La gestión de la reputación

In this section I discuss some of the political dilemmas and limitations of being an outsider, first, as an African researcher and secondly as a foreigner undertaking research in a Western country. I acknowledge that the research is limited by my gendered and foreigner perspective. Other limitations include being a conspicuous outsider whom some students and teachers were suspicious of throughout the duration of the research. The research was also limited by the fact that some teachers appeared to present good impressions of their expertise and thus painted a

picture of themselves as such. Pupils too, tried to make the teachers‘ lives more difficult than usual because of the presence of ‗a foreigner‘.

Vulliamy et al., [1990] argue:

Qualitative research methodologies are often viewed as posing particular problems of political acceptability, because they tend to probe sensitivities which can safely be avoided or buried in the apparent neutrality of numbers [Vulliamy et. al., 1990, p. 22].

Vulliamy et al., s‘ [1990] statement haunted my memories when I negotiated access to the

research site and participants involvement in the research study. As established in the literature review [chapter two], the education sector is a politically contested arena. And so, the political dilemmas of carrying out international research demand that I make my political and value position explicit [Hall and Hall, 1996; Vulliamy et al., 1990; Said, 1993]. It is one of the criteria for measuring the successes of political regimes. And therefore, public condemnation of the quality of education being provided by the state is an overt condemnation of the political establishment of the time.

Thus, my political value position as a researcher is paramount in the construction of knowledge [Denzin 1989]. Therefore, a non judgemental, non partisan position underpinned the thinking and writing of this thesis. The following quote explains why it is crucial that my value and political positions are understood.

I do not believe that authors are mechanically determined by ideology, class, or economic history but authors are, I also believe, very much in the history of their societies, shaping and shaped by that history and their social experience in different measure [Said, 1993, p.xxiv]

Said [ibid] states that the author‘s writing are shaped by the society in which the writer is

immersed. As a foreigner I was a conspicuous outsider and there were obvious limits to the

extent to which I could ‗blend into the fabric of the system I researched‘ [Vulliamy et. al.,

1990, p. 211]. There were however, notable changes in some teachers‘ and pupils‘ attitudes towards me when they understood who I truly was and doing at ‗their school‘ [an independent researcher]. My previous involvement with the school as a supply teacher helped to lower the temperatures. However, even up to the end of the research, my presence was not wholly approved of by some teachers within the department.

Similarly, Choksi and Dyer [1997] while carrying out a research in Indian schools noted that

teachers‘ perceptions of researchers were that of outsiders who had probably come to look for

problems since primary schools were rarely visited by anyone except inspectors, whose visits

were associated with fault finding. ‗Teachers did not really understand why we were there, asking all those questions, and were suspicious of us‘ [Choksi and Dyer, 1997, p.275].

Therefore, with this in mind, my main challenge with teachers and pupils was building up trust. For Mason [1996] trust is to do with honesty, ethics and politics. I was, to the best of my knowledge truthful and honest with the teachers and pupils about my reasons for doing the research [a PhD]. Therefore, developing and sustaining this trust was critical to the research since the teachers had no way of knowing how I would use their narratives upon leaving their school.

My interpretations were based upon specific observations which both pupils and teachers presented me with. During the early days, the teachers presented me with the image of hardworking, tolerant professionals which was sometimes more accurate than at other times. Pupils too were quick to notice this sudden change in teachers‘ behaviour of being lenient and

tolerant to mischief. Thus, from the contradictory and multiple truths, the ideal ‗self as teachers and pupils‘ were presented. Synopses and individual analyses of the teachers‘

5.5.0. Data Collection Procedures

‗Data is seen not as something ‗out there‘ to be collected or captured but as something created through a social process‘ [Hall and Hall, 1996, p.42]. Hall and Hall, [ibid] further contend

that, in ethnography, data is generated through social interaction between the researcher and

participants, ‗so that the research itself is a creative process which you will be part of‘ [ibid]. Thus, Wellington [2000] argues, ‗qualitative research leads to one major consequence:

qualitative research produces large amounts of data! Data are lengthy and, by definition,

verbose, i.e. mostly in the form of words‘ [p.133]. Conversely, ethnographic research and

qualitative inquiry rely on the collection of data specific to an activity as it is ‗stretched over

the social and situational contexts‘ [Spillane et al., 1999, p.7]. Since this chapter is on

participant observation, emphasis will be on field notes. So, in the following sections, the means of data collection and rationale is examined.

5.5.1. The Field Notes

May [2002] argues that field notes and research journals are not a new phenomenon. They

have long been used ‗to record the feelings, emotions and personal identity work that can come with prolonged research engagement‘ [p.314]. This observation assisted me with my fieldwork

and note writing. Furthermore, May [ibid] asserts that field notes are private texts and are

rarely shared in their raw form...‗quoted field-note extracts are usually tidied up or edited‘

[p.318]. This is equally true of this research study as quotes and extracts are used in the data analysis rather than the entire field notes.

For Bryman [2004], ‗these should be fairly detailed summaries of events and behaviour and the researcher‘s initial reflections of whatever is observed or heard‘ [p. 306]. Like wise, I jotted

down notes of events however brief every time something interesting cropped up. Later on, at the end of the day, sat down to write full vivid and clear field notes that included location, the numbers of the samples involved, the activities observed, date and time of the observations. These were then word processed and safely stored in the computer.

The first of my field notes exhibit descriptive notes of the identified sample per class followed by step-by-step accounts of individual samples. Reactions or behaviours by the non-participant

students, the ones I would call ‗silent participants‘ [students who directly or indirectly

contributed to or influenced the overall behaviours of the samples] are not detailed but mentioned in passing. It has been noted that there is no clear step-by-step method to carrying action research in practice since every study is unique. There exist many structured approaches but no unified approach. The current study was informed by the suggested approaches in figure 2.1 as discussed by Hart, [2000] [see p.116 of the thesis].

5.5.2. Practical Approaches to the Participation- Observation Method

According to Morrison [1993], observations enable the researcher to gather data on the physical setting, the human setting, the interactional setting and the programme setting. Other advantages include providing information about the environment and behaviour of those who cannot speak; sees what participants cannot see and provides information about those who will not take part one way or the other. Also, data from observation can be useful check on and supplement to, information obtained from other sources [triangulation].

Nonetheless, like any other research method, the observation method has its own limitations as a research tool. According to Sapsford and Jupp [1996] sometimes, the observation method s

rendered useless because, ‗the social norms surrounding the event or behaviour do not usually permit observation...because the behaviour deliberately avoids observation‘ because of various reasons [p.59]. Also, because ‗people may, consciously or unconsciously, change the way they

behave because they are being observed...behaviour may be inaccurate representations of how

they behave ‗naturally‘‘- reactivity [ibid]. And, since the observer has the final say of what is to be observed what needs recording, ‗it must therefore be emphasised that observations can

never provide us with a direct representation of reality...what the observer obtains...are

constructed representations of the world‘ [Sapsford and Jupp, 1996, p. 59]. Prior knowledge

can also bias the researcher and on the financial side, time consuming and costly as compared to other cheaper and broadly used methods such as interviews and questionnaires [Sapsford and Jupp, 1996].

5.5.3. Note Taking and Interpretation

Data collection procedures for this phase of the research study looked at what was ‗happening

in situ rather than as second hand‘ [Patton, 1990, pp. 203-205] and were influenced by ethnographic paradigm with triangulation as a way of increasing validity. The tools selected for data collection in this phase were unstructured classroom participant observations and participant critical log schedules [with free flowing-text produced by the researcher] as suggested by Taylor-Powel and Renner [2003]. These tools were appropriate for data collection as they provided answers to the research questions, which were provided by way of descriptive accounts that resulted from watching and listening.

Patton [1990] noted that observations enable researchers to understand the context of the programmes, to be open-ended and inductive, to see things that might otherwise be unconsciously missed, to discover things that participants might not freely talk about in interview situations and to move beyond perception-based data, and to access personal

knowledge. However, ‗it should be noted that field notes are not ‗raw‘ data, since they come encoded with the author‘s conscience, understandings and interpretations‘ [de Laine 2000, p.

148]. The reality of fieldwork is that involvement covers not only being an observer, but also being an actor, author, teller and writer [ibid].

It has been postulated that carefully and systematically recorded observations of ‗slices of everyday life‘ generate richly detailed accounts of practices rarely obtained through interviews

alone, and can provide deep insights into social practices, events and processes [Lankshear and Knobel, 2004]. In comparison with the other techniques of data collection, the main advantages of the observation method are that I had direct data collection since I was a participant observer in the situation under study; that data were collected in the natural setting; through participant observation, I managed to acquire data which cannot be obtained with other techniques; also through participant observation, I could manage to verify the validity of

responses ‗since observing the situation, the researcher finds out whether people do as they say‘ [Bryman, 2004, p. 167].

5.5.4. The Early Days of Observations

At this juncture, I must point out that during the first days in the fieldwork, I was very uncomfortable and was at first not so sure about my footing. So, I decided that my first encounter with the participants was going to be just for acclimatisation to the new roll as a researcher. I was rather overwhelmed by the amount of information that I received within a very short time which gave me a rough picture of what was coming. I however, used this window of opportunity to brief and inform the participants the purpose of my observation, and roughly how long I would be attending their classes. I also used this time to fuse into the

system and to learn the groups‘ culture and tried to become a member of the classes that were

being observed. As I became accustomed to the research setting, I took opportunity to identify the kinds of behaviour prevalent.

For this study, I adopted an ethnographic or unstructured observation as it is characterised by flexibility and minimum pre-structuring [Sapsford and Jupp, 1996]. ‗The origins of less- structured observation lie in anthropology and in the application of its ethnographic approach

to the study of communities and groups in industrialised societies‘ [ibid, p.61]. This approach

minimised the influence of preconceptions as I approached the observation with a relatively

open mind. I focused on pupils‘ behaviours, reactions and attitudes as they interacted with the

teacher and with other students.

Of particular interest to me, were their reactions to feedback and comments from fellow students as well as those from the teacher. During the activities or individual work times, I assumed the roll of teacher assistant. This roll accorded me time to get very close to and interact with my samples without telegraphing my intentions but remaining relatively unobtrusive. That way, I managed to move from one sample to another without disturbing and alerting individuals that they are being watched or targeted all the time. The observation aimed to provide support to the data generated by interviews and critical incident log entries, in some instances. I need to make it clear though, that my consent and relationship with pupils was that

of a ‗student researcher‘. The assumed assistant teacher was just a convenient way of thanking

the teachers and pupils for accepting to partake in the research study, as well as a way of getting closer to the sample without prejudicing my welcome.

The observation focused on the classroom, particularly the way the student teachers taught their lessons. I produced a descriptive account as a result of watching and listening to student

teacher‘s lesson sessions. During the ‗teething‘ days of the participant-observation, I found it

difficult to jot down my observations and comment at the same time. So, I decided to use symbols on the margins that represented actions and then after the observations wrote down the comments. This assisted me to keep abreast with observations. Later, I thought that tape recording would be used as a back up although, I continued with jotting down my comments reactions and feelings.