Re-Scripting Understandings and Beliefs: Young Children’s Collaborative Re(Imaginings) of Girlhood, Puberty, and Menstruation
Restricted (Penn State Only)
Author:
Snyder, Julie
Graduate Program:
Curriculum and Instruction
Degree:
Master of Science
Document Type:
Master Thesis
Date of Defense:
June 26, 2024
Committee Members:
Kimberly Anne Powell, Thesis Advisor/Co-Advisor Jacqueline J A Reid-Walsh, Committee Member Scott Mcdonald, Program Head/Chair
Keywords:
Ethnography Performing Arts menstruation girlhood
Abstract:
This thesis centers on innovative and engaging curricular and research methods that privilege young children’s voices, movements, and creative choices within collaborative performing arts workshops. Pulling from my current work with young girl-identifying participants, I illustrate my use of performance-based techniques (e.g., participatory and devised theatre-making and scripting) alongside established and innovative uses of ethnography to explore young girls' emergent understandings and beliefs around the often-marginalized topics of puberty and menstruation. I describe creative, visual, and embodied methods that encourage greater participant collaboration and opportunities for ethical and relational research and classroom practices with young learners and performers.
The methods described in my thesis emphasize intentional and actionable approaches to justice and agency when working with children. These approaches entail embracing imperatives to involve children in their learning process as they contribute to creating classroom experiences (Hughes, 1995; Alexander and Tanner, 2010), recognizing children as experts on their own lives, experiences, and desires (Mitchell and Reid-Walsh, 2002; Thorne, 1993), and privileging children's expressions of thoughts and ideas through their movements, words, and interactions with the materiality and space of our workshops (MaClure, 2013; Pacini-Ketchabaw et al., 2016).
