(The discipline of) Noticing

Posted on 4th January 2024 by Elena Oncevska Ager

One of the main influences for Noticing (including its name!) is Mason’s (2002) Researching your own practice: The discipline of noticing. According to Mason, noticing is central to all professional practice, because it’s very easy to fall into habits which prevent development. Not all habits are bad, though; some habits are useful in that they free our attention to be able to focus on new learning and on our overall goals.

We do want to interrogate the usefulness of our professional habits, though, which is where the importance of what Mason calls ‘disturbances’ comes in. A disturbance is a situation which startles us out of our current habits and can trigger professional development. We often see these disturbances as a nuisance, a problem we need to sort out quickly so we can get back on track with our professional duties. Mason suggests that becoming overly emotional about disturbances in the form of engaging in blame, justification, explanation or judgement, may deflect from learning from the disturbance. An emotional response can prevent us from coming up with a plan for an alternative action when a similar situation presents itself in the future.

Mason, instead, argues for a dispassionate response to disturbances, resisting a surge of emotion. Following an emotional situation, Mason suggests that we reflect on the situation, describing it descriptively, in a dispassionate way, as would anyone else observing. The focus on the descriptive content enables us to understand the situation more fully and sketch alternative responses. By engaging in such dispassionate reflection, we sensitise ourselves to seeing similar situations coming before they happen, and we give ourselves the choice of not getting caught up in them, but acting differently in some desired way.

According to Mason, all professional development is sharpening our sensitivity to notice and developing an alternative repertoire of actions to respond thoughtfully and professionally, not merely out of habit — to respond rather than just react. He calls this ongoing process of developing as a professional ‘educating awareness’.

References:

Mason, J. (2002). Researching your own practice: The discipline of noticing. New York: Routledge.

Written by Elena Oncevska Ager

Elena Oncevska Ager is Full Professor in Applied Linguistics at Ss Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje, North Macedonia.

Her work involves teaching English for Academic Purposes (EAP) and supporting the development of English language teachers, in face-to-face and online contexts. Her research interests revolve around EAP and language teacher education, with a focus on mentoring, group dynamics, motivation, learner/teacher autonomy and wellbeing.

Elena is particularly interested in facilitating reflective practice, in its many forms, including through using the arts and by using AI to facilitate it. Her investigations are designed in such a way as to inform her practice of supporting learning and teaching.