Joyful Literacies and Humanizing Research in a School-based Summer Camp
Location
Walsh A
Proposal Track
Research Project
Session Format
Presentation
Abstract
This paper explores how the authors applied Paris’ (2011) concept of humanizing research in a school-based summer camp with middle schoolers. In this camp, the authors applied a multimodal literacy curriculum to explore the youth’s vision of their ideal community through YPAR. Given the fact that most youth in the camp came from underserved communities and had negative literacy experiences, our main goals were: (1) to build relationships of dignity and care where youth would trust us as adults that respected them; and (2) to provide the youth with joyful literacy experiences that were playful and connected with their real-life experiences, constructing a solid base onto which they could build positive literacies in the future. A key strategy to achieve these goals was the use of arts and performance-based research and learning methodologies that unschooled literacy. We will discuss how these research and learning methodologies contributed to humanizing research, and the limitations (such as the lack of sufficient time, and the contradictions of unschooling within a school environment) and the affordances (such as the use of the arts and performance) of the camp and how they contributed to humanizing research and to providing joyful literacy experiences to participating youth.
Keywords
humanizing research, youth participatory action research, creative research methodologies, literacy, unschooling
Recommended Citation
Jaumot-Pascual, Nuria and Coda, James Edward, "Joyful Literacies and Humanizing Research in a School-based Summer Camp" (2016). Georgia Educational Research Association Conference. 13.
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/gera/2016/2016/13
Joyful Literacies and Humanizing Research in a School-based Summer Camp
Walsh A
This paper explores how the authors applied Paris’ (2011) concept of humanizing research in a school-based summer camp with middle schoolers. In this camp, the authors applied a multimodal literacy curriculum to explore the youth’s vision of their ideal community through YPAR. Given the fact that most youth in the camp came from underserved communities and had negative literacy experiences, our main goals were: (1) to build relationships of dignity and care where youth would trust us as adults that respected them; and (2) to provide the youth with joyful literacy experiences that were playful and connected with their real-life experiences, constructing a solid base onto which they could build positive literacies in the future. A key strategy to achieve these goals was the use of arts and performance-based research and learning methodologies that unschooled literacy. We will discuss how these research and learning methodologies contributed to humanizing research, and the limitations (such as the lack of sufficient time, and the contradictions of unschooling within a school environment) and the affordances (such as the use of the arts and performance) of the camp and how they contributed to humanizing research and to providing joyful literacy experiences to participating youth.
