Students as Enquirers: using photo stories to evidence
Members of the School of Education, Kate Wall, Amy Hanna, Kath McCrorie, Will Quirke, Rebekah Sims, Nova Scott and Jonathan Firth, have been working with Barrhead High School in East Renfrewshire, to support practitioner enquiry with staff and students. On the 9th March this year, the students as enquirers group, including 22 S1 and S2 pupils, visited the university to see what it is like. They had a tour of the sports centre and the library and got to sample some of the many cafes on campus, but they also progressed their research thinking.
The students are developing their own projects around issues that are important to them in school. This includes questions related to primary-secondary transitions, how incidents of bullying are resolved, use of school grounds, homework learning, clubs and wellbeing, and identity. The visit to the university coincided with them thinking about evidence sources to answer their research questions and so as part of the day they trialled photo-stories as an evidence collection technique, but also as a potential method to share their research.
The students were tasked with taking photos throughout their day of things that interested them and reflected their experience. They then had to slim this down to a maximum of 6 (a difficult task for some) and write exactly 50 words to accompany their story. Their photo-story could be narrative or theme based and the content was completely up to them to decide, although they had to consider ethics and make sure that any people in the photos gave permission. Below are the young people’s photo-stories.
Isla, Grace and Lacey
Our day at Strathclyde University. We started in a lecture room, after that we went to the sports centre and the library for a tour. Shortly after we went the sports café for lunch. We all got delicious smoothies. Then we went to the TIC Building. It was great.
Robyn and Grace
We started our day in the lecture hall, where we heard the plan for today. We then journeyed across campus and got some pictures of the landscape on our way to the library. The library was immense. Bookcases stacked full of books. All of this gave us quite an insight into student life.
Freya, Sophie and Amy
Today we were a Strathclyde University and visited a lovely lecture room. On our way to the sports centre we came across lots of nice buildings and scenery. We visited the amazing sports centre and an incredible library. And to end it all off we had such a delicious lunch.
Jack and Alastair
Our day at Strathclyde University. We saw many of the different buildings and facilities, like the sports centre and the library. We saw inside of them. We then got lunch and got chips (Alistair got too much!). Overall, the trip was fun. Thank you for this experience.
Freya, Abby and Hannah
We started off in the lecture room learning about photo stories. We then walked over to Strathclyde Sports Centre to learn about the facilities, we learnt about their slogan which is #WeBleedMaroon We looked around the Strathclyde library. We saw each study. For lunch we had pizza and met Taytay.
Zoë, Allana and Amy
Our day at Strathclyde University was very enjoyable and a unique experience. We saw and experienced lot of different parts of the university. The sports centre had lots of different facilitates and amazing opportunities. The library was filled with incredible books. After lunch we saw art work on the walls.
Cailin, Lana and Leigh
We discussed the schedule of the day and some methods on how our question could be answered. Took some pictures of the library and sports centre. Jack posed with the sports centre motto. Lovely scenic picture through a window. Nice picture of the gym from the library. Munched delicious muffins.
Elizabeth, Marysia and Brooke
Today we went to Strathclyde University. We started off in a lecture room, then we went all over the sports centre. It was so cool! Next we looked at all the books in the library. Finally, we had lunch on campus. There are at least 10 places to eat. Amazing day.
(This group had technology knowledge the university team could only dream of and they generated a film of their photo-story and words.)
Since the university visit day the students have continued to work on their research projects meeting regularly with the university team. Projects include targeting the school campus, issues around bullying, transitions to secondary school, identity, homework and after school clubs. The aim is that the students will be ready to share their outcomes by the end of the school year.