EL CASO FERNANDO HENRIQUE Y EL PROYECTO DE LA REELECCIÓN

As discussed in the previous chapters, the background of the study has resulted in the formulation of six research questions. They are articulated as below:

RQ 1 : What does ‘reflection’ mean to the pre-service student teachers and teacher educators on the Bachelor of Teaching TESL programme in Malaysia?

RQ 2 : What do they perceive to be the benefits of ‘reflection’?

RQ 3 : What do the pre-service student teachers focus on in their written reflections? RQ 4 : What features of reflective writing can be found in the student teachers’ written reflections?

RQ 5 : What support currently exists to guide student teachers in their reflective writing during the practicum and how adequate is it?

RQ 6 : Based on the analysis of the answers to the above questions, what improvements can be made in the provision of pre-service teacher education in the training context of this study?

It was clear to me that ‘research questions are the vital first steps in any research’ (Lewis & Munn, 2004, p. 5). Their function is ‘to explain specifically’ what my study is intended for, that is ‘to learn or understand’ (Maxwell, 2013, p. 75). They also serve other vital functions such as helping me to stay focused on the problems that I wanted to investigate as well as defining and clarifying the limits of my study, and to guide me on

86

how to conduct my research. There are many ways in which questions about research are formulated. Marshall and Rossman (1995, p. 16) stated that:

‘In qualitative inquiry, initial questions for research often come from real- world observations, dilemmas, and questions and have emerged from the interplay of the researcher’s direct experience, tacit theories, and growing scholarly interests. At other times, the topic of interest derives from theoretical traditions and their attendant empirical research.’

(Marshall & Rossman, 1995, p.16)

As for me, I began the process of constructing my research questions when I noticed that there was a gap between what was required of ‘reflection’ on the Bachelor of Teaching programme and its practice. The problem also came to light when I realised many of us (myself and my colleagues) had trouble defining what ‘reflection’ is and what it entails (as I stated in 1.3).

The initial process of constructing my research questions took several rounds of reconstructions. I refined the questions many times and arrived at six final central questions as stated above. These questions precisely addressed the issues that I wanted to investigate which to me were ‘essentially important since they determine the success of the research’ (Flick, 2014, p. 146).

My research questions reflected the concerns that have arisen from my own practice and the importance of what ‘reflection’ really means to me, my colleagues, and my student teachers. Furthermore, given the importance attached to the practice of reflection on the Bachelor of Teaching curriculum and course documentation (as discussed in Chapters 2 and 3), I wanted to know what the term means to the participants of the course, and how well-developed their understanding of the term seems to be. It is also important to explore the concepts behind this term as written in the literature and the extent to which the participants’ understanding converges with or diverges from the way the term is used in the extensive literature on the subject. Hence, the first research question was formulated to clarify the main issue of the meaning of ‘reflection’. This is followed by the second research question which focuses on finding out how student teachers perceived the value of ‘reflection’ in the teacher education programme that is what they learned from the process of ‘reflection’ during teaching practice. It is

87

important to find this out in order to determine what sort of improvements might be necessary to the support and guidance provided on the course. Thus, having a clear idea of what ‘reflection’ is and what to do with it is key in ensuring an effective teacher education. In addition, as my literature review has shown, there are few published research studies into the perceptions that pre-service student teachers have about the meaning and value of reflection. My study helps to fill this gap.

Both research questions three and four focused specifically on the student teachers’ written reflections. Research question three was constructed to find out the topics and the issues student teachers often discuss in their written reflections. This will help to shed further light on what the student teachers understand by the term ‘reflection’, and what they consider to be important to reflect on. The fourth research question sought to identify the different features of student teachers’ reflective writing (e.g. description, evaluation, reasoning, self-realisation and problem-solving) through a close textual analysis of their writing and explores how they combine these different features into identifiable patterns of reflective discourse. This will shed important light on their level of engagement in the process of reflection.

Research question five was to identify the support and guidance given to student teachers in helping them to write their reflections during the practicum. It also investigated whether the help provided was enough to develop student teachers’ reflective writing skills.

The final research question focused on identifying the improvements that can be made to the pre-service teacher education in Malaysia based on the findings from the other research questions.