In this chapter, we define what research and pre-service research is and provide background for the upcoming chapters. We also position our understanding of research here regarding how research for pre-service language teachers could be designed and offered as a course. The specific foci are as follows:
- Background
- Contextualizing knowledge: What pre-service teachers can discover
- Research as development opportunities
- What does research mean to pre-service teachers?
- Teacher inquiry, reflection, and research
1 Background
One of the courses that pre-service teachers preparing to become language teachers generally take is a research course. Such a course is usually the first time in their life that those students encounter research since the earlier schooling experiences do not generally include research courses. We consider this initial meeting quite critical in developing research perspective throughout their lives. Unlike existing books on research, we take into account why pre-service teachers usually report fear, anxiety, and reluctance when they take a research course. In fact, the information provided to pre-service teachers in such courses generally aim to equip them with skills and knowledge at a level that an academic would need. Most students, however, will become in-service teachers not academics. Nevertheless, such knowledge would be a foundation for those planning a career for becoming a professional researcher. In addition, we acknowledge that in-service teachers, more often than not, are overwhelmed by the amount of teaching and preparation they are expected to do as part of their contracts (see for example Borg, 2013). As such, it is stated that teachers abstain from participating in and/or conducting research (Allwright, 2003; Hanks, 2015). However, to strengthen the link between research and practice, it is important to encourage teacher/practitioner research and we believe that can be achieved by equipping future teachers with skills that will allow them to undertake practitioner research.
Therefore, taking these aspects into account, we aimed to produce a book that could address pre-service teachers’ negative attitudes and help them develop positive attitudes towards research through an enjoyable process of learning to do research. We consider that developing research skills is not only needed for academic development at pre-service level, but also for in-service level. There is an increasing interest in developing teachers’ inquiry skills, which can be promoted by research knowledge. Teachers who can investigate their own practices and beliefs can develop an insightful stance towards teaching and learning. This book, therefore, aims to promote such a stance early in their career and help teachers attain such a mind-set and skills while developing into their teacher role and identity.
1.1 Differences Between Academic and Pre-service Teacher Research
Pre-service teachers’ research engagement should differ than general academic research not in quality but in process and purpose. The concept of quality in research is demanded in any research conducted depending on its process and purpose. While academic research serves a wider purpose in a way that can generate new knowledge in an addressed gap in the layers of knowledge system, pre-service research should serve the purpose of cultivating research and inquiry skills regarding the emerging and constructed pedagogic knowledge. ◘ Table 1.1 shows detailed differences between academic and pre-service teacher research, from our perspective.
Table 1.1
Differences between academic research and pre-service teacher research
Research dimensions | Academic research | Pre-service teacher research |
|---|---|---|
Topics | Field relevant issues | Personal and contextual teaching/learning issues |
Issues | Generic and generalizable knowledge and understanding pedagogical issues | Personal, contextual understandings of pedagogical issues |
Goal | Theoretical and practical knowledge | Practical knowledge |
Purpose | To add to knowledge/theory | To improve practice |
Questions | Research questions that involve a range of audience | Puzzles (what, how, and why questions) |
Participants | Identified through random or purposeful sampling | Individuals in teachers’ immediate surrounding |
Data collection tools | Tools developed for solely data collection purpose | Tools developed for both data generation and teaching and learning |
Data analysis | Formal analysis tools | Reflection and interpretation |
◘ Table 1.1 marks the differences between academic research and pre-service teacher research, though some dichotomies might be overlapping at some points. Topics and issues for academic research often involve issues that could be linked to what the field needs, whereas for pre-service teacher research issues and topics could be more personal and contextual issues about teaching and learning. We acknowledge that academic research might also study such practical issues but usually with a wider lens and for a wider readership. Both academic and pre-service teacher research share similar goals of promoting practical knowledge, but the former could also be dealing with theoretical issues by generating a theoretical perspective to the issue under investigation. The latter, however, does not necessarily adopt a theoretical stance towards the research issues. This is because academic research attempts to contribute to the field involving people from multiple international contexts, whereas pre-service teacher research helps teacher researchers construct their practical knowledge and understand the teaching and learning process from their own perspectives. This constitutes different purposes of research for both.
In both types of research, research questions might serve for the same purpose (i.e. telling the reader what questions the research is going to answer). However, they might differ in terms of focus. While academic research questions focus on asking about issues that highlight a broad perspective, pre-service teacher research questions could concern personal issues so using “I” or “we” or “my students” could indicate the scope of the research. A puzzle such as “Why do I use pair work more than group work?” or “Why do my students prefer pair work more than group work?” indicates the ownership of the puzzle and implies the answers found or insights reached could be confined to the researcher’s classroom or context. In line with research questions, participants of research could vary too. While academic research would rely on participants from a wider range of contexts (not necessarily though), pre-service teacher research would need to work with those who are the object of the puzzle in the immediate context rather than those in other contexts who might not provide context-related responses and inform the teacher researcher reliably.
The data collection tools also vary in terms of their function. For example, while academic research aims to collect data through non-pedagogical tools, pre-service teacher research creates data collection tools that do not exclude the learning opportunity. The latter benefits learners too, while they are contributing to the investigation led by the teacher (or sometimes both teachers and learners co-research issues). The analysis of the data collected is processed though formal approaches in academic research including statistics and in-depth systematic qualitative approaches, whereas in pre-service teacher research this process involves reflection and interpretation of the students’ scoring and verbal comments. Pre-service teacher research is, therefore, characterized by its simplicity and relevance to the researcher’s professional life and context of work. Academic researchers may sometimes deal with issues that do not specifically address their own needs and interests, but with issues that are underexplored. Teaching academic conventions and procedures of research to pre-service teachers especially in the initial research courses may not be appropriate, since such knowledge may be irrelevant while they are learning to become a teacher. Accordingly, a research course should serve them with the process of learning to become a teacher rather than a researcher. In line with this, research should be viewed and embedded into their course structures as a strategy to advance their understanding of language teaching and learning. Such a course should promote deep thinking discovery and sense making in regard to retrospective reflections and observed practices. Factors that need to be considered are as follows.
Pre-service teachers;
- are focused on formal learning of language teaching methods, language acquisition and so on,
- lack teaching experience but full of language learning stories,
- have fairly limited knowledge about/of research,
- have almost no experience of doing research but may have experience of participating in research of others,
- might deem research methods courses to be extraneous to becoming a teacher,
- have not yet established a sense of professional development particularly by doing research in their classrooms,
- could be ...