2006 POSTGRADUATE CONFERENCE Self portraits of young children as art-makers Rosemary D. Richards Abstract This research investigates the experience of being a young child who draws and art-makes. The study will vestigate children’s art experience in their home, early childhood setting and school as they move from pre- ) suggests that a major issue with dominant research methods is that t-makers. o links between messages and drawing self-efficacy, I noted, as thers have done (Gunn 2000; Kindler 1996; Lewis 1998/99; McArdle & Piscitelli 2002; Visser, 2006) that young children during art-making might be overcome if we were able to form pedagogic understanding of in school to school. Robbins (2005 children are frequently portrayed as anonymous and decontextualised with little apparent likeness to children’s everyday lives. The challenge then is to undertake research with children that can be related to real children, in real contexts, leading real lives. This challenge is made more problematic when filtered through traditional methodological, ethical approval and PhD submission processes. This paper documents my journey to find appropriate theoretical and research approaches that honour the visual narrative of young children’s lived art experiences. In particular this paper weaves together salient features of narrative inquiry, phenomenology and visual ethnography, under a socio-cultural historical perspective to propose a way of working collaboratively with young children. Ethical issues are discussed, not as an adjunct to good research, but as a basic pedagogic concern as we develop portraits of young children as ar Introduction Sometimes it seems we are too close or too far from an image to make sense of either the parts or the whole. The same can be said when looking at an issue or phenomenon. Sometimes one has to take a step back or forward to get a better view – as I have done in my own research journeys. My initial research interest was sparked by the commonly held view that children show artistic decline around age eight, and that adults’ negative messages are implicated in this trend (Cox 1991; Gardner & Winner 1982; Kellogg 1979). This led me to step back from dominant adult perspectives and ask what young children themselves believed about their ability to successfully undertake a drawing activity, that is their drawing self-efficacy, and how this related to the messages these children gave and received (Richards 2003a, 2003b). While this research offered some insights int o teachers were often hesitant to interact with children engaged in art-making activities. This tended to reflect a belief in natural art development and the fear that adult interference would stifle artistic creativity. Despite recent advocacy for co-construction and the concept of the competent child, teachers remain wary of adult interactions negatively affecting young children. I would suggest that a reticence to actively engage with 338 UNIVERSITY OF NEW ENGLAND what it is like to be a young child art-making and how social interactions influence this. Furthermore, in this earlier work I was keenly aware of the environmental, social and pedagogic changes that children experienced as they moved from the early childhood to school settings. Not only did the physical environment everyday lives. ding of young children’s artistic experiences, research with children must honour and make visible their art experiences as real children, in real contexts, leading real lives. Such change, but so too did concepts of time, space, interactions, free choice, teaching and learning. I have wondered how my four-year-old participants adapted to the new ways of being school boys and school girls, and how the transition impacted on their drawing self-efficacy and experience of art-making. Therefore I have now stepped forward to look intensely at four young children’s actual lived experiences of art-making, as they transition from early childhood to school, and to narrate their experiences from their point of view. Furthermore this current research includes children’s homes as contexts for art-making. Traditionally research on young children’s art, such as that by Kellogg (1969) has been based on analysing large numbers of drawings collected over a long period, without access to the context in which they were produced or the intentions of the young art-makers. Other research, such as that by Brittain attempted to link drawings with the child’s intentions in ‘controlled’ conditions to determine ‘what is typical at various ages’ (1979 p.24). However these approaches provide very limited insights into children’s actual and authentic experience of art, and as Robbins (2005) suggests, dominant research methods frequently portray children as anonymous and decontextualised with little apparent likeness to children’s Despite more recent early childhood art research with firm links to sociocultural theories, (see for example Anning & Ring 2004; Brooks 2000, 2002, 2005a, 2005b; Ring 2003, 2005), traditional theories of art development, and scientific approaches to art research persist. For example, in Australia Lambert (2005) based her qualitative longitudinal study of children’s drawing and painting within a positivist paradigm, where ‘the children did not know their artwork was being collected’ (p.252). While such research projects add to knowledge about the surface features of children’s drawings and generalised theory of cognitive processes, they add little to knowledge about children’s experiences as art-makers. If we are to build an understan research requires theoretical and methodological approaches that focus on lived experience, and allow children’s voices to be heard and their experiences to be seen. The following discussion will explore research methods which support such an aim and allow child participants to construct aspects of their own self portraits of art experience. 339 2006 POSTGRADUATE CONFERENCE Researching young children’s lived experience of art-making As I read about research methodologies three related research approaches presented themselves as potentially useful in considering young children’s art experience – these were narrative inquiry, phenomenology and visual ethnography. Most influential on my approach are the works of Jean Clandinin nd Michael Connelly (2000), Max van Manen (1990), and Sarah Pink (2001). nin & Connelly 000 p.71). As such a narrative inquiry suggests a viable interactive and collaborative way to work with ontinuity); and place (situation). Making sense of e experience under study may require the researcher to move inward to the intrapersonal, outward to the esearch commitment to recognise the bility to engage in that story through their own experience. This oses problems for a number of reasons. own experience to make sense of the young children’s stories. I believe this is particularly problematic as much traditional early childhood art resea little refere irstly, childr adult press ased a Narrative Inquiry Narrative inquiry approaches aim to understand experience through sharing and re-sharing the narrative of individuals’ lives. Researchers working with participants become part of that story and develop reflexive relationships ‘between living a life story, retelling a life story, and reliving a life story’ (Clandi 2 children as I listen for the story of their art experiences, and retell these with them. This is a dynamic approach as the story is ongoing and relived, shared and re-shared, between the young children, fellow participants, and the researcher. Clandinin and Connelly (2000) suggest that the narrative researcher’s experience is a dual one of inquirer experience and being part of the experience. They refer to three-dimensional narrative inquiry space: personal and social (interactive); past, present and future (c th social and interpersonal, backward and forward through the past, present and future, and situated in place. This approach sits well with contemporary early childhood r sociocultural-historical nature of young children’s learning and development. Reflexive practices encourage the researcher to watch outward at the experiences under study and turn inward at their own experience of experience (Clandinin and Connelly 2000). Herein, however, is a potential problem when researching with young children – narrative inquiry will rely on the children’s ability to verbally relate their story, and on the researcher’s a p The first problem may arise as the adult researcher draws upon their rch has tended to reinterpret young children’s experience through the lenses of adulthood with nce to actual children’s experience. A classic example of this is Kellogg’s (1979) assertion that f en show a decline in drawings around age eight, and secondly that this was due to inappropriate ure, lack of positive messages and poor teaching practices. Kellogg came to these ‘conclusions’ b 340 UNIVERSITY OF NEW ENGLAND on vie orical, socia rawing production. The second potential problem with narrative inquiry is that young children may still be developing the capacity to students. I generally find that my verbal capacity is idetracked as I engage in the actual art-making and I need to remove myself from the art experience to herefore, while narrative inquiry offers some valuable research tools I needed to look at other models of van Manen (1990) suggests that nderstanding experience is both an easy and difficult task; easy in that we constantly attribute meaning to accepted media for xpressing thanks (perhaps an older child would write a letter, We may also have notions of the pleasure of receiving or making such a card. But do any of these notions lead us to understand what it feels like to be a wing over two million drawings collected over 22 years – thus she failed to acknowledge the hist l, or cultural contexts that these children would have lived in at the time of their d to express their experiences as verbal inner thought, and they may have difficulty accessing this for researchers. For young children the world is often experienced at a social level and over time these experiences come to have internalised and abstracted meanings (Vygotsky 1978). It is the understanding of these preverbal or non verbal experiences that are a challenge in research with young children. Thirdly, art experience can be understood in ways other than verbal thought. While some meanings can be verbalised others are realised through the realm of sensing, emotions, graphicacy, physicality or interaction. Furthermore, even for adults, verbal descriptions of art experience can be difficult to access. As an artist and art teacher I have experienced the difficulty in accessing logical verbal description when involved in artmaking – even as I consciously try to convey meaning s access words to describe the processes to others. Even then so much is still experienced but not shareable, and much of my description is accompanied by gestures that rely on the student’s active observation of the art making to make sense. So to expect children’s experience of art to be primarily through verbal descriptions or narrative is likely to be limiting. T accessing lived experience. With this in mind my journey took me next to explore phenomenology. Phenomenology Narrative inquiry might be positioned alongside phenomenological research as they both aim to grasp and convey the meaning of experience. Phenomenology ‘does not offer us the possibility of effective theory with which we can explain and/or control the world, but rather it offers us the possibility of plausible insights that brings us in more direct contact with the world’ (van Manen 1990 p.9). Max u our everyday experiences, but difficult to come to a reflective determination of what that experience is. For example when seeing a young girl at school engaged in drawing a thank-you card we assign a basic understanding – a girl is drawing. But we also have notions of the girl as pupil, or the girl as child art-maker, and we have notions of the possible associated expectations placed on that pupil to generate the card. We may also have notions of what a six-year-old child might draw, and of the card as an e 341 2006 POSTGRADUATE CONFERENCE young school girl drawing a thank-you card, or what it means to be a young child drawing at school? These more difficult notions are the ones that my phenomenological reflection aims to focus on. henomenological themes dy – our confident stance or awkward self-awareness. Young children ngage daily in physically and cognitively challenging activities, including art-making, and their bodies wing up to be a ‘big school girl or school boy’ is an issue for young Lived time is the subjective, rather than measured, understanding of time (van Manen 1990). We have temporal ways of regarding our lives – time of childhood, time of responsibility, looking ahead to the future. Lived time is about our history and memories, about our present, and about our future hopes. Young children participating in this research will experience times of transition – from home, to preschool, to school. They will As phenomenology sets out to make sense of certain aspects of human experience, it draws attention to that which is often taken-for-granted or obscured in everyday life. Van Manen (1990) suggests that through analysis of a phenomenon we can explore the structures of that experience and in doing so generate phenomenological themes. Four themes that van Manen (1990 p.101) suggests may prove useful in guiding reflections on phenomena are lived space, lived body, lived time and lived human relation. P Space is usually seen as the physical space one occupies, while lived space is felt space (van Manen 1990). We do not usually reflect on felt space, but rather it is largely pre-verbal. For example home may be a special, safe, place, or reading a magazine requires one space, while reading a scholarly article requires another. In researching young children’s art experiences I will acknowledge and try to make sense of their felt and physical spaces. These spaces will have their own attached meanings – such as home, pre-school and school, or spaces generated by children for specific situations. For example seven-year-old Jonah told me about his ‘killing drawings’ of war, shooting and violence. As this topic was unsanctioned at school or home, he drew them with friends in secret – he had taken his drawings underground (Richards 2003b p.107), creating secret spaces that became his lived space for drawings these pictures. Lived body, or bodily presence, reveals and conceals something of ourselves to others. The gaze of others can influence our own sense of bo e respond with ease or difficulty. Gro children and onlookers see children’s bodies that are tall, short, lean, chubby, clumsy or coordinated. Children also hold gendered images of themselves that can influence their choice of clothing, behaviour and activity (Blaise 2005a, 2005b). Young children can be keenly aware of bodily presence and this can be an important aspect of their lived experiences of art-making. For example eight-year-old Andrew associated his lived body experience with his drawing ability. Andrew commented on how often ‘not-nice’ things are said about his drawing: ‘Yeah about three times a day – like Adam and Nicholas and Eric [say not-nice things]. Sometimes they make fun of me when I fall over, they sometimes laugh. They go [Andrew makes a snort/snigger noise]’ (Richards 2003b p.99). 342 UNIVERSITY OF NEW ENGLAND have a sense of what has been and what is to come. There will be expectations for drawing and for school ived human relation refers to interpersonal relationships with others and also intrapersonal experience of lations are likely to involve peers, teachers, siblings, parents, community members and researcher. ake, the ce art and ust part ways with Max van Manen’s approach as he insists that all experience can be spoken of as some eat all experience textually is to be forgetful of the metaphoric origins of one’s methodology’ (p.39) he does drawings and constructions – to be forgetful of these, at the expense of capturing f the lived experience. By honouring young children’s lived experience of ren’s art-making – the visual. Therefore, y making and analysing broad bservations. In this road sense the research journey from drawing self-efficacy to lived experience of art is ethnographic in k (2001) regards ethnography as a ition to language based approaches, I can draw upon my experience. For example four-year-old Mike believed that he would find it easy to draw once he turned five and went to school (Richards 2003b p.75). L ourselves-as-other (van Manen 1990). In my research on young children’s art experience interpersonal re Intrapersonal experience of self-as-other could include self as son/daughter, self as preschool girl/boy, self as chool pupil, self as friend or sibling and self as researcher. The social context in which children art-ms vicarious experience of seeing others art-make, verbal feedback, emotional responses all influen drawing self-efficacy (Richards 2003b). These are important interpersonal and intrapersonal facets of the lived experience of art-making. These phenomenological themes of lived relations, body, space and time, sit well with sociocultural-historical perspectives and seem promising in investigating aspects of young children’s art experiences. However, I m kind of text, and ‘human science meaning can only be communicated textually – by way of organised narrative or prose’ (1990 p.78). While van Manen points out that to ‘reduce the whole world to text and to tr not consider possibilities other than text to represent or analyse experience. Young children’s art experiences are soaked through with actual images and structures, with physical ovement and action, withm the spoken word, is also to ignore the basic phenomenological concern with both the ontic (concreteness) nd the ontological (the essential) oa art through only text would erase a core experience of young child while considering narrative inquiry and phenomenology as research tools, my journey to find research methods that make young children's lived art experiences visible lead me to consider visual ethnography. Visual Ethnography Burns (1996) outlined the enthnographic research cycle as one that started b descriptive observations, narrowing to more focused observations, and then selective o b nature. While traditional ethnographic methods have been seen as collecting data generated by the searcher’s active extended participation in people’s daily lives, Pinre process of creating and representing knowledge, about society, culture and individuals, based on the thnographer’s own experiences. As such, in adde 343 2006 POSTGRADUATE CONFERENCE own propensity to engage in visual ways of knowing, and seek ways for young children to share both verbal and visual ways of knowing. Furthermore, just as I may be regarded as a visual ethnographer who creates ecome involved in the children’s everyday lives, they too become part hildren’s art experiences are likely to generate many visual images and artifacts, and the ethnographic ctive reality. As the participants in my research will be four- to five-years-old, rch experiences. rs and learners I will introduce the hildren can review their images and explore ways to modify them in subsequent photographs. I propose nderstanding how I, the children, parents, extended family, preschool/school staff and local communities e children feel comfortable with their camera’s use and purpose their photographic images can provide the asis for child-initiated discussion. Thus digital images both record data and provide a medium ‘through which new knowledge and critiques may be created’ (Pink 2001 p.11). In this respect visual ethnography can be said to be both objective and subjective. The nature or importance of photographic or artistic images in this research cannot be predetermined, but will evolve out of the research process. Pink (2001 p.19) reminds us that: Any experience, action, artifact, image or idea is never definitely just one thing but may be redefined differently in different situations, by different individuals and in terms of different discourses. It is impossible to measure the ‘ethnographicness’ of an image in terms of its form, content or potential as an observational document, visual record or piece of ‘data', Instead, the and represents knowledge, so too will the child participants be visual ethnographers who create and represent knowledge. Likewise, as I b of my everyday life. C knowledge about these and the children’s experiences will develop through conversation and negotiation, rather than existing as an obje strictly text and language based research methods are liable to limit their ways of communicating experience. Therefore I propose giving each child their own digital camera to record activities, images and events. I will also use the same model camera as part of my own observations and resea Subscribing to the view that young children are capable problem solve children to the basic functions of the cameras and encourage then to explore the use and possibilities of the camera and the digital images generated. The instant visual feedback that digital cameras allow means that c using Kodak EasyShare C533 cameras which are simple to operate and have a 40mm x 30mm review creen. As the children and I will be using the same model camera we will engage in parallel and shared s learning experiences of camera functions and possibilities. Reporting on this aspect of my research in future publications will provide useful insights for subsequent research and visual ethnographic approaches with young children U identify with and use digital cameras in day to day living will also help support collaborative partnerships. As th b 344 UNIVERSITY OF NEW ENGLAND ‘ethnographicness’ of any image or representation is contingent on how it is situated, interpreted and used to invoke meaning and knowledge that are of ethnographic interest. The ethnographic value of images and artefacts will not rely entirely on my research goals or the context in in the broadest sense images are ethnographic when the iewers judge it as such. For example, a photograph of a child’s 5th birthday party at a New Zealand early hildhood kindergarten may appear to be just that – a child’s party. However for the child and parents this is ignificant event, as for many children this marks their last day at kindergarten, and a transition to heighten their consciousness of art experiences. ill allow the children to create narratives with and around photographs. Furthermore, Pink w the inform e images as vessels in which to invest meanings and through which to produ d emotions’ (2001 p.68). s associated with using and discussing children’s visual images will be the issue of re- presenting such understanding. Traditional ethnographic, phenomenological and visual ethnographic rpose of analysis is not to translate visual evide owing space sense of links media represent different types of nowledge that may be understood in relation to one another’ (2001 p.96). ain informants but parents, pre-school and school staff, and even which they are obtained. Pink points out that v c likely to be a s to school. Accordingly, the same photograph can have multiple meanings, depending on who is looking, where and when. Thus conversations around photographs, between the children and me, can ‘create a “bridge” between their different experiences of reality’ (Pink 2001 p.69) and my own. Essentially the photographs provide opportunity for collaboration and co-construction as we determine each other’s view – views that may change over time and experience. The very process of children taking photographs is likely The images produced w reminds us of the ‘power’ of photographs and advises ethnographers to be ‘interested in ho ants use the content of th ce and represent their knowledge, self-identities, experiences an Alongside challenge research still privileges text based analysis of visual data over all other forms. However, Pink (2001) outlines a different approach, beginning with the premise that the pu nce into verbal knowledge, but to explore the relationship between visual and other knowledge, all for visual images in ethnographic representation. Analytical processes should include making between various research materials and processes as ‘different k Viewing photographs and video with the children can help me to work out appropriate representations of the participants, their culture, history and experiences, and bring this knowledge to the editing process. In my research the young children will be the m school boards, may see different representations of young children’s art experiences as appropriate. Thus ethical considerations are interwoven in the collaborative process of visual ethnography. 345 2006 POSTGRADUATE CONFERENCE Ethical Considerations Although Pink (2001) suggests that ethical issues cannot be concluded until the researcher is in the field, ional stances on anonymity, onsideration must be given to the content and context of research. Ethical considerations and research behaviour is not a pre-defined entity but it must be negotiated at the intersection of personal ethics (the researcher’s and participants’ personal knowledge, experiences, and beliefs), local ethics (such as family homes, pre-school, schools) and the more generalised ethics of the university in which the research resides. Working in an ethical way is a dynamic push and pull of all these influences. Basic to any ethical approval, I believe, must be the researcher’s conviction that what they are undertaking is worthwhile and likely to benefit the participants and the larger group (e.g. parents, early childhood teachers and young children). Therefore the researcher and universities must be prepared to er and re-pencil the edges of traditionally accepted arch practices in pursuit of their goal. At researcher should never lose sight of it is to be intensely involved in the lives of others and the impact their research behaviour may y research investigates young children’s art experience in their home, early childhood and school settings. ctives. In particular visual ethno d co- const core, promo generation and analysis. Challenges ahead includ families, and education workers cross the various contexts and times; the management of multimodal forms of data and analysis, and the research with young children often requires more rigorous ethical approval processes than research involving just adults. This reflects societal views on protection of the young, and recognises the inherent power relationship between adults and children. However, Pink suggests that notions of protection are overly paternalistic and that by adapting collaborative approaches to data collection, such as I am proposing, children become empowered and ethical problems can be minimised. While research with young children involving visual ethnography challenges tradit c ase the same time the ‘ethical’ rese the privilege have on subsequent research. Concluding Statement M Interwoven threads of narrative inquiry, phenomenology and visual ethnography offer innovative ways to work collaboratively with young children, and sits well with sociocultural-historical perspe graphy, and the use of photographs, provides the opportunity for genuine collaboration an ruction with young children, across time and place. Collaborative approaches, at their very te ethical research practices as an integral part of data e developing collaborative relationships with young children, their a honouring of children’s visual narrative of art experience within the confines of PhD submission process. 346 UNIVERSITY OF NEW ENGLAND REFERENCES Anning, A. & Ring, K. 2004, Making Sense of Children’s Drawings, Open University Press, erkshire, England. 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