Promoting Methodological Creativity and Innovations: Editorial Learning from a Poetic Self-Study Journal Special Issue

Abstract

ABSTRACT We are teacher educators and methodological innovators who have been practicing and facilitating co-creativity (collaborative creativity) for ourselves and for others through poetic self-study. This article examines our professional learning as editors of a journal special issue on poetic self-study scholarship. Our study was built on the conceptual foundation of polyvocal poetic play using the self-study virtual bricolage method and the layering of co-creative data and data analysis. The multidimensional data set and analysis comprised solicited feedback poems from the special issue contributors, our individual found poems developed from the contributors’ poems, a tapestry poem, and our dialogue from a recorded, transcribed online video meeting. In considering the professional impetus and impact of our work as editors, we asked, ‘What difference did editing a special issue make to our understanding of promoting methodological creativity and innovations through poetic self-study? How did poetic feedback from the contributors inform our understanding?’ We discovered four central features of our learning through several data generation and analysis phases: plurality, methodological and epistemological inventiveness, academic – personal intersections, and relational scaffolding. This set of features contributes to the body of knowledge on supporting methodological creativity and innovations in self-study and qualitative research. Editors, reviewers, and authors may find our study’s explanations, examples, and findings useful in their efforts to promote transformative and innovative research.