Learning, Teaching, Leading: a Patchwork of Stories from a Non
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AN ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION OF Wilkins-O'RileyZinn for the degree of Doctor of Educationin Education presented on April 5, 2004. Title: Learninq Teachinq Leadinq A Patchwork of Stories froma Non-Traditional Life. Abstract approved: Signature redacted for privacy. ,-- . Betty Duvall This autoethnographic research explores learning,teaching, and leading from the perspective ofan adult woman who is both a non- traditional student and a non-traditional workerin the academy. Because she returned to school at theage of forty to earn a bachelor's degree, and is currently an associate professor ofeducation following more than twenty years of work in the private sector withan additional seven as a high school teacher, she focuses thispersonal exploration on academia, seeking to better understand her place inan evolving educational culture in which she is both insider and outsider, learner andteacher. By providing insight into her learningprocesses and products, she also provides opportunities for readers to reflecton the ways in which they learn as well as to better understand learner diversity. In the process of articulating theways in which she learns and linking them to her passion for teaching,the author began to formulate a theory, Home.Makers of the Academy: TheValuing-and Devaluing-of Teaching, that proposes a connection between thehistorical role of the homemaker in the American family and the academichomesmaking evidenced in caring, connective teaching. This developingtheory is illustrated through pages that alsorepresent her learning processes which she calls connectivity, or the linking of disparatesources to create new meaning. Connectivity is also used by the authorto refer to the intertwining of activities within a life of creative integrationwhere multiple facets of a person's life interconnect rather thancompete. These intersections are discussed as the authorcomes to understandings about her work as an artist and poet and writer and its significancein her roles as learner, teacher, and leader. These understandings gain significance in light of her nascent theorizing which also addressesissues related to the defining of academic scholarship for the twenty-firstcentury. ©Copyright by Wilkins-O'Riley Zinn Defense Date April 5, 2004 All Rights Reserved LearningTeaching Leading A Patchwork of Stories from a Non-Traditional Life by Wilkins-O'Riley Zinn A DISSERTATION submitted to Oregon State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Education Presented April 5, 2004 Commencement June 2004 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I wish to express sincere appreciation to the faculty and staff of the Community College Leadership Program and to the members of Cohort 9, and particularly wish to acknowledge the wit and wisdom of my major professor, Dr. Betty Duvall, who let me "bring the twins," and provided ongoing insight that nurtured further thought and exploration. I am also grateful for the support of other committee members, Dr. Ruth Stiehl, Dr. Charlotte Hadella, Dr. Sara Hopkins-Powell, Dr. Judy Bowker, and Dr. Anne Chambers. It has been several hundred years since Sir Isaac Newton wrote in a letter to Robert Hooke: "If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." I have come to realize that I am surrounded and supported by giants of the spirit and intellect who are my colleagues, my family, and my friends, and I also wish to thank them for their belief in possibilities: my husband, Jim; my sons, Jeremy and Joshua (the best writer I know); my mother, Carol Daye, whom I admire more than she knows; my sisters, Nancy and Sue; my brother, Paul; my aunt, Mildred Albers; my cousins, Charlie, Georgie, and Carol; Petey Young, for endless lattes and listening; Betty LaDuke, whose art is an inspiration; and Pam Parshall, who also thought she'd grow up to be Donna Reed. I am also grateful for my students who continue to teach me what is really important in learning and teaching, and to my colleagues in the Southern Oregon University Department of Education and the Access Center who have supported me in this journey. TABLE OF CONTENTS Page 1 Listening to My Life Introducing the Author 1 2 I'm Talking to You Explaining the Voice 14 3 Inside Out/Outside In Choosing a Methodology: Autoethnography 28 4 The Mother's Tongue Clarifying Expressions and Concepts 38 5 You're a White Woman; You Ain't GotNo Culture Disclosing the Significance of Gender 72 6 The Qulitmaker's Stories Telling the Tales of a Designing Woman 105 7 Home.Makers of the Academy: The Valuing-and Devaluing-ofTeaching Creating Theory in a Learning Life 156 7.1 Riding the Waves: Reviewing the Literature froma Life of Learning.. 178 8 What If We All Thought We Were Poets? Presenting Implications for Learning,Teaching, and Leading. 370 9 Conclusion ln'Finito The Continuing Stories of Autoethnography 406 Bibliography 417 LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page Mental floss symbol, indicating reader reflection points 1 6 No Place True Place, a collection of quotations and images presented as a multigenre collage/montage 27 Connectivity: serendipitous learning through reading 50 Cumulative effect of successive demotivating events. Exit may be literal or figurative 53 Pentangulation: Five source research 63 Ad from FaIl-Winter 1 962-63 McCall's Needlework & Crafts, published during my senior year in high school 78 Reduction of a page from Riding the Waves, a multigenre collage/montage creation which illustrates how I began to develop the theory, Home.Makers of the Academy 113 Reduction of a portion of materials used to create pages for the section of Chapter 7 entitled Riding the Waves 115 Logo created for Quilltz 123 Image from one of my grade school papers 124 Doodles from my grade school papers side by side with patterns from Northern Mesopotamia, c. 3000 B.C. 124 Quotation about home written on a 3x5 card 1 25 Image (log cabin) with quotation inked around it 126 LIST OF FIGURES (continued) Fiqure Paqe 14. Image and quotation with hand-drawnborder 127 1 5. Three blocks that show background inkingin progress 128 Reduction of a corner of Home'Work,a Quilltz about work in and out of the home i 30 Shower thoughts writtenon the inside of a soap box 132 Reductions of iconic outline created inJanuary/February for research proposal 1 36 Unifying visual image for October 2001paper and presentation: Play and Passion: Leadership and the Serious Benefits of Fun i Invitation for Breast Wishes, September 2003,JEGA Gallery, Ashland, OR 146 DEDICATION There is only one person to whom I could possibly dedicate this dissertation, and that is to theman whose invisible work and endless support have helped make this journey possible: my husband, Jim. I have spent more than half ofour thirty years together in school, and his love and uncomplaining support have sustainedme while I've pursued my dreams. Could I have done this without him? Probably. Would I want to have done so? Definitely not. Jim: There are new paths to follow andnew dreams to create, and I look forward to exploring them withyou. "THE LONG SACRIFICE OF WOMEN'S DAYS PASSES WITHOUTA THOUGHT, WITHOUT A WORD." So BEGAN A SCRAPBOOK KEPT BY A MISSOURI WOMANNAMED REBECCA FOARD IN 1 860. MAKING SCRAPBOOKS-A SALVAGE ART NOT UNLIKE MAKING QUILTS-WASTYPICAL OF MANY NINETEENTH CENTURY WOMEN. BuT MRS. FOARD' S SCRAPBOOK, WHICH NOW RESTS IN THE MISSOURI STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY LIBRARY, IS, SO FAR AS ONE KNOWS, THE ONLY REMAINING EVIDENCE OF HER LIFE, AND IT SERVES AS AN ESPECIALLY POIGNANT AND REVEALING DOCUMENT. THE QUOTATION WITH WHICH SHE BEGAN THE SCRAPBOOK SETS THETONE FOR MANY OF HER FUTURE ENTRIES: A POEM ENTITLED, "TIRED WOMEN;" A NEWSPAPER CLIPPING, "WOMEN'S DRUDGERY;" ANOTHER POEM, "ENDURANCE;" AND YET ANOTHERTHAT URGED DAUGHTERS NOT TO LET THEIR MOTHERS SLAVE AND TOIL. Too RETICENT, PERHAPS, TO RECORD LIFE IN HER OWN WORDS, MRS. FOARDSPOKE AT A REMOVE, THROUGH THE WORDS OF OTHERS. YET THE CLIPPINGS MANAGED TO CONVEY A VERY PERSONAL VIEW OF HER LIFE. -ELAINE HEDGES, "THE 19TH CENTURY DIARIST AND HER QUiLTS, Learning 'TeachingLeading A Patchwork ofStories from a Non-TraditionalLife How MUCH PIECIN' A QUILT'S LIKE LIVIN' A LIFE...THE LORD SENDS USTHE PIECES, BUT WE CAN air 'EM OUT AND PUT 'EM TOGETHER PRETTY MUCHTO SUIT OURSELVES, AND THERE'S A HEAP MORE IN THE CUTTIN' OUT AND THE SE WIN'THAN THERE IS IN THE CALIKER. THE SAME SORT 0' THINGSCOMES INTO ALL LIVES, JUST AS THE APOSTLE SAYS, THERE HATH NO TROUBLE TAKEN YOU BUT ISCOMMON TO ALL MEN. - - AUNT .JANE OF KENTUCKY [ELIZABETHCALVERT] (IN BANK, 1 979, 1 995, . 76) Chapter 1 Listening to My Life Introducing the Author THIS IS NOT A PART I AM PLAYING, IT IS NOT A DUlY, ITIS NOT EVEN CALCULATED; IT IS AN INSTINCT AND A NEED...WRITE YOUR OWN HISTORY ALLOF YOU WHO HAVE UNDERSTOOD YOUR LIFE AND SOUNDEDYOUR HEARTS. To THAT END ALONE IAM WRITING MY OWN. -GEORGE SAND, HisTo/RE DE MA VIE THOSE WHO DO NOT HAVE POWER OVER THE STORY THATDOMINATES THEIR LIVES, POWER TO RETELL IT, TO RETHINK IT, DECONSTRUCT IT, JOKE ABOUT IT, ANDCHANGE IT AS TIMES CHANGE, TRULY ARE POWERLESS, BECAUSE THEY CANNOTTHINK NEW THOUGHTS. -SALMAN RUSHDIE WHAT A WRITER ASKS OF HIS READER IS NOT SO MUCH TO LIKEAS TO LISTEN. -HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOWIN A LETTER TO J.S. DWIGHT, DECEMBER 10,1847 There are many voicesin my life, speaking tome from outside and from within. I speak withmany voices as well, telling stories inways I hope will appeal to others,choosing stories I believe they willwant to hear. Yet stories contrived to pleaseare not useful in a manuscript designedto reveal truth about me and about my ways. To produce suchan autoethnographjc document, revelatoryof me and of my culture, Imust 2 first listen carefully and thoughtfullyto my life.