Transformative Education: Personal Construct Approaches ot Practice and Research

245 Pages·2001·0.78 MB·English

by  Maureen Pope, Pamela Denicolo

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Transformative Education
Personal Construct Approaches
to Practice and Research
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Transformative

Education

Personal Construct Approaches to
Practice and Research
MAUREEN L POPE AND PAMELA M DENICOLO
Department of Professional Education in Community Studies
University of Reading
W
W H U R R P U B L I S H E R S
L O N D O N A N D P H I L A D E L P H I A
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© 2001 Whurr Publishers
First published 2001 by
Whurr Publishers Ltd
19b Compton Terrace, London N1 2UN, England and
325 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia PA 1906, USA
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be
reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted
in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,
photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the
prior permission of Whurr Publishers Limited.
This publication is sold subject to the conditions that it
shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold,
hired out, or otherwise circulated without the
publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or
cover other than that in which it is published and
without a similar condition including this condition
being imposed upon any subsequent purchaser.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the
British Library.
ISBN: 186156 201 2
Printed and bound in the UK by Athenaeum Press Ltd,
Gateshead, Tyne & Wear
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Contents

Foreword ix
Prologue xi
Acknowledgements xix
Chapter 1 1
Alternative perspectives on education
Chapter 2 23
Personal construct psychology approaches in education
Chapter 3 47
Alternative constructions of educational research
Chapter 4 66
Practical considerations in the use of repertory grid techniques
Chapter 5 91
Beyond the grid
Chapter 6 121
Developing an appropriate climate
Chapter 7 132
The learner as personal scientist
v
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vi Transformative Education
Chapter 8 157

Teachers’ perspectives
Chapter 9 197

Anticipation and transformation
References 207

Index 219
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Dedication
To Adrian and Kathlyn, Marie-Anne and Paul, who have been a constant
source of constructive revitalization.
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Foreword

BY PROFESSOR MICHAEL KOMPF
Groucho Marx was once asked to review a book on comedy. He wrote: ‘I
was convulsed with laughter from the moment I picked up this book. I
hope to read it some day.’ I admire Marx’s sentiment and have waited for
years to find an opportunity to include his clever remark in such a place as
the foreword to a book.
As Marx was ‘convulsed with laughter’ when he picked up a book on
comedy, readers can sometimes be ‘tickled with anticipation’ when the
opportunity arises to pick up the works of exceptional contributors to the
theory and practice of teaching and learning. Transformative Education:
Personal Construct Approaches to Practice and Research is such a book.
Building on an impressive array of individual and joint projects, the
dynamic collaboration of Maureen Pope and Pam Denicolo has taken a
long-awaited further step in applying the principles of Personal Construct
Psychology (PCP) to the heart of teaching and learning: the practical and
theoretical thinking of teachers.
There is evidence of the influence of PCP in teachers’ practices
throughout the world, an accomplishment in no small part fostered by
such luminaries as Pope and Denicolo. Exposure to PCP through its appli­
cation to a variety of matters in education has created an increasing flow of
students of the broader work of George Kelly and the overall PCP
movement. Kelly would have acknowledged ‘the person the learner is’ as
the foremost concern of the constructivist educator.
This work stands as an invitation for educators to understand PCP and
use it as a valuable orientation for understanding aspects of learning and
teaching. It serves double duty in that it also acts as an invitation for PCP
adherents outside of the practice of education to see PCP as a theory in
action and as a theory of action.
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