The promotion of creative culture in the higher education classroom holds the potential to prepare students for their contemporary roles in an increasingly diverse and demanding modern world. A premise of this work is that education should strive to encourage creativity with process-oriented curricula that actively engage students in (a) tasks that are collaborative and novel, (b) the interpretation of new and meaningful experiences, and (c) the synthesis and critical evaluation of ideas at individual, collective, and global levels. This dissertation study identifies aspects of pedagogical design and teaching practice that enable the building of students’ creative capacities. These enhanced capacities, in turn, can lead to transformative experiences that inspire and shape participants’ personal and professional lives. I adopted a dual role as researcher and student to conduct an exploratory study in the context of a PhD level Education course, Contemporary Curriculum Theory. Findings from this exploratory study informed a multiple-case study that involved the observation of two graduate level courses, Professionals in Rural Practice and The Lived Experience of Disability, which together form the unit of analysis for the study. Data sources included: (a) a Learning Activities Survey, modified from King’s (2009) original work; (b) a Creativity Checklist, modified from Munro’s (n.d.) instrument; (c) field observations and field notes; and (d) individual interviews with students and instructors from each course. Data were analyzed by three creative drivers that enabled transformation: (a) multiple ways of knowing, (b) adult conversation, and (c) the storied self. Through this examination of university-level courses of varied disciplines, this research study addresses creativity as a catalyst for transforming the ways in which teachers and students experience knowledge-making in post-secondary education. / Thesis (Ph.D, Education) -- Queen's University, 2013-12-05 12:37:25.474

This thesis employs phenomenological hermeneutic circle analysis, to investigate structure versus agency and adult identity change in lifelong learning. Achieving transformed agency and enhanced identity is argued to be about other ways of doing and other ways of seeing (Mezirow 2000:21). It proceeds by exploring if curricula employed in education can provide structure and/or the catalyst which allows ‘other’ to be revealed, agency to be regained, and to explicate what contribution curricula might make in transforming adult identities. Drawing upon the disciplines of sociology and psychology it provides holistic interpretations of participant accounts in the contemporary competitive world and explores the interstices in the duality of tensions between the utilitarian, and pragmatic adult, who employs education as a developmental pathway of choice. Interviews with six participants tell individual stories to provide holistic data of their erudition and experiences of cognitive and social change. Data are then employed to essentialise similarities, differences, themes, and congruent essences, and to distil factors which exemplify growth in understanding and expectations of the self. Growth in self-assurance and identity change capability is then contrasted with the fragility of adult identity; whereupon, this thesis critically positions fragility causation amongst the instrumental policies and forces of lifelong learning. Mezirow contends that agency is achieved by elaborating existing frames, learning new frames, transforming habits, and transforming points of view. This thesis moves to discuss the connected nature of these developmental factors and ‘glass ceilings’, and how immanent personal potential is (re) revealed to the adult self. Employing an archaeological hermeneutic research tool which suggests reflection is a central and developing feature in adult’s educational development the thesis finally contends that education is important in the personal delivery of agency over structure, and that curricula of any structurally legitimate form make a significant contribution to allowing persons to both flourish and confront a range of ‘other’ life circumstances and dilemmas.

This thesis is an exploratory case study that investigates the epistemological beliefs of students’ on a Foundation degree in Teaching and learning, and the possible influence of these beliefs on their learning. Critical realism provides the theoretical context for this case study through a multi-phase approach. This study explores the students’ beliefs of knowledge, knowing and learning through the employment of questionnaires and in-depth interviews which reveals the stories and experiences of five of the students. The research data suggests there is an apparent relationship between personal epistemological beliefs and the engagement with learning in higher education for these students. Moreover it emerged that there were personal transformations in their attitudes and beliefs towards knowledge, knowing and learning that had a profound impact on their self-belief. The changes can be attributed, in part, to the students’ capacity for change-readiness and openness to learning mediated by the situated and contextualised nature of the learning environment. Findings from this case study are not generalisable due to its specificity to one particular setting and small number of participants. However, a conceptual model of the relationship between students’ epistemological beliefs and transformation is offered exposing the complexity of social phenomena in real-life settings. The findings are discussed within the context of previous research. As part of my own learning, and in harmony with the theme of learning and change of the participants, I have also explored my learning changes as a result of engaging in my doctoral studies.

Thesis advisor: Jane E. Regan / How does one teach Scripture in a way that leads to transformation? To answer that question, this study limits the matter to the Psalter and asks how the Psalms teach and transform in order to capitalize on the dynamics inherent in them. The Psalms here are treated not merely as documents to be studied but as texts to be enfleshed in practice. Utilizing the constructivist framework of transformative learning pioneered by Jack Mezirow, “thickening” that with Robert Kegan’s constructivist-developmentalist subject-object theory, and letting those interface with Walter Brueggemann’s categorization of the Psalter into Psalms of orientation, disorientation, and new orientation, I present the Psalms as holding environments which support and challenge us through transformations throughout our lives. After this, I focus on the extra-rational facets of embodiment, emotions, images, and encounter in the Psalms which enable them to accompany us as we widen our perspectives and paradigms. If we follow the dynamics of the Psalms, what theology, anthropology, and ethics arise? I provide glimpses of answers that can be prophetic in our postmodern culture, and I then suggest ways of practicing the Psalms which take advantage of their transformative elements. To conclude, I return to the broader question with which I began and propose a way of teaching Scripture that is inspired by the importance of the body, emotions, images, and encounter – aspects which are also active in Ignatian contemplation.

The purpose of this research paper is to explore and examine the nature of learning within the context of and situated within a social movement. Based on an exploratory qualitative study of learning within the Jyoti Jivanam Movement of South Africa, this research explores the nature and purpose/s of learning within a social movement. Accordingly, this study is guided by the research questions: How and why do adults learn as they collectively participate in social movements; and what factors facilitate, contribute, hinder and influence learning within social movement? This study confirms that social movements are important sites for collective learning and knowledge construction. For this reason, social movements need to be acknowledged as pedagogical sites that afford adults worthwhile learning opportunities. Furthermore, social movements, as pedagogical sites, not only contribute to conceptions of what constitute legitimate knowledge(s), social movements also contribute to the creation of transformative knowledge(s). / Magister Educationis (Adult Learning and Global Change) - MEd(AL)

This case study finds two modes in adults transformative learning experience. These modes create different openings for learning and conditions to be facilitated. A group of 23 adultlearners and the environment from a University course on organizational counseling, coaching and leadership provided its research site. Data from subjective, collective and interactive spaces in the course illuminate what conditions facilitate transformative learning processes. Field observations, interviews and documents from all parts of the course were analyzed using the computer software Nvivo. Conditions for transformative processes are found in the learner-experience relationships, the premises of a comfort zone, teacher-student and group constellations and are discussed in relation to considerations for their development. Commonalities are found in how to facilitate two phases of a learning experience in these conditions: Passive modes of learning can be facilitated by helping an individuals or groups extract meaning and express these meanings from his/their experience. Being exposed to the meaning environments of others can also have facilitating effects. Active modes of learning can be facilitated by helping an individual or group keep his/their attention directed towards the processes he/they are involved in. Holding attention directed over time towards the process and seeing the processes through a variety of different lenses and frames of thought helps integrate the learning and sustain its impact.

This heuristic inquiry outlines the chronology of my own theory-building, developing awareness and understanding of my educational development practice; I define my practice as learning&assessment-focused educational development. The inquiry maps the ways in which my early doctoral work shaped both my thinking and my practice as an educational developer eventually leading me to undertake a collaborative empirical study with the post-secondary teachers with whom I work. The purpose of the qualitative study we undertook together was to better understand how learning&assessment-focused educational development might facilitate transformative professional learning. Sixteen college and university faculty members with whom I had engaged in learning&assessment-focused educational development, and who were familiar with the ICE (Ideas, Connections and Extensions) model of learning and assessment (Wilson, 1996; Fostaty Young & Wilson, 2000), collaborated with me as part of my heuristic inquiry. The study of our lived experience of learning&assessment-focused educational development became the next logical step of the investigation of practice that I had already begun to question and to write about. Together we set out to identify and name the instructional content, processes, approaches and relationships that supported significant professional learning. Findings indicated that the adoption of a framework, preferably one that is congruent with teachers’ emerging conceptions of teaching and learning, helps post-secondary teachers’ organize their thinking about learning and enables improved communication about their expectations for students’ learning. The collaboration led to the identification of six essential characteristic features of learning&assessment-focused educational development. Overall, this research contributes to the evidence-based literature on effective educational development practice and to the discussion on the scholarship of educational development research and on the scholarship of teaching in general. / Thesis (Ph.D, Education) -- Queen's University, 2012-04-25 00:00:54.215

The Himalayan region of India has a surprisingly fragile ecosystem due in part to its geomorphic characteristics. In recent years the Himalayan ecosystem has been disturbed in various ways by both human and natural processes. Large developments threaten ecosystems in the area modifying local land use and subsistence patterns. This has important implications for the sustainable livelihoods of the local communities. People in these areas are very concerned about the lack of inclusion in development decision-making processes and the negative effects of development on their livelihood. Protest actions are spreading throughout Himachal Pradesh, not only to stop developments but also to re-shape how developments are taking place. The village of Jagatsukh was selected for in-depth study. That is where people started to organize around the Allain Duhangan Hydro Project and also where the protest actions in relation to the Hydro Project actually started. The overall purpose of this research was to understand the role of protests as a vehicle for public participation in relation to decisions about resources and the environment and to consider whether such movements are learning platforms for action on sustainability.

The Himalayan region of India has a surprisingly fragile ecosystem due in part to its geomorphic characteristics. In recent years the Himalayan ecosystem has been disturbed in various ways by both human and natural processes. Large developments threaten ecosystems in the area modifying local land use and subsistence patterns. This has important implications for the sustainable livelihoods of the local communities. People in these areas are very concerned about the lack of inclusion in development decision-making processes and the negative effects of development on their livelihood. Protest actions are spreading throughout Himachal Pradesh, not only to stop developments but also to re-shape how developments are taking place. The village of Jagatsukh was selected for in-depth study. That is where people started to organize around the Allain Duhangan Hydro Project and also where the protest actions in relation to the Hydro Project actually started. The overall purpose of this research was to understand the role of protests as a vehicle for public participation in relation to decisions about resources and the environment and to consider whether such movements are learning platforms for action on sustainability.

This research applied Mezirow’s transformative learning theory to theological education, in particular in situations where theological education is concerned with the purpose of formation. A field study among minority Christian women attending a Bible school in Pakistan found that the transformative pedagogy contributed to the formational aspects of the theological education programme and helped to integrate the fragmented curriculum, and the separation of theology and spirituality. Students’ epistemological, theological, and personal assumptions were identified at the beginning of the course and changes in these assumptions tracked over the year of study. Five areas of formation, namely relationship with God, thinking theologically, communicating the gospel, relationships with others, and self-understanding, were identified as a way of assessing how changes in assumptions impacted on formational change. Transformation occurred over the range of assumptions and areas of formation. Students’ assumption change was found to be idiosyncratic, responding to the transformative environment created by the teachers, according to particular developmental and formational needs students had. Fostering reflective ability, and the inclusion of reflection activities, as well as mentoring, contributed to students’ formation in the use of transformative learning pedagogy. Transformative learning proved effective even among students with less developed cognitive ability. The South Asian earthquake of 2005 was a significant trigger event which impacted on student formation in developing care and concern, understanding ministry, theodicy, and in developing epistemological complexity. Implications for further research on the use of transformative learning in different theological education settings, and to compare changes over a longer term are also considered.