At the level of analysis and interpretation, reflexivity implies that no observations, accounts from interview participants, document data, have an unequivocal or unproblematic relationship to anything outside the empirical material (Alvesson and Skoldberg, 2000). For a reflexive researcher, empirical data in social science are not ‘facts’ in any straightforward sense but rather, the data emerging from a study are aspects of the empirical material worked up to serve as one of many arguments in favour of a particular interpretation. The reflexive researcher should acknowledge that any study highlights only certain claims about the most accurate way to understand the particular situations, experiences, conditions, processes, etc. (Alvesson and Skoldberg, 2000). The position of the researcher in terms of the reality of the text and the researcher’s values, norms, and institutional pressures form elements that affect the ways that texts are read, interviews are coded, and research participants’ narratives are represented in the writing up of research data (Mauthner and Doucet, 2003).
The position of a researcher has also got to do with a theoretical lens within which a research study is couched. There are also practical issues which may influence interpretation and it is important for a reflexive researcher to acknowledge them. In this study, I discussed my epistemological position (see Chapter Five) which is constructivist and interpretive. I also discussed an activity theory framework (Chapter Four) and how it guided the analysis of data. In this section, I give a reflexive account on the practical issues of data analysis and interpretation. To make sense of the qualitative data collected in this study, I focused on particular aspects of activity theory in relation to the research questions.
As already mentioned in the previous section, categorical analysis was useful in organizing qualitative data into various clusters of meanings for interpretation. In relation to the three research questions in the study, the overarching units of general meanings elicited from the transcript data were:
(a) Student teachers’ perceptions of teaching and teacher education programme; (b) Experiences of student teachers during teaching practice. This was in relation to contexts of teaching practice, namely classroom context, socio-professional context and supervision context;
(c) Views of student teachers regarding innovations to teaching practice.
The interpretation processes generally answered questions such as ‘what was going on in the data, what did it all mean, and what was to be made of it in relation to teaching practice.’ This was accomplished by reading through data transcripts and developing meaningful units, which were then sorted into thematic categories that looked and felt alike.
In the case of the first research question in the current study, accounts that emerged in the transcripts constantly showed a divide between utilitarian and altruistic views for joining a teacher education programme. The process of interpretation also showed a divide between what could be conceptualized as positive and negative views of the teaching profession by student teachers. In addition, it was possible to undertake further analysis with the aim of exploring minor representations of the dichotomy of views by paying attention to additional meanings of clustered data. I managed to develop sub-categories for further analysis and interpretation. I tended to select salient quotes for use in the writing up of the findings while acknowledging that all pieces of data were important. I did this in the knowledge that I did not want the interpretation process to suffer from ‘halo effects’ (Cohen et al., 2000). The findings in Chapter Seven represent the interpretation of data in relation to the first research question.
In the case of the second and the third research questions, the focus of interpretation was on experiences of student teachers during teaching practice. The bases of interpretations in these questions were three, namely; classroom context, socio-professional context and supervisory context. An additional dimension of the interpretation was on innovations to teaching practice. These aspects were connected conceptually to an activity theory framework. This was a painstaking and highly iterative process. I generated major categories by trawling through data transcripts for interpretation. On the basis of the major thematic categories on the key aspects of the research questions, I managed to analyse clusters of data further to generate sub-categories. The sub-categories were useful in interpreting specific and other related experiences of individual research participants during teaching practice at two selected secondary schools.
At the level of interpreting data on innovations to teaching practice, my focus was on perceptions of research participants in trying to reconceptualise teaching practice. It would appear that research participants relied on contradictions or tensions within an activity system of teaching practice to derive their notions of innovation. The notions which research participants provided in the data transcripts were analysed and thematic categories were
developed and interpreted. The findings in Chapter Eight and Chapter Nine represent the interpretations of some of the experiences of research participants during teaching practice placements.
There were a number of issues which affected the process of data interpretation and thereby inevitably affecting the findings in the study. These issues are also discussed as limitations of the current study (see Section 10.5). In terms of data sources, I think that the absence of school teachers and pupils as informants was a limitation in the data collected and affected the interpretation process. Some of the interpretations regarding views of student teachers were not cross-checked by school teachers and pupils. However this research was aimed at understanding experiences of student teachers and to that effect, the study fulfilled its main purpose.
My assumptions as a researcher might also be sources of irrationality, bias and unreliability. The impact of my assumptions could affect the interpretation process. I attempted to minimize the effects of my assumptions by relying on a systematic and rigorous process of a qualitative research design. Indeed, there were issues which could make the interpretation biased such as a case where a researcher unconsciously ‘goes native’ or becomes part of those being researched. The potential for this to happen was ever present in the data interpretation process where I remembered my own experiences of teaching practice in 2000. However, I relied on critical judgement and systematic and analytical skills to keep my own experiences out of the data interpretation.
The issue of power relations between the researcher and the researched is another source of bias in a data collection process. This may affect an interpretation of data. Some respondents may provide inaccurate data that appeals to the researcher and when such data is interpreted, it does not reflect the actual experiences of research participants. However, I relied on my knowledge and skills as a teacher educator to bridge the power relations with research participants. I noted in another section (see Section 6.3) how it was problematic interviewing female participants.
Also, during semi-structured interviews, respondents might bring about data bias through imperfect recall. The researcher may also not know whether respondents are lying and that may be a source of bias if the data they provide is interpreted without verifying its trustworthiness. Non-participant observation may also be a source of bias through Hawthorne effect (Cohen et al., 2000) whereby those being observed try harder to behave differently because they know they are part of a study. This may also be due to the pressure caused by
the presence of a researcher in classrooms. I attempted to minimize the Hawthorne effect by also asking research participants questions before and after the observation sessions.
In summary, this reflexive account of data interpretation provides a perspective of understanding the findings presented in the next three chapters. The findings provide accurate ways of understanding teaching practice within an activity theory perspective with particular reference to situations, experiences, conditions and processes of an initial teacher education programme. The reflexive account of interpretation helps to construct knowledge in relation to experiences of student teachers during teaching practice at Masambiro College in Malawi.
6.7 Conclusion
There were a number of issues that needed to be considered deeply before and during data collection and analysis. I considered the practical issues during data collection as well as the techniques and tools for data collection. I examined interview, observation, field notes, critical incident log techniques, document data and how each contributed to the pool of data that had to be analysed using categorical analysis while adhering to tenets of qualitative inquiry and activity theory. I mostly relied on interviews in the study, followed by critical incident logs and observations. In terms of data analysis, I had to link activity theory perspectives with research questions and brought in categorical analysis as the analytical tool. This provided a useful way of understanding experiences of student teachers during teaching practice.
In the next chapter I address research findings on perceptions of student teachers about teacher education and teaching.
CHAPTER SEVEN: RESEARCH FINDINGS ON
PERCEPTIONS OF STUDENT TEACHERS
7.0 IntroductionThe aim of this study was to explore some of the critical experiences of student teachers during secondary school teaching practice using an activity theory framework. In this chapter, I present and discuss the findings on the research questions that revolved around the perceptions of student teachers of teacher education and teaching. The research questions were as follows:
(a) What were the goals of student teachers for joining a secondary school teacher education programme?
(b) What were the perceptions of student teachers regarding the teaching profession?
An activity theory is predicated on the assumption that individuals’ frameworks for thinking are developed through historical, culturally-grounded beliefs and actions. An activity theory calls attention to the goals of development and the ways in which environments are structured to promote development towards those goals (Grossman et al., 1999). In the case of student teachers in the study, the central concern was to understand the kinds of culturally defined futures that influenced them to join a teacher education/teaching as well as their general perceptions of the teaching profession. The literature in Chapter Three unveiled some of the international discourse on perceptions of teachers regarding teacher education and teaching.
The student teachers who provided data for the first research objective above were conducting teaching practice at four secondary schools (see Table 5.1). The findings in the study were not very different from the international discourse. The findings are presented and discussed in the next sections.