ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION: CRITICAL EVENTS I have described and analysed elsewhere the phenomenon of critical events in education (Woods, 1993a). In this chapter, I shall discuss the methodology of the research. 'Critical events' are exceptional kinds of activity that occur from time to time in schools and that bring radical change in pupils and sometimes teachers. Some children achieve standards their teachers hardly thought possible (cf. Nias et al., 1992). There are 'great moments of teachability' (McLaren, 1986, p. 236), when teachers transcend the contradictions of the job and achieve the 'peak experience' of which Maslow (1973, p. 77) writes, and in which they Tjecome aware of their full identity' (Nias, 1989, p. 200). Some teachers say that the experience has 'changed their lives', and that 'they will never be the same again'. Others feel their dearest beliefs and values have, for once in their lives, found a combination of circumstances where they could be shown to work, and work uncommonly well. There can, of course, be negative critical events, that is, those that have educationally retrogressive consequences. I have described some of these in Woods (1990a). They have somewhat different methodological implications, but they were not my concern in this research, nor are they in this chapter.
