Legislación y normatividad a nivel nacional

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Based on the findings of Carpe Vitam Project and the „principles‟ of the concept introduced by MacBeath et al. (2009), my research explores the concept in schools in Pakistan. It is claimed in the LfL Project that these principles are important components of the concept. However, here the principles can “… lay claim to an impact, help chart a new course or set the narrative off in a new direction” (MacBeath et al., 2009: p.223). These principles were used throughout the study to guide my data collection tools and questions. Contrary to Gage (1989) who says that the interpretive researchers draw upon the “phenomenological perspective of the persons behaving”, Erickson (1986) claims that behavioural uniformities are not considered in interpretivism “… as evidence of underlying, essential uniformity among entities, but as an illusion - a social construction” (Erickson, 1986: p.126). The people may differ in their responses to the same or similar situations. Thus, interpretive researchers argue that individuals are able to shape and phrase their own social reality, rather than having reality always be the determiner of the individual's perception (Cohen et al., 2000). According to Erickson (1986), interpretivists can do research without any hypothesis. They are not “standard” researchers in their “… theoretical presuppositions about the nature of schools, teaching, children, and classroom life, and about the nature of cause in human life in general” (Erickson 1986: p.125). He disagrees that the teaching and learning is a mechanical or chemical or biological concept which may be completely standardised and structured, rejecting the assumption of uniformity in nature. He questions the assumption that the same phenomena may occur in the same way in different places and times. Some people challenge this notion and introduce the concept of ecological validity. The ecological validity investigates if the known similarities or dissimilarities of one setting established through in depth study are “… generalizable in substantial degree to those in other settings” (Spindler,

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1982: p.8). They claim that the findings of in depth studies may be generalized if the actions take place again in the similar conditions and some sort of common agreement can be established. For example, a common belief about the correlates of effective schools or education may be generalised. Therefore, my research tries to find out if these principles are applicable in Pakistani schools or is there any change required according to the specific context?

In my research, the subjective experiences of the human beings are important. The main focus in this project is not to invent or frame a universal law or establish generalization, like it happens in the positivist approach, rather it is concerned with the way in which the individual creates, modifies and interprets the world around him/herself (Cohen et al., 2000) and to contribute to the knowledge through population and ecological validity (Hammersley, 1979a and b; Spindler, 1982; Evans, 2001; Vulliamy and Stephens, 1990). Indeed, Cohen et al., (2000) suggest “understanding” is a more suitable term than validity in qualitative research. So, although the research is not generalizable, trends and issues will emerge to inform and answer my research questions and contribute to the ongoing research agenda.

My research is positioned with an epistemological assumption that reality is not out there as an amalgam of external phenomenon waiting to be revealed as facts, but a construct in which people understand reality in their own different way (Morrison, 2007). I am focussed that the entire research design and process leads to a useful analysis and findings as more than one method has been used to reach to that. It is important to consider its limitations. Though the

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sample is not very big to attempt generalizability, I think the internal validity is established through the piloting of instruments, respondent triangulation and methodological triangulation. Moreover, the data was collected from different cities of Pakistan to have a wider inclusion. This is the first study of its kind in Pakistan to explore the concept of LfL. Its findings may set the direction of any future research that may be conducted with a more in depth and rigorous long term project, taking an action research approach as participant or non- participant observer to develop a strategy and scheme of works as a bench mark of performance of LfL in the schools in Pakistan. Anyhow, the selected sample and the data obtained provide a comprehensive picture of the extent to which the concept of LfL is prevalent and may be developed in the schools of Pakistan.

5.12 Summary

This chapter navigates through the entire process beginning from an ontological and epistemological consideration to a realistic analysis of the research design, highlighting the limitations of the research. The description of the entire research design has been provided with a link in context of the research objectives and with justifications of selecting the specific research methods. Being in two knowledge domains, I find that my research objective can be achieved best by adopting an interpretivist, qualitative methodology with a mixed method approach for data analysis. The researcher tries to justify the reliability and validity factors and ethical issues within this qualitative study. The data analysis process has been explained in detail to give a clear idea about the authenticity of the findings. The chapter tries to establish the validity of the entire research design as being an appropriate one for the selected

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study. The research design and the entire process involved, from selection of tools to selection of sample, and from data collection to findings and analysis and then to drawing conclusions, have been made considering fitness for purpose; such is the complexity of the design process. After considering various aspects of the research design, the epistemological, methodological and ethical issues, methods and limitations, the next chapter presents the findings based on the data collected through this research design.

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