The False Paths, the Endless Labors, the Turns Now This Way and Now That: Participatory Action Research, Mutual Vulnerability, and the Politics of Inquiry

Participatory Action Research (PAR) and its many variants are rapidly gaining prominence as viable research tools and methodological alternatives to address histories of exploitation, surveillance, and social exclusion, deeply embedded in mainstream research. However, it is at this transgressive intersection of theory, action, expertise, power, and justice that a host of new challenges to the conduct of research in collaboration with and not just on, or for subordinated people, emerges. This article attempts to intimately describe the challenges of using PAR methods to revise Paulo Freire’s notion of critical consciousness in the context of a parent organizing group and a youth research project, while taking seriously the speed bumps, multiple subjectivities, implicit racism, sexism, classism, and politics of knowledge production that are too often obscured behind published academic writing.

The biomechanics of situational baseball: execution and perception of left-handed pitchers' simulated pick-off moves to first base

The aim of this study was to provide an in-depth analysis of the pick-off play in baseball. Ten collegiate left-handed pitchers and nine base-runners participated in this study. The pitchers were videotaped with four cameras to derive three-dimensional data while performing deliveries in the directions of first base and home plate in a laboratory setting. Deliveries were performed from flat ground. Differences between these deliveries were measured through ten selected joint and segment angles. The base-runners completed two distinct procedures in which they viewed video footage of left-handed pitchers and estimated the intended delivery direction. Base-runners were subsequently interviewed to determine the reasoning behind their decisions. The pitchers' data revealed differences between delivery types in nearly all of the selected angles (P < 0.01). The base-runners' data demonstrated that their ability to discriminate delivery types improved when allowed more viewing time per trial (P < 0.01). Additionally, commonalities exist among the base-runners' focal points on the pitcher while making decisions regarding delivery direction and the kinematic differences between deliveries in left-handed pitchers. The practical significance of these results, however, may be more difficult to interpret.     

Games for boys: a qualitative study of experiences with commercial off the shelf gaming

Boys are less likely to receive praise and recognition for good schoolwork, to consider school important, and have fewer opportunities to do the things that they do best (Lopez and Calderon in How America’s boys become psychological dropouts. The gallup blog, 2013). Traditional school cultures have come in conflict with the normal and natural ways that boys behave. As a result, boys have had alienating experiences and high levels of disengagement and lowered academic success in school due to rejection of boy culture, which includes aggressive play, competition, and violent fantasy. The purpose of this study was to explore ways in which we can re-engage boys and enhance their learning opportunities in traditional classroom settings. Boys are drawn to video games, which offer a unique environment where they can engage in learning activities. By taking seriously the indigenous knowledge of this portion of boy culture, we may identify ways in which their expertise can become useful towards common learning goals (Carr-Chellman 2007; Carr-Chellman and Savoy 2004). The current analysis represents the first of a multiphase study that uses an interpretive lens within a CHAT framework to identify relevant learning in Commercial of the Shelf (COTS) games. This phenomenological design identifies learning accounts that map to the United States Common Core State Standards. Our findings suggest that engaged learning can occur for these boys as a result of playing games. COTS games engage boys in normal and natural ways, and consequently can be relevant learning tools that educators, researchers and instructional designers might employ toward traditional learning objectives.     

Oral and written references to new and given information by 9- and 11-year-olds and adults

Monolingual, native French-speaking subjects (9- and 11-year-old children and adults) were requested either to talk or write about nine triplets of pictures whose components varied along the pragmatic dimension «new vs. given information». In the first picture in each series, all components were new. In the second and third pictures, one component was replaced each time by a new component, the other components becoming given. The oral execution of the task made the experimenter (the addressee) into a co-producer of the situational discourse produced, whereas the written production situation placed a certain distance between the producer and the addressee. The expression of the contrast between old versus new elements to be described in each situation was studied by examining the use ofarticles (definite andindefinite) andpronouns. The expression of oldness and newness by means of articles was more common in speaking than in writing. In the oral medium, the given/new contrast was marked more and more often as age increased, although this was not true in the writing situation, where the subjects generally used definite articles, even when referring to a new element. Pronouns were used infrequently orally, particularly by 9-year-olds, to express the increasing «oldness» of the elements. The written use of pronouns was extremely rare. Although it was already present orally in older subjects, the tendency to give autonomy to the production associated with each picture (decreasing use of pronouns in favor of nouns) was predominant in the written medium. Maximum explicitness was favored in writing (due to the deferred reception of the production by the addressee), and the marking of elements as new or given was therefore not given priority. The way in which the written and oral production media modulated the choices of the subjects is discussed.