decent writing. I’ll explain how I came to that conclusion.

Each of the other students in the class was in the third or fourth year of his or her Bachelor of Arts program. I, the science guy, stuck out as an oddball. Armed with a slide rule, a text on electronics, and another on differential equations, I entered the classroom. I had efficiently stapled the hem of my Fortrel pants to keep them neat.

During our first class, we spoke about our majors and what writing experience each of us was bringing to the course. When I spoke about my majors, some whispered jokingly to each other.

“What are you doing in this course?” a fourth-year history student sarcastically asked me.

As a science student, with only a first- and a second-year literature course and a second-year creative writing workshop/course under my belt, I had far less formal training in writing than my classmates.                    

            “I like to write,” I said.

            He frowned, somewhat condescendingly, and said, “One of my profs told me this course would be a breeze in view of all the essays I’ve written in my history courses. He told me that it would probably be a waste of time. But I figured it would be an easy course to help me boost my GPA.”

            After the first essays had been marked, our professor brought them to class to hand back to us. But he kept mine as the last one to return. He said, “This was the only ‘A’ essay in the whole class. Although there are a few things that would have improved it, I’m holding it up as an example. The essay discusses not just one, but three subjects, and actually has something specific to say about each. The rest of you need to learn to be specific in your writing, and to use concrete examples to support your statements.”

               Although he didn’t read aloud the essay, whereas Elizabeth’s teachers had read aloud her writing, I felt that if my work could serve as an example that actually had value, then it was not in vain; my hard work could produce something worthwhile. That experience encouraged me, at least to some degree (see Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases), to become a writer. Elizabeth’s theme-two experience encouraged her.

 

Theme Three—Special Events as Resource Material

In our multicultural classrooms, the opportunities for special events abound. Keith Osajima laments that “those who do not know about or have never experienced a … family gathering of any sort in the African-American community [have] missed something. For those who have never heard a Native … storyteller or who haven’t danced the salsa, … [they’ve] missed something” (1992, p. 92). We should have no need to lament. Astute teachers who survey the cultural heritage of their students may create a wealth of classroom events that could become the resource material for some students who become adult creative writers.

            Could James Joyce (1916/1976) have written the bazaar scenes in “Araby,” a story about a romantically frustrated boy, if he had not visited a bazaar as a child? Could Dickens (1855-57/2005) have written so authoritatively about an English debtors’ jail in Little Dorrit if he hadn’t known anybody, such as his father, who had spent time in one? Could W. O. Mitchell (1947/1993) have written Who Has Seen the Wind if he had not grown up on the Canadian prairies? Could I have written “The Farm” if I had not visited my grandfather’s farm as a boy?

*****

THE FARM (2004c)

 

Death that keeps grandpa silent

In a 25-year-old coffin, rotted,

I’m sure,

Releasing neither theme

Nor river-flow,

Just echoes, from the imploding

Timbers, or perhaps from a clotted

Coordinate of my brain or mind

Or heart—

 

His tyrannosaurus-cherry tree

That spoke in hums and whirs and strange

Night voices that said, “Beware of

What you cannot see. Beware of

Death, little boy.”

 

And that olfactory-raping

Chicken coop:           

Why was it so big? Like the barn?

Like grandpa’s bedroom and bed?

Like his temper that his mad wife

Sometimes unleashed?

 

The farm, and the horses,

They were big as the ocean,

Big as the whole universe.

 

The outhouse once used

Remained a fly’s paradise,

A terrible reminder that not everything

Turns out fine,

Like the neighbour who fell off

A horse and ended up retarded.

 

“Have some mushrooms,” my glee-picking

Half uncles would say.

“Come on, Danny, ya city slicker.”

They’d fry them—poisonous?

The kind that dissolve and

Rupture kidneys?—

Sizzled and black

In butter, with the acid smell

Of cooked onions everywhere

Like the chicken manure outside.

 

My jaw never opened for mushrooms,

Warts of the apple orchard.

 

Cow manure would get me,

Sometimes every hour,

As it squeezed into running shoe

Tread, to sleep like the bats in the attic

At day.           

 

The monstrous wasp-whirring

In the cream separator as

I’d turn the heavy handle with all my

Skinny-armed might—

I grew drunk almost, on the huge sound

Of that mini metal beast.

 

“Stop that noise!” Reality always

Reminded me this was not

My universe,

Which made me wonder whether I

Actually had one.

 

I certainly had never heard

Of the word marginalized.

 

A razor-sharpening belt

That could have girded

Hercules,            

A washboard-crater-       

Driveway to this wonderful, horrible

Planet called “the farm.”

 

And the preserves,

Concealed and protected in Sheol,

Where 15-year-old cherries in dusty jars

Lay still as boredom—

Still as eggs of prehistoric fish

Embalmed in rock.

 

O, the theme of it all,

The rusty tractor that  

Smoked and scuttled and

Screamed.

 

But it’s the dungeon,

The cellar, that I see,

In the grassy hump between the house

And outhouse.

Grandpa, who baked pies like

A magician,

Who finally sent his wife to

The mental institution,

Floats in one of those jars,

Beside the cherry eyeballs,

Pickled in time,

Themeless, without the flow of

Fiction, or even non-fiction.

 

Grandpa, gone in the coffin

That must be going—

I loved his pies so much

I want to cry.

 

*****

One of Elizabeth’s famous stories involves a child, an ice-bound adventure, and a cultural event. I present no more details, to protect her anonymity. Could she have written that story without her experiencing at least some of what that child experiences? I can’t answer no! to that question, but I leave it for the reader to ponder—and I further ask, “Doesn’t an extrapolation of Elizabeth’s Theme Three imply that teachers ought to provide students with an educational environment rich with special events?”

            Interestingly, Arthur (see Chapter Sixteen: Conclusions—Arthur’s Themes) found that several special school events had played roles in encouraging him to become a writer: poetry and fiction read aloud, a movie, a play. Jack Hodgins (1993) was inspired to become a writer through one high school teacher’s reading aloud Hemmingway’s The Old Man and the Sea (1952/1999); I had similar experiences (see Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases). I realise these examples weren’t full-scale events as Christmas concerts were for Elizabeth, but they were nevertheless special events, implying that the teacher who has the knack of turning the ordinary into the extraordinary; of turning a poetry read-aloud into a celebration of that poetry; of turning a novel read-aloud into a likewise celebration; of turning a class that is sleepy-eyed on a dreary cloudy day into a class that revels in the variety of clouds that come and go like fog, winter, spring, summer, fall, and life too may be encouraging some of their students to become future writers—writers with cerebral storehouses of resources available to power many of their poems, stories, novels, and plays.           

 

Theme Four—Presenting Students’ Good Writing to Established Writers

Teachers who present students’ work, good work that deserves praise, to established writers for review, may encourage some of those students to keep on writing, perhaps for the rest of their lives. Where can teachers find local writers who might agree, without even receiving payment (schools typically run on reduced budgets these days, although administration might set aside some funds for author reviewers), to visit their classes to pass on encouraging comments to student writers, or who might agree to read and comment on students’ writing that teachers pass on to them?

            Often local bookstore owners, librarians, newspaper editors, and high school English teachers can provide the names of authors living within their communities. Local writer’s groups may have established writers as members. Faculty at local colleges and universities’ English Departments may provide names. More adventurous teachers may want to contact authors outside their communities through the post or e-mail. Publishing houses will usually forward letters addressed to their author clients.

In 1996, I contacted many authors to acquire permission to use excerpts from their works in my Creative Writing for Senior Secondary Students (1997). I wrote to their publishers who forwarded my requests to the respective authors. My choice, however, now, in 2006, in the age of widespread e-mail-speed-of-light communication, would be to do a search—a Google search, for example—of the author’s name and the word e-mail: for example, “Robert Harlow” e-mail. That will likely help me locate an e-mail address that Robert Harlow uses. The beauty of e-mail contact resides in its efficiency. How quickly and cheaply one can contact a multitude of authors who exist “out there,” many of whom, I’m sure, would offer insights on students’ writing as Nellie McClung offered hers on Elizabeth’s work.        

            If the students’ creative writing teacher, however, is a published writer, then that’s all the better. I trusted Robert Harlow’s direction because of his success as a writer. In time, Elizabeth learned about Nellie McClung’s literary stature; Elizabeth then greatly valued McClung’s praise because of her success as a writer. Creative writing departments at universities and colleges typically hire established writers (Hollins Univeristy: Coed graduate programs; n.d.; New York University: Creative Writing Program, n.d.; Stanford Creative Writing Program, n.d.; The Creative Writing Program: Arizona State University, n.d.; UBC: Creative Writing Program, n.d.) able to provide students with direction that they can trust. Herein lays an argument for creative writers teaching creative writing at the elementary and high school levels. But I don’t say the argument stands as conclusive in view of the fact that none of my studies’ participants mentioned encouragement that specifically came from a teacher-writer.

 

Theme Five—A Variety of Reading Experiences

Arthur found that a variety of silent reading experiences (poetry and fiction) promoted the wonder and joy of reading, and that they encouraged him to become a writer. Elizabeth found that a variety of reading experiences (poetry, fiction, and non-fiction) promoted a love of stories and a quest for knowledge, and that they encouraged her to become a writer. Clearly, Teachers who offer their students a variety of reading experiences through reading and literature programs, access to class libraries, visits to school libraries, visits to municipal or otherwise public libraries, visits to book fairs, and opportunities to browse creative book displays may be encouraging some students to become creative writers. Sometimes teachers provide a variety of reading experiences to promote literacy (Lukiv, 2005e), without realizing that these experiences may promote a love for creative writing. Silent reading opportunities encouraged Elizabeth, and Arthur too (see Chapter Sixteen: Conclusions—Arthur’s Themes). They encouraged me as well (see Chapter Thirteen: Tying up My Own Biases). The Ministry lists a vast number of resources for silent reading in each of its three guides (1996a, pp. B-9 to B-126; 1996b, pp. B-9 to B-122; 1996c, B-9 to B-103).

 

 

Chapter Twenty-Two: Further Research—

Hermeneutic Phenomenology

            This monograph launches a new area of study. I say new because my suspended literature review (see Chapter Seven: A Suspended Literature Review) and further literature reviews (see Chapter Eleven: Literature Related to the Teaching of Creative Writing) located no hermeneutic phenomenological investigations beyond Studies I, II, and III into what experiences in school have encouraged other people to become writers. Comments about events in school that encouraged or apparently encouraged some to become creative writers do exist (see Chapter Eight: Creative Writers Who Were Encouraged in School—a Literature Review), but none that I have found are based on in depth interviewing. I encourage researchers interested in my research question to consider a hermeneutic phenomenological approach.

            Arthur, now that he has lived through this kind of study, wishes he had done the same kind in his graduate studies. He found the experience illuminating. The wealth and truth of the eight themes astounded him. They filled him with wonder, and the recommendations based on those themes validated his experiences, made them seem worth studying. Thomas found his theme surprisingly accurate. Elizabeth felt her themes truly described her. Thomas and Elizabeth also felt the recommendations based on their themes validated their experiences.      

            I have found the experience of conducting all three studies fascinating. It fills me with wonder. I have taught senior high school creative writing courses for nine years, generally basing my teaching on my own experiences and instincts. But now I have Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth’s experiences too. I feel better equipped to teach creative writing in the future. I consider Arthur’s eight themes, Thomas’ single theme, and Elizabeth’s five themes alongside my own experiences in school that encouraged me to take up creative writing as a pastime and as a profession, and that body of information prompts me to think about what might work for students, what might encourage some to take up creative writing. I have no rules here, simply direction.

            Other researchers who add conclusions and recommendations through hermeneutic phenomenological study of my research question to the body of this monograph will add depth and breadth to that direction. Researchers could alter the research question to consider university as opposed to elementary school and high school experiences, or researchers could consider dramatists as opposed to poets and fiction writers. Eventually, a body of knowledge, possibly even a “preponderance of evidence” (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997, p. 391), based on experiences from the continuum of education that poets, fiction writers, and dramatists have had could crystallize into direction in Language Arts and creative writing programs that better “germinates” future poets, fiction writers, and dramatists.

One method for crystallizing this direction lies in what I call Theory From Phenomenology, which may help me formulate a covering theory (2004a). In the next chapter, I discuss what I mean by that method.

 

 

Chapter Twenty-Three: Further Research—Covering Theory

The body of knowledge from my phenomenological studies could crystallize into theoretical direction based on certain grounded theory principles (Dick, 2002). The grounded theory approach, founded in formal text, in 1967, by Barney Glaser and Anselm Strauss (The Discovery of Grounded Theory: Strategies for Qualitative Research), swerved from traditional quantitative, hypothesis-testing methodology to a qualitative, inductive methodology grounded in data (Babchuk, 1996). Sometime after 1967, however, Glaser and Strauss apparently began to disagree on the methodology of grounded theory, and many others have followed them into the arena of discussion/argument/how dare you say that (Babchuk, 1996; Chalip et al., 1998; and Glaser, 2002).

I liberally reference direction I follow in this chapter to give voice to the authors I choose to listen to, to provide authority beyond myself, and to provide the reader with a map to follow (Babchuk, 1996) should he or she wish to read these references. My goal, then: not to enter that arena I mentioned, but rather, to choose elements of grounded theory that may guide me from phenomenology to theory. 

            Phenomenological research is primarily concerned with the study of essence, the description of the essence of particular experiences, and not fundamentally concerned with creation of theory (Burch, 1989, 1991). Therefore, to fulfill my research goal of writing theory, I step beyond the phenomenological research of Studies I, II, and III to a novel concept: Theory from Phenomenology. Grounded theory typically depends on more than data, such as interviews, but on phenomena (Davidson, 2002; Haig, 1995; Pandit, 1996; Kinach, 1995; and Myers, 1997). Logically, then, the themes of my studies could, although I won’t say at this point they will, generate theoretical perspectives. I’m making tentative statements that editors of prestigious journals might not want to publish, but I’m not alone amongst researchers who would prefer to speak their minds, or speak tentatively, thoughtfully, than to concern themselves about whether their words meet strict guidelines of what gets into the journals (Barritt, 1992; and van Manen, 1992).

            Some refer to the kind of data my phenomenological interviews generated as first-order (Pogson et al., 2002). Rather than think in terms of order, I prefer to think in terms of degrees of abstraction. The data to themes to theory refers to increased levels of abstraction. Mathematicians describe a process of integration (Nelson, 1998), which can take a one-dimensional formula to two dimensions and then to three (Volumes of Solids, 1999), thereby increasing the abstraction of the formula. For example, if with respect to r (radius of a circle) you integrate 8πr (a 1-dimensional formula), which is 4 times the circumference a of a circle, you get 4πr2 (a 2-dimensional formula), which is the surface area of a sphere, and if with respect to r you integrate 4πr2, you get 4/3(π)r3 (a 3-dimensional formula), which is the volume of a sphere (1999). For my purposes, with respect to the original research question, the integration of interview data = themes; with respect to the new research question (What, if any, theoretical direction do these themes give to teachers of creative writing?), the integration of themes = theory. 

            I welcome researchers reading this integration approach who could offer suggestions or concerns (Barritt, 1992) about my stepping from phenomenology to grounded theory direction to contact me (lukivdan@hotmail.com). If grounded theory is an emergent methodology, as Dick says (2002), then I’m standing in the right ball park. I will need to develop my own style of constant comparison between themes that emerge from phenomenological studies and theoretical statements that may emerge (2002) from their themes. 

            These themes, or as some grounded theory researchers say, categories or perhaps concepts or understanding (Calloway & Knapp, 1995; Glaser, 2002; and Introduction to Qualitative Tools, 1998), established through systematic hermeneutic phenomenological methodology, would become the data I use to construct theory, but construction would follow new systematic methodology, defining analysis and interpretation in the grounded theory landscape (1998; and Kinach, 1995). Of course, categories in grounded theory arise through what many researchers call the comparative method (Glaser, 2002), whereas themes in my phenomenological studies arose through phenomenological analysis and interpretation (see Chapter Fourteen: Methodology). Whichever qualitative methodology we consider as researchers, one goal of applying it is to bring us close to what we are studying. Grounded theory direction, then, could bring me close to what I would be trying to understand (State of the Art, 1998), namely the phenomenological data (themes) and theory that may lie implicitly therein (see Chapter Six: Qualitative Interview Data Is like a Poem); additionally, the direction could help verify, make valid, the theory (State of the Art, 1998)—if one does emerge.

The themes of my phenomenological studies could parallel the abstract categories or less abstract concepts of a grounded theory approach (Pandit, 1996). My objective: to group the themes through connections between them (1996), and integrate them (1996) into a covering theory. The quality of this inductive approach would naturally parallel the quality of theory produced (Borgatti, 1996b). I could discover a core category or theme that all or most other themes relate to (1996b; and McCarthy, 2001). If the core category were considered the vertebrae, these other themes would be the ribs. Here, however, I sidestep grounded theory terminology such as open, axial, and selective coding (Babchuk, 1996; and Davidson, 2002).

I base that decision for sidestepping on the premise that codes may relate to single words or phrases (Dick, 2002) far more concrete than the phenomenological abstractions I call themes (van Manen, 1990). I have other reasons too. Logic suggests that Theory from Phenomenology should retain, as much as possible, “phenomenological” language, even the logic of Studies I, II, and III. For example, those hermeneutic phenomenological studies explored lived school experiences and then described themes that emerged (Bennet, 1998) from those experiences (see Chapter Ten: Narrative Style and the Research Question); Theory from Phenomenology would explore those themes and then describe theory that emerges (1998) from them. As I mentioned in Chapter Ten, this journey from exploration to description defines a common journey for researchers (Neuman, 2006).

As for the language of my hermeneutic phenomenology, it includes themes, but not open, axial, and selective coding. I prefer, at least for now, the language of grouping of themes, connections between themes, integration of themes, and covering theory. I say “at least for now” because the actual process of theory building from phenomenology may reveal to me a better language. My proposal for such a study could allow for a fluidity of terminology; however, I likely will not sidestep the use of the concept of a core category/theme that themes relate to as a useful theory-building spine.

As for memos, I definitely will not sidestep using those. Pandit (1996) used memos in his grounded theory doctoral work to help him group and integrate what he called concepts and the broader categories, and to keep track of concepts, categories, questions, and possibilities. Actually, memos helped me analyze and interpret interview data in my phenomenological studies. Borgatti speaks about memos as a means to generate theoretical insight in grounded theorizing (1996b). Memos address what Pandit (1996) calls internal validity (a credible establishment of relationships) and construct validity ([Trochim, 2002b] enhanced through clear procedures of operation).

In view of the relatively small number of themes that Studies I, II, and III produced, I will not follow Pandit’s (1996) example of using data analysis computer programs to help me compare and contrast my themes. But I will, I think, follow his example of comparing my theory to relevant literature, if any exists, once I establish theory. Some researchers encourage a review of literature during analysis and interpretation (Grounded Theory Research Design, n.d.); however, during Study I, I conducted a suspended literature review after my interpretation (see Chapter Seven: A Suspended Literature Review), to avoid, in view of my neophyte status as a researcher at the MEd stage, biasing myself. Pandit (1996; see, also, Davidson, 2002) worked similarly, reviewing relevant literature after the theory emerged.

This order fits the spirit of grounded theory, which does not allow “our theories ... [to] drive our research” (Pogson et al., 2002, p. 6). Grounded theory researchers avoid forming a priori hypotheses (2002). Actually, its methodology began, in part, as a reaction against the preponderance of 1960s and pre-1960s education research that quantitatively tested hypothetical premises (Grounded theory, n.d.). Not surprisingly, then, I will avoid doing an extensive literature review related to my theory until it crystallizes. This will help me keep hypotheses and biases at bay. Curiously, however, just as I found no hermeneutic phenomenological studies that investigated my research question, I may find no literature that supports, contradicts, or extends theory I construct.

            Participant review, which includes the specialized process called free imaginative variation, and which verifies or appropriately alters the analysis and interpretation of data (see Chapter Fourteen: Methodology) bolsters internal validity. Therefore, at the stage of crystallizing my theory, I might consider my conducting participant reviews with each of the participants of my phenomenological studies, if possible, to see if the theory rings true for their experiences. As in hermeneutic phenomenological research that values the researcher’s analysis and interpretation along with the participants’ thematic verification and/or modification, my proposed methodology would value the same processes. This novel approach would place the theory generated at a high level of validity.   

            I enjoy this thought, because if I am going to spend great lengths of time conducting phenomenological studies and then work through the time-consuming method of crystallizing a covering theory (Pandit, 1996), then I want to end up with high validity. Therefore, from the beginning of my research I have been aware of the need for what I call good process. For example, I have made sure my phenomenological studies have fit my original research question without “the question being made to fit the research method” (McCarthy, 1999, Three Stages of Developing the Research Topic, para. 1). I am matching this logic as I step beyond phenomenology. Really, I am attempting to join up the established, valid process of phenomenological research with valid grounded theory direction.

In the name of good process, here is my logic: 1) The topic of creative writing in school gave rise to my research question, which sent me on a research design (Daniel, 1996) exploration (I chose qualitative research), which sent me on a methodology exploration (I chose hermeneutic phenomenology), which introduced me to how to conduct valid research of my research question, research made valid in part because of participant review; and 2) Likewise, my topic of themes of events (phenomenological data) in school that have encouraged some people to become creative writers has given rise to my new research question of What, if any, theoretical direction do these themes provide for creative writing teachers?, which has sent me on a research design (Daniel, 1996) exploration (I have chosen qualitative research), which has sent me on a methodology exploration (I have chosen direction from grounded theory literature), which is teaching me how to construct valid theory (Pandit, 1996), the validity of which could be enhanced considerably through participant review.

            Those readers familiar with grounded theory may notice that I have spoken about participant review but not about saturation. “Saturation point is defined as that point in data collection/analysis when no new features related to the research question turn up in the most recently collected data” (Rintel, 2001). Not all researchers agree about the validity of saturation: “It seems so intense a process that I wonder,” Rintel says, “if anyone has ever actually achieved saturation” (2001). In spite of such comments, many researchers treat saturation seriously, especially with regard to a core category (Glaser and Strauss: Developing Grounded Theory, n.d.). The logic of saturation lies in a variety of interviewees who provide a variety of data, thereby providing diverse aspects of the core category, enabling the researcher to deepen his or her insight (n.d.; see, also, Davidson, 2002).    

            If saturation is to grounded theory, then, I must add, verification and richness are to hermeneutic phenomenological research. Participant review (including free imaginative variation)—verification—ensures that the essential themes discovered truly/accurately/reliably describe the essence of the participant’s lived experience. Applying the principles of saturation appears possible in terms of the interviewer finding a participant’s “same old themes” in new qualitative (interview) data, however: 1) the phenomenological researcher has to respect a participant who says, “That’s all I can remember; I have nothing more to say,” and 2) the researcher may simply stop interviewing once he or she sees that the data is rich, fruitful.

For example (with respect to “2”), Study I is fruitful/rich in its number of essential themes, namely eight, and Study II, although only one essential theme emerged, has richness too. The breadth and depth of the single theme makes the study more than worthwhile in my mind. Elizabeth’s five essential themes from Study III describe, too, a richness that I find very satisfying. And verification gives the themes of all three studies credibility. 

            Credibility with regard to a covering theory that utilizes my studies’ themes as data may also rank high through similar verification. As for richness: It will likely arise from the diversity of experiences of my information-rich (Patton, 1987) participants and their individuality (Stipek, 1998; and Zunker, 1998).     

            If my covering theory approach, based on phenomenological data (themes), truly works, then I can present two modes of direction to teachers: 1) direction through a list of all themes from my studies (see Chapter Twenty-Five: A Checklist for Creative Writing Teachers); and 2) theoretical direction (McEwan, n.d.). The list, as a checklist, could direct teachers to consider activities or ways of dealing with students. Those activities or ways might encourage some to become creative writers, based on the premise, analogy (Kline, 1967), that they have encouraged others. The theory could also direct teachers, although at a more abstract level, to consider activities or ways of dealing with students that might encourage some.  The checklist and the theory provide a context for extrapolation based on the experiences of information-rich participants (Patton, 1987). I will further discuss extrapolation shortly.

            In my phenomenological work, I have addressed validity issues in considerable detail. I realize that research that does not fully address validity issues invites criticism from, even rejection by, its readers. McKewan (n.d.) says, “If you read only the introduction and the conclusion to a research study, ignoring everything in between [which would include discussions about internal and external validity], you may as well not read it at all.” I agree. A reader who does not evaluate a study’s rigour and consider the researcher’s arguments in favour of the study’s validity seems, to me, odd.

            I have read many studies that do not fully address validity issues, such as comparability between classes or students (see, e.g., Atkinson, 2003; and Sluyter, 2003), survey validity (see, e.g., Haynes, 2003), confidentiality and anonymity and other ethical concerns (see, e.g., Haynes, 2003), researcher effects or bias control (see, e.g., Christiansen, 2003), standardization procedures for interviewing a variety of participants (see, e.g., Christiansen, 2003), questionnaire validity (see, e.g., Rauschenberger, 2003), and student effects on each other (see, e.g., Rauschenberger, 2003). These studies invite criticism. Therefore, where grounded theory structures guide me to locate theory in the phenomena, I will address credibility (internal validity); I will also address consistency (reliability) and confirmability (objectivity) (State of the Art, 1998; refers to Lincoln & Guba, 1985; see, also, Siegle, n.d.c), or I will formulate and apply other concepts of rigor to ensure the study’s integrity (Morse et al., 2002).

            I did not use Lincoln and Guba’s (1985) terminology as explicit signposts in my phenomenological studies. With regard to validity, generally I referred to trustworthiness (Guba & Lincoln, 1982; see, also, Siegle, n.d.c) rather than credibility. Essentially, however, I addressed credibility in terms of taped and transcribed interviews, participant review, free imaginative variation, bracketing, and peer debriefing; consistency (Siegle, n.d.c) in terms of participant review, free imaginative variation, bracketing, and peer debriefing; and confirmability (n.d.c) in terms of audibility, field notes, contact summaries, memos, a field journal, bracketing, participant review, and peer debriefing. But the repetition/overlap seems cumbersome. Herein lies some of the trouble with qualitative researchers trying to straddle qualitative and quantitative language to addresses validity and reliability issues (Morse et al., 2002).

            Lincoln and Guba (1985) refer not only to credibility, consistency, and conformability, but also to applicability (external validity), which really made no sense for my phenomenological studies because generalization was not the goal. Finding themes specific to the participants, however, was. Hence, rather than applicability, I prefer to use the term extrapolation (Patton, 1987). I have discussed this concept already (see Chapter Eight: Creative Writers Who Were Encouraged in School—a Literature Review, and Chapter Nine: The Nature of Encouragement). Extrapolation translates into direction from my studies for creative writing teachers.

Extrapolation will arise again if grounded theory principles can provide me with a means to generate a valid covering theory (based on my phenomenological themes) of use in the classroom; a theory that will guide teachers who want to create classroom climates and events that may encourage some students to grow up to become creative writers. I do not speak of an if x (if teachers provide certain activities or interact with students in certain ways), then y theory (then those activities or interactions will encourage some students [I speak, of course, other than (beyond) Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth] to become creative writers; Borgatti, 1996a), which relates to external validity, the validity of generalizing the theory. Rather, I am speaking of an if x, then perhaps y theory, especially if the theory rings true for all participants. Such a theory would not describe independent and dependant variables, but it would describe at least a “sense of process” (1996a, para. 7). 

            The best theory would address classroom climate and events from kindergarten to grade 12. My intent was to draw on elementary and high school events. I feel at home with my intent because I have taught students in grades 1 through  4 and 9 through 12, and I am familiar with the cognitive, emotional, and social make up of students in those grades. Another researcher, however, might feel more at home with just elementary or just high school experiences, based on his or her past as a teacher. That researcher’s audience might be just elementary or just high school teachers. This reminds me that skilled ethnographers of the same group of people might conduct different interviews and, therefore, discover different data and, therefore, arrive at different, although not contradictory, conclusions because different ethnographers might be researching for different audiences (Ethnography, 1998).

            Let me now leave this discussion about the best theory to focus on good grounded theory, which has four fundamental requirements that seem excellent evaluative tools for Theory from Phenomenology. The theory should 1) “fit the phenomenon” (described by the themes that come out of my phenomenological studies); 2) “be understandable” (to teachers in general, but especially to Language Arts teachers); 3) be “abstract enough to be [useful in] a wide variety of contexts” (useful in all grades and, I hope, in various school climates socially and economically); and 4) “provide control, in the sense of stating the conditions under which the theory applies and describing a reasonable basis for action” (the theory should give creative writing teachers direction about what sorts of activities they could engage students in or about how they could interact with students) (Davidson, 2002, para. 7; see, also, Grounded Theory, n.d.). “A reasonable basis for action” refers to practise, which seems paramount. Just as each action research cycle means “practice informs theory which in turn informs practice” (Dick, 1998, para. 4), Theory from Phenomenology means participant experience informs phenomenology which in turn informs theory which in turn informs practise, which can relate to what some call theoretical applicability.

            As I have said, I prefer to leave out the term applicability, with its hint of generalizability, in favour of extrapolation (Patton, 1987). It will take the teacher beyond the phenomenological interviews of my studies, beyond the themes of the studies, and beyond the theory as defined by the experiences of information-rich creative writers. How? The themes as a checklist and the theory will both stand as direction for teachers. The checklist and theory will “take” teachers to their own students in their own classrooms to address scholastic environments and activities. As I mentioned before (see Chapter Nineteen: Recommendations with Respect to Arthur’s Themes), some students, given the right environment, like a botanical seed given the appropriate combinations of soil, nutrients, water, and sunshine, might germinate into creative writers. If educators want to think about what that right environment might be, the themes and theory from the studies will direct teachers with respect to appropriate practise.

            The next step in my work as a researcher may be to test the extrapolating power of the theory. I might consider sending out a survey to a sample of creative writers to find out if the theory rings true according to their experiences in school. I have not yet decided whether to follow a quantitative or qualitative paradigm. I will explore this possibility in the next chapter.

 

 

Chapter Twenty-Four: Further Research—Survey Research

            I have formulated Theory from Phenomenology methodology by drawing on grounded theory principles (see Chapter Twenty-Three: Further Research—Covering Theory), although what I call covering theory is not true grounded theory (Baker, Wuest, & Stern, 1995; Glaser, 1995; Becker, 1995; Simmons, 1995; and Stern, 1995). I want to see if I can synthesize, through an inductive process, the themes of my phenomenological studies into a covering theory that could direct teachers interested in creating classroom settings that may encourage some students to take up creative writing as a vocation. I will confirm, if possible—if the participants of my phenomenological studies are available—the truth of the theory through participant review, just as I confirmed the truth of the themes in each of the phenomenological studies through participant review.

            But my series of studies of the phenomenon of what school experiences have encouraged creative writers will not end at Theory from Phenomenology. I wish to conduct one more study, namely survey research of a sample of creative writers, to investigate or “test [the] theory’s predictions” (Neuman, 2006, p. 34) or the worth of the covering theory according to other writers. If teachers are going to extrapolate my covering theory, to apply it in their classrooms, to “extend known experience [based on the theoretical expression of those experiences of the participants] ... to arrive at a useful conjecture [a useful mode of practise]” (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997, p. 7), then they may want to see that the theory applies to more than just my phenomenological studies’ participants. 

This path, from my point of view, looks epic in scope, but all great journeys begin with shorter ones. If Study I was Point A on my phenomenological landscape, then Study II placed me at Point B, and Study III places me now at point C. I look forward to the journey ahead—the great adventure of my further researching writers’ relevant lived school experiences and sharing my findings with other researchers and classroom teachers. As in pure scientific research, my work may gain me surprisingly new, even astonishing insights (Kiener, 2002) worth sharing.

Stebbins (1995) refers to this process of study following study, “as if [they] were in a chain leading to cumulative, … or inductively generated theory” (p. 21). He notes that “sociologists typically conduct one or two field studies, which may or may not be related, and then retire to their offices to write” (p. 22). He refers to “the result[:] … our understanding of an area of [study] that has gained a good start through exploratory research is commonly arrested thereafter owing to neglect, for it is rare that someone else takes up the project where the initial researcher stopped” (p. 22). During my MEd studies, I purposely came up with a research question that would launch a career in research, for me, that would last many years. I recall Dr. Madak, my supervisory chair, telling me, after I’d said to him that I’d wanted to explore a phenomenon that I could continue exploring once I’d completed my degree, that he wished he’d continued at the PhD level what research he’d started in his master’s program.

A researcher who wants to make his own mark may find that some graduate schools expect graduate and doctoral students to “test [or extend] their teachers’ [mentors’] work” (Glasser & Strauss, 1967, p. 11) rather than explore their own passions. Such a researcher may want to dig in his heels and consider a series, a concatenated (Stebbins, 1995), approach that enables him to establish his body of knowledge throughout his career. To test or extend a famous professor’s work draws attention, frankly, to the professor and his or her work, but not to the graduate or doctoral candidate.

In a similar sense, if a young, energetic student writes a brilliant thesis or dissertation on some aspect, say, of Margaret Atwood’s poetry or fiction or both, the work may land the student a post in a university’s faculty of literature, but the work will likely not bring the researcher notoriety. The work, on the other hand, may indeed make Margaret Atwood all the more famous. Sometimes, too, charismatic professors influence graduate and doctoral students to test or extend their theories (Glasser & Strauss, 1967), drawing attention to the charismatic professors rather than to the work of the students.

My studies are based on my interests, my passions, and not on an agenda handed me from any particular university’s research slant. I thank the University of Northern British Columbia for allowing me to conduct MEd research that reflected my and not its faculty of education’s agenda. My supervisory team allowed me to start on a path that, I hope, will help teachers encourage some students to become creative writers, thereby contradicting the “widespread perception that knowledge created by [researchers] is not used in practice” (Boland et al., 2000, Learning Theory, Knowledge Representations, and Knowledge Transfer, para. 1). I witnessed this perception repeatedly as many students in my recent MEd cohort expressed concern over “ivory tower” (Neuman, 2006, p. viii) researchers whose work lies cocoon-like, educationally dormant, without influence in everyday classroom activity. Transformational knowledge, on the other hand, “moves” from the researcher to the classroom teacher who actually uses that knowledge to help him or her instruct students.

Shriberg (2002) speaks of “transformational leaders [who] focus themselves and all stakeholders on long-term, shared personal … commitments” (p. 45). He speaks of leadership at the university level that promotes ecological sustainability for all concerned—for all university faculty, other staff, and students (2002). His language reminds me that education researchers should help teachers apply their research in the classroom. Such researchers would become transformational leaders.

            I could, as a transformational leader, see that my studies are published in a number of printed settings, to ensure that a wide variety of teachers have access to their direction. That means publication must go beyond the journals that, generally, only education professors read. To date, actually, I have each of and part of each of Studies I, II, and III published in one of more of Academic Exchange Extra, Mentor: The Online Publication for Nova Scotia’s Educators, Arts North, Connected Magazine [online supplement], SchoolNet Africa, The Journal of Secondary Alternate Education, The Teachers.Net Gazette, and BCTF Lesson Aids publications.

            Also, as a transformational leader, I could run workshops for teachers, helping them apply my studies’ direction. If wisdom, in one sense, is not simply a product of knowledge but of knowledge applied (Draw Close, 2002), then my efforts could help teachers make wise choices—with respect to their applying the themes and theory of my studies—in their efforts to encourage students to take creative writing seriously. I could run workshops at my own school, McNaughton Centre, and at my school district’s yearly professional development days. There are provincial- and national-level conferences, too, that invite researchers to “display” their work. 

            Publication of my studies and workshops about their findings will offer teachers opportunities to think about how to “extrapolate.” From these studies or workshops, teachers who want to encourage some students to take up creative writing as a vocation may gain a sense of what sorts of activities, what sorts of extrapolations, make sense. The survey’s results and conclusions may add considerable weight, or usefulness, to the covering theory (based on Theory from Phenomenology; see, again, Chapter Twenty-Three: Further Research—Covering Theory) as an intellectual point of reference for teachers. With respect to the theoretical direction, teachers may gain a sort of class smarts, like the street kid who learns street smarts (Hawley, 1993), in terms of their creating a classroom “event in time” (Waterman, 1998), even a variety of “extrapolated” classroom events.

            As in the previous chapter, extrapolation, here, does not relate to an if x (or w, to use a different symbol), then y (or z, to again use a different symbol) theory (Borgatti, 1996a), which would relate to external validity (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997), the validity of generalizing the theory. Population and ecological external validity (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997) would equate my respondents and their experiences in school to the larger pool of other creative writers and their experiences in school. For example, if I took a random sample (Ferber, Sheatsley, Turner, & Waksberg, 1980c) from a sampling frame (Ferber, Sheatsley, Turner, & Waksberg, 1980b) of, say, all the creative writers of Canada, and all respondents stated that the theory matched experiences they had in school that had encouraged them to become writers, then that means that probably all or at least most creative writers in Canada (population external validity) would have had during their elementary and high school years the same types of encouraging classroom experiences (ecological external validity) that the theory describes. The implication: Teachers who want to encourage some students to become creative writers should definitely apply the theory in their classrooms.

            But random sampling will not be a feature of my survey, which, for a number of reasons I will shortly explain, will use a non-random sample of purposive/information-rich respondents (Patton, 1987; see, e.g., Arnold & Ketter, n.d.). My proposal for a survey study will discuss non-random sampling, just as it will discuss how I will ensure confidentiality/anonymity for each respondent (Ferber et al., 1980c; and Ferber, Sheatsley, Turner, & Waksberg, 1980a; see, e.g., Arnold & Ketter, n.d.; and McElrath & McEvoy, 2001), a subject given considerable weight in graduate courses in surveys (see, e.g., Godfrey, 2002).

            Shortly I will explain that a random sample and a complete sampling frame are not possible for me to formulate, erasing the possibility for generalizability based on population and ecological external validity. Given that statement, my survey could speak of an if w, then perhaps z theory, especially if the theory rings true not only for all participants of my phenomenological studies (see Chapter Twenty-Three: Further Research—Covering Theory), but also for many survey respondents. Extrapolation of that theory, then, in terms of teachers creating appropriate classroom events and circumstances, draws on if w, then perhaps z. The implication: Teachers who want to encourage some students to become creative writers should consider applying the theory in their classrooms. Therefore, as mentioned in Chapter Twenty-Three, such a theory would not describe independent and dependant variables, but it would describe at least a “sense of process” (Borgatti, 1996a).

            By sense of process I refer to activities, events, and teacher-student interaction that may encourage students to become creative writers. To say that all or most creative writers have experienced such activities, events, and teacher-student interaction would, as already mentioned, constitute generalizability. Such a bold statement, if global, would require a random sample of creative writers from a sampling frame beyond the writers of my hometown, Quesnel, beyond my province, British Columbia, and, quite frankly, beyond Canada, my country. Granted, many studies use random samples (see, e.g., Barbados Study, 1997), but such samples are not always possible (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997). My study will be a case in point.

            How could I acquire the sampling frame for just my hometown? The Quesnel Writers’ Group, which I helped establish in 1979, presently has a list of members who write, but many people in the area who do not belong to the group also write. I am one example. As for others in my area: Who are they? Are some “invisible” because they write under pseudonyms, as I sometimes do? I cannot comprehensively answer either question. Therefore, a random sample of my area is not possible (Trochim, 2002i).

            The difficulty in answering those questions grows exponentially as the geographical area increases. Other variables add difficulty. For example, the Burnaby Writers’ Society, of BC, advertises that “membership ... is open to anyone, anywhere” (Burnaby, 2003, p. 487). That means members may not be established writers and they may not live in Burnaby. The question would remain, who make up the sampling frame of established writers in Burnaby?

            Who make up the sampling frame for British Columbia, for Canada? I know much-published creative writers who belong to no writers’ groups, guilds, or leagues at the municipal, territorial, provincial, or national level. Will the Canadian Poetry Association (Canadian Poetry, 2003, p. 487), the Canadian Authors Association (Canadian Authors, 2005), the Writers Guild of Canada (Writers Guild, n.d.), and The League of Canadian Poets (The League, 2003, p. 490) enable me to establish a comprehensive sampling frame at the national level? No. Not even The Quesnel Writers’ Group can enable me to list such a frame at the hometown level. Other researchers, however, have taken random samples from available sampling frames, such as Adams, Matto, and Harrington (2001), who randomly sampled from “social workers nationwide (NASW [National Association of Social Workers], 1999), from … 65,996 members in their database who indicated they were in direct clinical practice” (p. 365), to study “convergent and discriminant validity of the Traumatic Stress Institute Belief Scale (TSI)-Revision L (Traumatic Stress Institute, 1994) as a measure of vicarious trauma in … clinical social workers” (p. 363). Such a study affords excellent possibilities for external validity, for generalizing to a large body of social workers.

In view of what I have discussed about random sampling from a sampling frame, which is necessary for externally valid (i.e., with reference to external population and ecological validity) conclusions (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997) within the bell curve-probability realm of statistical interpretation, generalization becomes an impossibility for my survey. (As a point of interest, note that random sampling in a survey that reaches for generalizability must address what to do about non-respondents possibly biasing the statistical pool [de Leeuw, 2005; and Lesser et al., 2001].) Clearly, for my survey research, non-random sampling becomes the reasonable alternative (Developing a Survey, n.d.; see, e.g., Hare & Skinner, 1999).

Hence, extrapolation, the fruit of non-random sampling, replaces generalizability. Researchers who make sweeping conclusions—in short, generalizations—from non-random samples can mislead the public, especially when these statements enter the public domain. For example, Brown and Booth (in press) discuss a famous study by Arlie Hochschild (1997), who concluded from a non-random sample that many mothers and fathers avoid the demands of domestic life by spending many hours in the workplace (Brown & Booth, in press), a conclusion that implied a nation-wide phenomenon. Hochschild’s research, published in her book entitled The Time Bind, has been referenced dozens of times in academia, but other studies have not supported her research. Why not? As Brown and Booth (in press) point out, “the generalizability of her findings is limited by her nonrandom sample of a small number of workers in a single firm” (p. 6). People who make decisions based on grandiose generalizations may find themselves embarrassed according to Matthew 15:14 (New World Translation): “If, then, a blind man guides a blind man, both will fall into a pit.” Therefore, I want to reflect some modesty in my use of the word extrapolation. In the words of Williams (1996), “good researchers recognize and acknowledge the limitations of their work” (First Project: Experiments, para. 7). 

            For my survey, non-random sampling, as in the case of my purposive/information-rich (Patton, 1987) respondents, will define a group of successful—established—writers, and will, I hope, lead me to some modest conclusions. By successful, I mean my respondents will have proven their commitment to their vocation through their own letters of recommendation—their own substantial credits, as in the case of Arthur, Thomas, and Elizabeth. For poets and fiction writers, I refer to a substantial body of published works. For dramatists, I refer to a substantial body of produced or published plays.

            I won’t resort to snowball sampling, although researchers frequently “snowball” (see, e.g., McElrath & McEvoy, 2001). I wouldn’t want to snowball through fringe writers, with little professional experience, referring to likewise fringe writers. Ironically, researchers often use snowball sampling to locate fringe groups (Qualitative Field Research, n.d.). Granted, I could use snowball sampling to locate established writers through established writers, but the process isn’t necessary. Established writers are easy to find. I will purposively choose such writers, just as I purposively chose them for Studies I, II, and III.  

Therefore, the survey will not require a screening question to determine which respondents are appropriate for the survey (Trochim, 2002i); however, one contingency question (Trochim, 2002j), to root out biased respondents, could be: Have you read any of my published phenomenological research studies or articles that refer to them? I would not mention that the studies have explored experiences in school that encouraged some to take up creative writing. Even that statement could bias respondents who have not read my work to think that some school experiences should have encouraged them.

A “yes” to my question would mean the respondent would not continue with the survey, due to possible bias effects from his or her reading my research or references to it. Just as history effects (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997) could affect respondents in particular ways that adversely affect the internal validity of a study, bias effects could also adversely affect its internal validity.

The survey could focus attention on the covering theory, which will likely be a short, simple statement that “covers” the themes from my hermeneutic phenomenological studies. In fact, “a simple statement of the observed relations” (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997, p. 8) is preferable to a complex statement, and brevity is preferable to wordiness. Such a statement not only helps the reader understand the theory but also helps the survey avoid certain problems. For example, a lengthy theoretical statement might, if the survey asks respondents to read the statement and respond to its various parts with respect to their own experiences, open the door to recency and primacy effects (Krosnick, 1999).

            Variety amongst respondents will depend on a non-random, stratified purposive sampling; some researchers might synonymously use the term “maximum variation sampling” (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997, p. 398); others, the term quota sampling (1997). McCaffery et al. (2003) “purposively selected [a] sample of women from four ethnic groups: white British, African Caribbean, Pakistani and Indian” to “examine[ ] attitudes to human papillomavirus (HPV) testing” through qualitative methodology (para. 1 [Abstract]). I will want to contact poets, fiction writers, and dramatists, likely in equal proportion. How many in each stratum? I’m not sure, but I will keep the number modest, in line with this statement: “It is better to do a small study well than a large study poorly” (McMillan & Schumacher, 1997, p. 299). But I won’t keep the number too modest. Too few respondents may translate into my obtaining too little data (see, e.g., Cicero-Reese & Black, 1998) to address the worth of my covering theory beyond my participants’ experiences, although I should point out that some studies with small samples have yielded useful information (Decker, Bailey, & Westergaard, 2002).

Whatever the number of respondents, I will, however, need to consider the implications to the study with regard to nonresponse (de Leeuw, 2005; and Trochim, 2002d). For example, will those from my sample who do not respond describe a group largely made up of individuals who believe no experiences in school encouraged them to become writers? That exists as a possibility; one Canadian novelist I spoke to told me he felt that no experiences in elementary or high school had encouraged him to become a writer. Another possibility: Could some respondents describe a group discouraged (Birney, 1966) rather than encouraged by experiences in school to become creative writers? For me to find answers to these and other relevant questions may require my interviewing nonrespondents about why they did not respond to the survey.  

            Given the non-random stratified purposive sample of respondents for my study, each stratum will define a type of writer rather than a statistically representative sample of a type. I refer to McCaffery et al. again: “As is usual in qualitative research, participants were not selected to be statistically representative of their ethnic and socioeconomic group; rather, they were selected to represent a range of [participants]” (2003, Discussion, para. 6).

There exist many research directions I could take to survey creative writers and analyze their responses. I could even, for a non-random sample, take a quantitative approach, using statistical analyses of respondent’s answers to Likert-type, dichotomous, nominal, and/or ordinal questions (Trochim, 2002j). Such questions, set in an interview guide or self-administered questionnaire, would define a structured survey format (Trochim, 2002a). I could determine statistical significance of the responses with regard to an analysis of om