Finding a Fountain of Knowledge in the Interplay of Structures and Relationships

• In Event: Organizational Theory Voices and Narratives

Abstract

School change efforts often center on organizational structures to support educator knowledge of new instructional practices. However, current scholarship also identifies social interactions in the context of trusting relationships as important for educator knowledge-building. Using the frameworks of structuration (Giddens, 1984) and knowledge creation (Nonaka, 1994) theories, this mixed-methods study examines how educators in one rural school district with few resources for formal support structures utilized the basic organizational structures present and their informal social relationships to support knowledge-building about new instructional practices. Findings suggest an interplay between the formal and informal led to important knowledge-creation spaces that supported knowledge-building across the organization and contribute new understandings to the importance of informal recursive interactions for organizational learning.

Author

• Jennifer Karnopp, San Diego State University