“Give It a Name and It Will Be Yours”: How Opportunities to Reflect on Essential Questions Can Create Space for Learning

Abstract

It started in Singapore. I was ready to present my new research on different perceptions of learning at work to a conference on workplace learning. I had some splendid data. One particular conversation illustrated how two different persons had different understandings of the learning phenomenon. There were three different understandings, in fact. The interviewer, me—a conversation partner, I would say today—had her own version too. I knew it from the very first minutes of the very first conversation with the two participants in the study. I felt it...I felt that, in this particular moment of this particular conversation, the two different notions of learning were constructed by the conversation partners. I felt that these two different notions differed from the one I had arrived at myself Intuitively, I knew exactly what to do with the precious research material. As the deadline for writing a paper approached, however, I experienced serious difficulty in describing the method of analysis. What is the name of the method I am using? A simple question, and one you normally know the answer to before you start the analysis, you would think. For me, it was the beginning of a long methodological hiking tour through the literature on approaches and methods...until a good colleague said to me: 'Give it a name and it will be yours!' A sentence that turned weeks of uncertainty and doubt, looking for one right research method, into productive reflections on being creative with the research material. And into a long line of reflections on research, identity, ways of thinking and ways of writing, communicating and creating. Reflections on being uncertain, always in doubt, always seeking the right way, being afraid of static texts, mirroring one's own work in others', thirsting for feedback from a good colleague.. .these are the themes I have been reflecting on when writing this text. This text itself can be considered as a detour. Months later—while writing this chapter—I would understand why the meeting in Singapore was so important. I would understand how the opportunity to put simple questions to a good colleague created space for reflection—a kind of safe space where everything was allowed and possible. A space where you were allowed to show your doubts without 'losing face' and to share your un-knowings, the space where you find the opportunity to reflect on essential questions and seek the answers. A space where you have a chance to understand things. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved)