Greetings

　This website is designed to report on the progress and results of collaborative research project activities aimed at developing the “Power of Diversity”. Initially during this research project, the concept of "diversity" was applied specifically when discussing children who were linguistically and/or culturally diverse. Now, it is used as a concept that embraces all possible types of human difference and now includes children with physical disabilities. Education (pedagogy) is always based on “teaching something”. So there is a pedagogical tendency to try to advance towards one value. However, each person’s learning process is different, and each person’s growth is achieved through his or her unique learning process. Also, learning is not just a passive process of following a set of instructions. Ordinary school instruction generally provides resources for support learning, but it is well known that this method of instruction tends to suppress learning. In this collaborative research project, in order to design a learning environment that considers the diversity, we are proceeding conceptual reconsideration of learning and teaching. At the same time, we are actually developing a learning programs that emphasize the diversity.

　The first period of our project
（https://sites.google.com/site/podiversity/home）is already over, and we are currently in the second stage. Our focus in this stage is research on learning activities mediated by performance arts. Learning activities here are not limited to the acquisition of subject knowledge at school, but rather refer to all activities that promote people’s self-development and encourage them to learn and change. Knowledge acquisition is inextricably linked to the building of social relationships and the negotiation of the task of establishing our own identities. We believe that activities that enable integrated learning on all three fronts will promote well-rounded development. In collaboration with socially inclusive learning practice groups, we are conducting research on learning activities mediated by the performance arts. These include a place for children with overseas roots to learn, a place for lifelong learning by citizens, and a place for the development of children with disabilities.

　The reason we are making our progress and results public on our website is to contribute these research results for the use of society as a whole and to enable critical examination by many stakeholders. Perhaps there are many education practitioners and education researchers who have similar ideas. We would like to examine together with you what might be necessary for the collaboration of many people in a calm and collegial manner, and to make the diversity of people a source of enrichment of ourselves and society as a whole. We are also actively engaging in outreach activities in collaboration with other people in fields related to the development of study- support programs mediated by the performance arts. If you are interested in this research, please feel free to contact us, ether you as an individual or as a participant in a practicing organization.

Hiroaki Ishiguro (Rikkyo University) on behalf of the research group, on September 7, 2017

Present: Research on learning activities mediated by the performance arts by children having diverse languages and cultures (Basic Research Program, Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B) 17H02710)

This page has been translated by translation specialists. The nuances may differ from the original Japanese.