This study did not focus on investigating teachers’ perceptions only but also on teachers teaching practices. The study is descriptive in character, using phenomenographic and phenomenological research approaches. Since the aim was to find out how teachers perceive the integration of environmental education into primary education and teachers’ teaching experiences, the research is ambitious in obtaining different perceptions and experiences and practices as much as possible from the primary school teachers.
Interviews were used as the main instrument for data collection from 31 primary school teachers. Another method used for data collection was lesson observa- tion, whereby six lessons were observed. The teachers were purposefully se- lected from four primary schools in Morogoro region in order to capture teach- ers’ perceptions and experiences from different subjects taught in the primary schools and in different settings. I chose interviews and lesson observations as my data collection instruments in order to gather rich data.
The interviews were conducted in two phases. In the first phase, the teachers provided a general picture of the teachers’ perceptions and teaching practices, while in the second phase the teachers’ perceptions were deepened to obtain an in-depth insight of the study. To make the teachers feel at ease during the interview, the researcher asked them to choose where they wanted to hold the interview. Some of the teachers chose their offices for the interviews, while others chose to be outside under a shady tree. During the interviews, the teachers talked about how they perceived environmental education, how it is integrated into primary school education and how the teachers teach it. In conducting interviews, there is a risk that the respondents may not tell the truth but tell the interviewer what they think he/she expects to hear. To minimize this risk, the interviews started with an informal discussion concerning the interviewees’ education and their work as primary school teachers. Also, the fact that the teachers knew that I was not a school inspector, nor an education officer from the municipality made them free to express their feelings and experiences. In addition, the fact that they were assured on the issue of confidentiality further increased their freedom of expression.
After an introductory discussion, the interview then moved on to how the teachers perceived environmental education as an integrated component in the subjects that they teach and how they implement it. The researcher asked
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questions which precisely focused on the research questions. This ensured that the responses given by the teachers were not inconsistent. Also the researcher asked for more clarification or examples on responses which were not clear or needed to be clarified more. Given the way the interviews were conducted and complemented with lesson observations, it can be claimed that the teachers’ perceptions and teaching practices in environmental education reveal what they actually do, and this enriched the results.
The interviews were transcribed and analyzed to get the results. In analyzing the interviews the researcher’s task was to interpret and try to understand what the teachers said correctly. One can question whether it can be ensured that the interpretation of the teachers’ utterances was done correctly. First, being a teacher helped me to understand what the teachers said during the interview and as a teacher I was also used to the way teachers express themselves. Secondly, during the interview, I asked probing questions to get more clarification of the statements which I did not understand. Thirdly, since the interviews were tape- recorded if I was not clear about what the teachers said, I simply replayed the tape when transcribing the interviews.
Another method used for data collection was lesson observation. In all, six different lessons were observed. The researcher sought the consent of the teachers to come into their classrooms and observe how they taught. The teachers were willing, so they taught as they normally did. One may wonder if the presence of the researcher in the classroom interfered with the normal teaching. In order not to do this, the researcher became a nonparticipant observer. Also the teachers and pupils are used to inspectors coming to the school and observing teaching in the classroom. After the lesson observation, the teacher, together with the researcher, reflected on the lesson which was observed.
One can also ask why both interviews and lesson observations were used. The question here is not the reliability of the teachers’ utterances. The essence of using both interviews and observations is that observations are used to see how what is said is put into practice. Also observations are used to verify what is said because sometimes people do not practice what they say. Furthermore, the study sought both perceptions and practices. Therefore, in order to understand a certain practice, the best way is to see or observe how it is done.
Interpretation of the data was organized and presented in categories and aspects/sub-categories. The question is, does the presentation of the results represent the content contained in the empirical data? The researcher can confirm that efforts were made to present the description of the data using the categories and aspects/subcategories which were generated from the data and supported them with extracts from the interviews to show the teachers utterances as they were expressed in the interviews.
Concerning the research methods used, one can ask if the use of phenomenography and phenomenology as points of departure for the study was successful in yielding rich data for the study. Based on how I carried out the study and on the results, I believe that the data collected through interviews and observations is quite rich. To a large extent it has exposed what teachers actually
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perceive and how they actually teach environmental education in primary schools.
Another question may be whether the results can be generalized and applied to other areas. Generalizations and replication of study results usually apply to quantitative studies. But as a researcher my intention was to get as many different qualitative perceptions and teaching practices as possible. As a result, the respondents in the study covered a wide range of teachers with different characteristics. Therefore, I think that the findings of the study can be used to shed light on how environmental education is taught in primary schools in Tanzania more generally because the teacher education and the primary school curriculum are both centralized.