Several years ago, we three were standing in the hallway near our offices at St. John’s University, conversing about our lives as academics and parents. As we delved into the challenges of balancing household responsibilities, carpooling, grading, and coding data, we continued to loop back to what we noticed about our middle school children and what they were doing. What circulated was a genuine interest in our children’s literacies and we soon realized that we were speaking about and for our children, and that did not seem authentic. We wondered what our middle schoolers would say about their own practices. It was then that the idea of child-parent research emerged.
We each went home and spoke openly with our teen about what transpired at work that day. Our adolescent children—Charlotte Abrams, Molly Kurpis, and Eric Ness1—were intrigued and seemed excited to speak about their digital and nondigital activities. Some might wonder if our children were capitulating to appease a parent, but adolescence is complex and often includes push back and dissent. Rather than simply going along with an idea that their parents had, the teens noted that co-researching with us, their parents, was a way to have their voices heard. What they did not realize—and they acknowledge in the final chapter—is that, at the time, they held preconceived notions of school-based research, and they did not know what to expect from a co-researcher partnership. However, they were well aware that they were investigating themselves as part of a research team-based experience (e.g., they would be sharing their ideas and co-creating with others around their age and their parents’ age). Charlotte, Molly, and Eric have provided their own thoughts—unfiltered, authentic, and un-“adult”erated (e.g., their words in this book are without parental influence or editing)—regarding the process and explain how it is that research unfolded for them and, as a result, the increased awareness of self and others they developed.
Although we could write a monograph about our experiences—and perhaps we will in the future—our objective was to bring attention back to child-parent research. What once was the provenance of education research vis-à-vis Dewey (Dyehouse & Manke, 2017) and Piaget (1936/1952), studying one’s child or grandchild has since surfaced sporadically (Bissex, 1980; Dezuanni, 2018; Goodman, 2014; Goodman & Goodman, 2013; Halliday, 1975; Kabuto, 2008; Kabuto & Martens, 2014; Long, 2004; Martens, 1996, 2014; McCarty, 2012; O’Mara & Laidlaw, 2011; Wolf, 1992; Yoon, 2012) with only limited examples of co-research stances (Long & Long, 2014). In general, however, parent-researcher investigations have not gained momentum among education researchers likely due to the important question of ethics; we address this in Chapter 1. In our work with our children over the years, we continued to consider two points of concern also noted anecdotally by other researchers: How can one remain unbiased while working with one’s own child? How might there be unintentional coercion and possible harm (e.g., what are the consequences if the child does not comply?) These are valid questions, but they build upon two problematic claims. First, in research, we know that there is no such thing as a full removal of bias. We can go to great lengths to recognize and mitigate biases, but to have a completely impartial study is impossible because people (e.g., humans who have experiences and belief systems) are examining the behavior, practices, and beliefs of other people. This tension would exist even when one is not familiar with the participant or, in our case, co-researcher. Second, we honor the tenets of ethical research, one of which is beneficence, or do no harm. This is true with participants who are unknown or known people in our lives. Plus, what parent would ever look to hurt his/her child? We certainly are not in the business of hurting others, let alone our own children. What is more, our children are at an age and stage where, if they do not like something or they are uncomfortable, they are open and ready to let us know.
When we work with youth in other studies, we remind them that they can discontinue their involvement at any time and that they do not have to answer any questions if they don’t want to. We upheld this same stance with our teens, and we respected the distance from and proximity to the study they dictated with their words, their body language, and their schedules. Although we develop this point in our introductory chapter, we reiterate salient aspects here because we recognize that the field, while ready to embrace this form of participatory co-research, might have its concerns. We hope that our edited collection offers an opening for (a) education researchers to discuss openly the child-parent research they either want to engage in or are thinking of engaging in, (b) child-researchers to initiate their own lines of inquiry and develop their space in the discussion of education, which, after all, is about them, and (c) the field writ large to envision and re-envision ontological, epistemological, and methodological stances when child-parent research is figured into how we conceptualize meaning making.
Note
In alphabetical order.
References
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Dezuanni, M. (2018). Minecraft and children’s digital making: Implications for media literacy education. Learning, Media and Technology, 43(3), 236–249.
Dyehouse, J., & Manke, K. (2017). The philosopher as parent: John Dewey’s observations of his children’s language development and the development of his thinking about communication. Education and Culture, 33(1), 3–22.
Goodman, Y. M. (2014). Foreword: Learning lessons from our children and grandchildren. In B. Kabuto & P. Martens (Eds.), Linking families, learning, and schooling: Parent-research perspectives (pp. xi–xvi). New York, NY: Routledge.
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