Radical listening and dialogue in educational research

We seek to trouble the construct of radical listening through an
interpretive analysis of our work in a collaborative research project
with primary school teachers. At the heart of this project is a focus on
researching together with the study participants. During two years, we
worked with a group of teachers in a “teacher inquiry group”, which
sought to shed light on the possibilities of using narrative assessment
approaches as an inclusive tool for teaching and learning science. The
original goal of the study was to empower teachers to utilize a variety
of dialogic assessment tools as tools for learning with their students.
Through a guiding focus on radical listening and dialogue, the design
of this overall study shifted and changed over time to fit the needs of
the different stakeholders, and our focus on narrative assessment approaches
also evolved over time. We will use different examples to illustrate
the interactions of the teacher inquiry group, and also draw on
our own work within our research group to complexify what it means
to “listen”, learn from, and “dialogue” with others.