The [Re]Construction of a Learner Self: A Phenomenological Study with Youth and Young Adults Postinvolvement in Criminal Behaviour

Abstract

This phenomenological research study had as its focus the concept of „self as learner‟ as an internal, complex process of self-discovery within human experience. It sought to illuminate, firstly, the meanings youth and young adults who had engaged in criminal behaviour and been unsuccessful in the K – 12 system had drawn from being part of the schooling experience and their perception of „self as a learner‟; and secondly, the meanings they had drawn from their current experiences of being learners after involvement in the development of a portfolio that represented in a concrete way their own personal knowledge, skills and attitudes. Transformative learning (Meziow, 1991) and the transtheoretical model of change (Prochaska, 2008) were complementary theoretical frameworks used to guide the study development. Congruent with the conception of how learning facilitates transformative change and the stages individuals go through within a change process as presented by the theories, each of the study participants had been faced with a disorienting dilemma surrounding an at risk lifestyle. Each demonstrated an openness to personal change by voluntary involvement in a community agency program utilizing the portfolio learning process involving self-evaluation, introspection, analysis, and synthesis concurrently with life skills programming. Through the reflective process that is part of the portfolio learning process, the participants [re]constructed their sense of themselves as learners through their personal meaning-making of their formal schooling experience and the evidence of their informal learning, in ways that support their positive engagement in ongoing learning. Five major distinctions in thematic content meanings emerged from the descriptions offered by the participants related to what it was like for them as a learner: 1. The school environment had a critical role in encouraging either success or failure. 2. The curricula, in its focus and scope, had a critical role in either maintaining exclusion through contextual disadvantage or facilitating social bonding and inclusion. 3. The personal relationships teachers either developed or avoided had a critical role in facilitating or derailing engagement with learning. 4. The substitution of peer influence for parental guidance and support had a critical role in introducing substance use and delinquent behaviours. 5. Emotion played a critical role in determining the extent to which factors either suppressed or encouraged the learner in learning. In addition, three fundamental findings concerning the broader context in which the lived experiences of the study participants emerged were identified as being congruent with the themes established in the literature review: (a) the role of systemic disadvantage in precluding learning of how society works; (b) the role of racism and prejudice in sustaining a perception of fear of youth who are perceived to not belong, even though those youth may themselves fear not belonging; (c) the role of learning environments that provide contextual and academic learning in lessening the effects of individual blame for lack of success as a learner.