The eternal ups and downs of ‘doing’ Storytelling

4 June 2023

We present an exciting engagement with Dr Helen Hanna who has had a most interesting chat about storytelling with Dr Jennifer Agbaire for the Ibali project. Helen is a Lecturer in International Education at the University of Manchester. She is passionate about citizenship education, education rights, and educational inclusion, particularly of migrant learners and those from racial, ethnic and cultural minorities, as well as using creative visual methods. Helen has completed funded research in England, South Africa, Northern Ireland, Israel, Canada, Kenya, Hong Kong and Thailand. She regularly presents at international conferences and has written and peer reviewed for publications including Compare, Children’s Geographies, Literacy and BERA Research Intelligence. She is an Associate Editor of Human Rights Education Reviewand Co-convenor of the International and Comparative Education SIG for BERA. She also acts as an academic writing consultant for British Council Thailand and a women’s employability trainer for the non-profit London Institute of Social Studies

Please give us a broad overview of your work with storytelling, Helen. 

I research migration and education using visual methods (photography, picturebooks and film-making), focusing on South Africa and England. I am really interested in the experiences of migrant children in primary schools, and I believe that we don’t ask them often enough what they really think and how we can make things better for them. And I believe that one of the reasons we don’t do it is because it seems challenging methodologically. So where storytelling comes in is around the methods – what methods can we use that will more effectively allow children to tell their own stories about who they are, what they think and what they need and want? And what outlets will allow me, as the researcher and the person who then has the chance to share the children’s stories, to tell these stories too. The first, I feel like I have some handle on now after doing this kind of work for eight years. The second? I’m still working on that!

Your reflection about suitable outlets is really important. How have you been navigating your interest in this? In what ways have you disseminated stories from your research already?

I have found that there are barriers to sharing children’s own narratives in the ‘traditional’ academic publishing outlets like many journals. It’s difficult to find journals (and reviewers) who really value the in-depth – but also fractured – narratives that you get when doing research with children (but maybe with people in general), and when you’re writing up the research and interacting with reviewers, it can feel like you’re wrangling and struggling. I think there are two aspects to this: partly, it’s the eternal challenge of convincing readers that presenting a small number of in-depth narratives constitutes research; and partly, it’s the other eternal challenge of convincing readers that children are reliable commentators on their own lives.

To get around this, I’ve tried to put together videos about the research, short films co-written, directed and acted by the research participants, and shorter written articles in the media. I guess some academics who are better connected than me might say that policy is the way to share these things, to effect real change. But as I said earlier, I’m still working on all this as I’m not yet satisfied that any of these outlets are the best ones for sharing children’s views.

Why storytelling? 

I first started thinking about storytelling when I finished my PhD and moved to England from Northern Ireland. At that time, I decided to switch topics to something that seemed more topical and relevant in England, and because I was really enjoying being somewhere more culturally diverse than Northern Ireland (that’s one of the reasons I was so ready to move), then I decided that migration and education would fit the bill. As I wanted to work with younger groups than I’d previously worked with, and because I knew that the groups would be more multilingual than what I’d been used to, I realised I was going to need to extend my ability to use different methods that would be more ‘fit for purpose’. Shortly after moving to England, I participated in a conference where Dr Helen Kara was a keynote speaker. Helen writes and teaches a lot about creative research methods, and I was really inspired to ‘have a go’, despite not feeling particularly ‘creative’ myself. But I think taking this leap – this risk – has made me better at finding the ways to help children tell their stories, and help me tell those stories too.

It is interesting that your storytelling work is with young children. Are there any ethical and safeguarding implications of this that you can tell us about? An example based on your own experience will be great.    

There are always potential ethical and safeguarding issues that have to be addressed through ethical review processes and ongoing processes during the research itself. There is always the potential that a child might share something personal with you, such as bullying or problems at home or a traumatic memory related to their migration story, and in some cases that is something that would need to be reported to the school (my research always take place on school premises). However, this has never happened to me. The main thing that occupies my thoughts is normally whether the children really WANT to be there in the research group or not. Like all people, children can be fickle, and sometimes just don’t feel like doing something! I always have to make sure they can feel like they can leave at any point, through lots of verbal reassurance, but you can never really know what a person is thinking. Any researcher just has to do their best and know when to ask for help. Still, it’s not easy and personally, it means I always feel anxious during and long after fieldwork, despite the fun and excitement.

In the Ibali project, we have adopted a weeklong residential storytelling approach for research with young people on educational inclusion. Could you briefly describe the storytelling approach/es you have used in your research?  

I primarily use picturebooks, photography and film-making with primary-age children with migration backgrounds, on school premises. Each period of fieldwork normally takes place over a number of weeks, where I go into school for an hour or two a week, and we follow a flexible plan of activities. The picturebook The Arrival sets the scene about migration (as that’s what it looks at) and we do sticky note activities where the children add their views on how the characters might be feeling and what could be done to help them. This allows the children to tap into their own experiences and sense of empathy with the characters, and give insights into what their schools could do to help them and their fellow migrant pupils. The photography ‘walk and talk’ activities that follow this involve us all walking around the school, with the children taking photos of things in school that they are interested in, and discussing them with me and with each other. Again, this can provide insights as well as a fun activity that gives a chance to chat side by side (which is less intimidating than a regular interview, for example). This also gives me a chance to have a better look around school myself. Finally, we turn all these ideas and insights into a film. I guess this is where storytelling comes in more clearly as the children and me (and sometimes a consultant) design a film based around whatever story they want to tell; most recently, it was a fictional narrative of what it’s like to be a new girl at school, what it’s like to arrive at the reception, meet your teacher, make new friends, that kind of thing. And also, the difficult thoughts and feelings a new pupil might have. While it’s fictional, the children were telling stories based on at least some of their individual and combined experiences. 

This all sounds fascinating. How do you think your work contributes to inclusion in education? 

My understanding around inclusion in education is that it should be an ongoing, reflective process. Even in countries where they seem to be really good at inclusive education, I believe there is always room for improvement. Inclusion has to mean enabling real, effective participation of all learners in school, both inside and outside the classroom. And participation means access to both the physical classroom, as well as the curriculum and the classroom environment. For migrant learners, to me this also requires full recognition of them as fully-fledged human beings, rather than being deficient in some way, for example, linguistically vis-à-vis the country they’ve now arrived in. I’ve leaned a lot on work done in the field of Special Educational Needs and Disability as I feel that other areas of equality and diversity, such as a migration and education studies, have a lot to learn from them.

What would you say are some of your best experiences of using storytelling?

Working with primary-age children really is a lot of fun, which is one of the reasons why I keep doing it! I think using hands-on, visual tools like photography, picturebooks and film-making really opens up the conversations with people, and you get into the most random discussions when the groups of children are so diverse, like they are with migrant learners. You learn a lot about their home countries, you learn a lot about how they would like to be treated and included in school…and you learn a lot about what they sell in the tuck shop at break time and why their school swimming pool turned green.

What have you found most challenging using the approach?  

I think using these kinds of techniques can feel a bit chaotic, a bit hectic. It’s hard to record everything, it’s hard to remember everything that happened on the sidelines of the research too. I came to the realisation that I needed to listen more to the silences – that they are part of storytelling too – and that I was missing those  among all the noise. When I listened back to audio recordings of the research, it made me feel sad that I’d maybe not always given the children the kind of undivided attention I thought I had.

Your recent work on migrant learners in South Africa, what do you hope to achieve with it? 

6 April 2023

I returned several times to South Africa to continue the research on migrant learners’ perspectives on school. I now feel like I have a lot of data, and I have written quite a lot of academic pieces, but what I really want to do is achieve some real impact. So I am currently trying to get funding to design high quality resources for teachers working with migrant learners, to support them in their work, and especially to help them in those first few weeks after a child has arrived at school. Ultimately what I want to achieve is that migrant learners feel happy at school, and find a place to belong and achieve what they want.

Are there any areas you might want to explore using storytelling in future?  

I lived in Asia for a few years before returning to the UK to start work at University of Manchester last year. This led me to return to my original research area of citizenship education as I was so moved, motivated and inspired by youth activists in Hong Kong and Thailand, young people who have been trying to change society, to bring about democracy and to build a better future for themselves and their peers. And I feel sad for those young people and teachers who no longer feel that they can safely live and work there. I would love to use storytelling techniques to enable these people’s voices to be heard more loudly.

What would you say to early career researchers who would like to use storytelling in their projects?

I would advise finding lots of examples to have an idea about what might be ‘fit for purpose’ for your study. There are so many different methods, tools and techniques out there – which is great! But also a little overwhelming. When you find the right ones, and see them in action, allowing your participants to tell their own stories in their own way, it’s such a wonderful feeling. So even if you don’t think you’re a really ‘creative’ person, have a go!

Helen, it has been a pleasure to hear about your work and aspirations! Thank you so much!