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MODULE 1 documentation
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Purpose:
in this module you can find a definition of what documentation is and its relevance in the educational practice.
What documentation is:
According to the apt phrase of the Reggio Emilia Approach, documentation “makes learning visible”. There are different aspects of learning that can be made visible and different strategies and methods of doing so.
Documentation is a process of construction of an artefact (a written text, a video, a group of photographs, a poster), in order to describe some elements of a learning process. [As you can see in the folder 1.1.Observing]
This definition has many educational meanings:
1) it is a material artefact: documentation is not only a personal impression or a mental remind of an event. It is something that has a material entity (should it be a written text on paper; on an electronic support);
2) it is planned in advance: the practitioners seldom document some events that happen contingently; documentation is previously discussed by the team of professionals: “what is considered relevant to observe and document? For which reasons? How can data (images, texts, compiled check-lists or rating scales) be composed in a trustworthy narrative? How can documentation be used for future educational activities?”
3) documentation is a deliberative practice, that is, it is a goal-oriented activity [what do we want to know?]. In a single educational event, there are many potential objects of observation and discourse: the practitioners should select some aspects of the process, in order to have a single focus of attention and documentation. A focus of attention could be: a single child’s process of thinking, a pair or a group of children doing intentionally some actions in their settings; a pattern of behaviours of a single child or a group (documented by the use of check-lists and rating scales), what a child shows to master (recognition of shapes, counting, representation of quantities in personal ways and any other relevant competence in the educational process).
Documentation promotes:
- communication with children: giving the children some remainders of their experiences; as reference points for the development of their self-narrative (how far I have developed since);
- intersubjectivity among practitioners: its methodology is designed in advance: discussion about what is educationally relevant in the activity; what happened here? What to do next? by identifying what was going on, a perspective on practice could be worked out;
- communication with families: presenting some reference points to share and confront ideas, to make explicit the unfolding of an educational model: are parents informed of the educational principles and practices of the educational setting? Do teachers and parents share materials and practices? Do they find elements of conflictual cultural models in raising children? Are there negotiations?
Recognize: in the folder “1.1 Observing” you can recognize the twofold process of observation, as looking carefully to a specific focus of attention, and producing an artefact in collaboration with colleagues. Please, note that the focus of attention is the children’s activity rather than their finished products. The teacher writes down notes, takes pictures and then discusses with colleagues to make sense of the children’s process of learning and of the future educational activities.
In the folder “1.2. documenting”, you can see different artefacts of documentation: one is an exhibition of both the children’s products and photos, narratives and children’s thinking during the activities (1: it is useful for children, families and community); a record of the activity that preserves the diversity and richness of children’s products, for the school and the group of children (please note that there is neither assessment of children’s products according to a given standard, nor a ranking of their products). You may have also recorded talks with children about their ongoing activities and written notes of adults’ observations (foto 3). Documentation may be organized as a wall display, that narrates a story about the activity and the children’s achievements (4, 5). Finally, you may collect the documentation into a booklet (foto 6).
Reflect: Please, observe your setting and take note: Which tools do you use in your own practice? For which purposes? Do you think the tools are consistent with your idea of child-centred practice?
Summary: did you notice? Documentation always involves both the act of observing and the act of registering down. Documentation is also an artefact that promotes communication and reflection. Therefore, there are as many opportunities of making it public and accessible as your creativity allows.
In the child-centred approach, documentation gives you the opportunity to highlight the different paths of children’s learning, their interest for exploration, personal inquiry and communication. There is no a single developmental line all the children should follow. This is an educational opportunity to create an educational environment that allows children to develop their potentialities and documentation will allow to reconstruct these developments.
Outcome: when you have completed the module you will be ready to recognize how many intentional or intuitive strategies you usually apply to monitor the children’s activities and their learning, what evidence you use to talk to your colleagues in order to reflect upon children’s learning and how you communicate with families. You also recognize how many textual artefacts are present in your school to make manifest some aspects of children’s learning (learning journals; wall displays; observational tools) and you may want to design and share with your team-mates new documentation tools, to capture children’s centrality in your educational practices.
What next: Educational events (such as a play activity, a learning process, an interaction among children) can be observed and documented according two alternative modes of thinking, and they are presented in the next two modules. Each is focused upon specific aspects of the educational practice; this means that there is not one single best way of documentation, each has its opportunities and its shortcomings.
Module 2: check-lists; rating scales; milestones
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What we do: in this module the structured observational tools are introduced. They are grounded in the logical way of thinking, in which different categories that characterise the nature of the events are identified and measured. Therefore, for each category (lunch; play; number learning, etc) of events, you can identify in advance all the characteristics that constitute all the examples of that category and then you observe if a specific characteristic is present/absent [they are called check-lists] or you measure its intensity through the attribution of a number [they are called rating scales].
Therefore, you can have structured observational tools (usually a printed grid) that present all the items you can observe in an educational activity, and a rating scale which allows you to attribute a numerical intensity to that characteristic. You then can compare the values you have attributed across children or events or sequentially across time.
Structured observational tools
The structured observation tools are constructed on predefined categories. A structured observational technique implies that every observation is conducted according to the same procedure, assuring that the data can be aggregated and the distribution of the unit of observation can be appreciated.
It is crucial to establish at the outset the relevant set of occurrences that are expected to observe and the coding scheme, that is the categories expected and the logic to assign each observed occurrence to a category. Therefore, categories must be mutually exclusive, that is each occurrence should be attributed to one and just one category. The set of categories should be inclusive, that is, should represent all the observed possibilities.
Check-lists are structured observational techniques in which the coding scheme allows only presence/absence of the occurrence of a given category in an observed event;
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Child Name |
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Task: |
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Object of the observation: the adult-child interaction in performing an activity |
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Observe and recognize the occurrence/non-occurrence of the following: |
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Yes |
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The adult performs the task and explains the actions to the child; |
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The adult performs most of the task and the child contributes for specific aspects of the performance; |
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The child performs the task and the adult helps by giving guidance in critical points of the performance; |
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The child performs the task and the adult poses questions to help the child to reflect and monitor her/his plan and procedures; |
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The child does the task and the adult comments at the end |
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rating scales are structured observational techniques in which a degree of intensity is given to each category (usually on a three- or five- point scale), therefore allowing for the recognition of the strength of the occurrence of a particular observed event.
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duration of the observation |
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Child Name |
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Task: the child is asked to collect as many spoons in the box as many dishes are on the table. The distance between table and box does not allow a simple perceptual estimation |
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Object of observation: child's counting ability |
Only by physically pairing one object at time |
tentative, for some amount |
Yes, by counting separate sets |
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Elements of the counting ability |
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The child composes a one-to-one correspondence between two collections of objects |
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The child counts the collection of objects: |
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correct counting sequence |
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counts all the objects, each only one time |
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recognizes the cardinal value, that is, that the last number counted represents the numerical value of the collection |
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Counting and comparing two collections of objects: which is larger? |
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Learning Milestones
Milestones:
Milestones are explicitly stated for different stages of education. In the example, at the end of the EYFS, children are expected to count from 1 to 20; place them in order, recognize the different magnitude of numbers (which is larger? Which is smaller?). They also add and subtract and solve problems with numbers to model a given situation.
You can compose the portfolio of each child’ number competence by using a rating scale and/or with short narratives of the child solving a problem (for example by reproducing a disposition of a number of elements such as the sheeps in the example
It is
useful to describe the process of the child’s problem solving.
- Does the child bring a number of objects to make a perceptually visible one-to one- correspondence (without counting)?
- Does the child count an array of objects (dishes) and then counts a number of objects (glasses) and then adjust the correspondence both by counting and making a correspondence?
- Does the child count an array of objects (dishes) and then counts the same amount of another group of objects (glasses)? For which magnitude is the child able to rely only on counting?
- Is the child able to understand which quantity is bigger by simply comparing numbers?
- Is the child able to understand how many elements are needed to equalize two sets of objects (how many to equalize a group of 4 objects to 7?)
You may notice the children’s developing competencies by observing them in spontaneous activities of counting, or by creating a situation in which the numbers are part of the activity (for example, asking them to prepare the table for a playing lunch with dolls, or reproducing a display of toys (paring through looking at the two sets and then by counting).
For each observational tool, it should be defined the date of the observation, the setting, the task, the target child or interactional unit, the children’s ages, the period of time in which the expected unit of observation is manifested.
If a high degree of interpretation is required or if different observers disagree on the attribution of an occurrence to a category, the structured observation schedule should be reworked: Maybe it is to complex and the unit should be simplified; maybe the categories are ill-defined and should be reformulated.
Outcome: this module is intended to promote your competence in analyzing structured documentation tools, in recognizing that each gives focus to specific aspects of the educational process and that the practice is always more complex than the data incorporated by each tool. You may want to complement different tools to have a richer representation of some educational processes.
Structured observations allow the gathering of a great amount of data, from different observers and they support comparisons across time and settings.
However, they limit the shift of focus during the observations, hampering the recognition of more encompassing educational processes
Did you notice? the logical mode looks for what is common and generalizable among educational events. Did you notice that each model of structured observation has its specific focus of attention? Please, reflect upon each observational tool in order to recognize its privileged focus, the opportunities it offers to improve the educational practice, and its shortcomings, the relevant aspects of the educational process that are left outside its focus.
Task: apply one of the structured observation tools presented in this module (or use one available in your service) and reflect upon the results, in order to think about what you can change in the learning environment to promote children’s learning. Reflect also upon the tool itself: how could it be reformulated, in order to make some other aspects of children’s learning visible?