CONCLUSIONS

At an uncritical and surface level study one indicates that the tutors who were responsible for co-ordinating and teaching interviewing and problem solving perceive these to be core skills to educational psychology practice. It was concluded that the data showed that the majority of course tutors in England, Wales and Northern Ireland claimed to teach an hypothesis-testing framework to guide interviewing and problem solving. All tutors rated interviewing and problem solving skills to be very important to the work of educational psychologists. In addition the majority of tutors reported that they taught accessible reasoning (or semantic variants of it) to the EPITs on their courses.

With reference to the conceptual review outlined in chapter two it was optimistically assumed that the majority o f courses surveyed were teaching both the various component strategies involved in successful interviewing and the cognitive strategies aimed at facilitating interviewer understanding. It was further assumed that tutors perceived that the complex task of deriving meaning from an initial teacher interview was more than just a matter o f how to communicate, but also how to understand the teacher's problem so that the interviewer can know what to communicate to the teacher. It was proposed in chapter two that an important goal of initial teacher

interviews is to reach a high quality understanding of the teacher's problem situation. This task requires considerable cognitive as well and communicative skill. It was concluded that the majority of training courses in England, Wales and Northern Ireland show at an espoused level an adherence to a process framework which not only describes the component skills, but also provides an explanation o f the cognitive processes contributing to an understanding of teachers' problem situations. Within the limited time available during one-year training programmes, courses perceive that they are doing a "more than adequate" job o f preparing EPITs for such activities.

Unfortunately study one does not provide evidence as to whether or not this is actually so, or that it is not so and as previous sections have outlined there are real concerns about the reliability and validity of the data collected. As a way o f addressing some o f these concerns study three (described in chapter seven) returns to a sub-sample o f the course tutors who were involved in study one. However, this time a series o f semi­ structured face-to-face interviews is undertaken to explore and investigate their reactions to some o f the main findings from the thesis as a whole.

Study three represents an attempt to move beyond the limitations imposed by the use o f a postal questionnaire and provides a useful way of concluding this thesis by presenting a careful analysis of course tutors reactions to some of its main findings. This is important given the complexity of the assumptions made about course tutors understanding of hypothesis-testing, accessible reasoning and the potential challenges to the ways interviewing and problem solving are conceptualised and taught to EPITs in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

3.6.1. Final reflections

Study one used a standardised postal questionnaire with predominately closed questions to obtain the views and reactions of course tutors to a range of issues focused on the conceptualisation, content and teaching of interviewing and problem solving skills. One o f the main limitations of using standardised questionnaire surveys is that the areas of interest are predetermined by the researcher who relies upon the anonymous reports of respondents. Study one did not attempt to triangulate or explore in depth its findings by directly approaching course tutors and seeking their views and opinions or indeed their

accounts o f what were important considerations when teaching EPITs interviewing and problem solving skills.

The exceptionally high return rate could well have reflected course tutors concern "to do a fellow tutor a favour" but because of constraints of time and social desirability factors they filled the questionnaire in, perhaps quickly tending to leave out those questions which required a greater degree of input, self disclosure, reflection and thought. However, there was no way to collaborate whether, at a theory-in-use level, courses actually did the things they reported that they were doing. It may also be the case that the course tutors did not actually understand some of the key concepts and ideas covered within the questionnaire. Yet the current researcher in their conclusions took the results at face value assuming a shared understanding of key concepts and generalising, for example that "sharing one's thinking aloud" was in fact thought o f as being the same thing as the complex concept o f accessible reasoning. The picture which emerged was an optimistic but uncritical one.

On hindsight these are real weaknesses to the validity of the conclusions derived from study one. It would have been more illuminating, in terms o f providing other perspectives and a much richer picture of course tutor views if follow-up interviews had also been conducted alongside the more "objective measures" used (Miller, 1996, p.77). As has already been mentioned some o f these issues will be dealt with in study three.

Any claim that study one represents the definitive word on course tutors views on interviewing and problem solving and the role o f accessible reasoning in the development o f problem understanding is unfounded. The previous sections have highlighted a number of significant reservations which cast real doubt on the reliability and validity o f the data collected. Taken together such concerns support the view that study one was rather a weak study, in the sense that questions are raised about the meaningfulness and thus usefulness of the data collected.

3.6.2. The next investigation

Study one highlights what course tutors say they are doing at an espoused level with regard to interviewing and problem solving. But how do we know that their views are reflected in actual practice? The next chapter will detail a study which investigated

elements o f actual practice (theory-in-use) in one of the courses surveyed. Study two is a longitudinal experimental study designed to investigate the development and relationship o f selected interviewer behaviours to the attainment of a high quality understanding o f a teacher's problem, in a group o f EPITs in training.