Data was collected via two modes, which are interviews and lesson observations.
3.4.1 Administration of interviews
Interviews are one of the data collecting methods that have been widely applied to gather qualitative data about different phenomenon. Gay and Airasian (2000) defined interviews as modes of data collection that are purposeful and involve the interaction between two or more people. Setati (2002) suggested that interviews are used to collect data that elicits in-depth information about participants’ perspectives and experiences. The use of structured interviews allowed the researcher to obtain deeper perceptions about the teaching of life sciences using English. Structured interviews involve the researcher asking questions which are specified beforehand and adhering to them in the given order (Setati, 2002; Patton, 2002; Ferreira, 2011; Prinsloo et al., 2018). The utilisation of structured interviews allowed the researcher to gain appropriate and comparable data from all six participants.
Richards and Morse (2007) suggested that interviews are the recommended instruments in order to obtain in-depth knowledge about participants’ thoughts, beliefs, knowledge, reasoning, motivation, and feelings about certain themes or aspects. Hence, individual interviews were utilised to obtain data about teachers’ perceptions in teaching life sciences using English. Moreover, Lincoln and Guba (1985) recommended that certain steps should be employed before conducting interviews; this includes introducing participants to the study and the procedure to be followed. In this way participants are aware of what is required of them and they can engage thoroughly with the interview questions. In this study, participants were informed beforehand of the nature of the study and what it entailed.
Gudula (2017) maintained that the utilisation of interviews presents both advantages and disadvantages, which have the potential to influence the type of data obtained by the researcher. Some of the advantages of using interview schedules are that they are: flexible, adaptable, present the researcher with the ability to probe and clarify, the ability to include non-verbal behaviour, and produce a high response rate for non-readers. Therefore, this allowed the researcher to structure questions that revealed in-depth information about participants’ perceptions on the phenomenon of language. In contrast, there are some disadvantages that are associated with using interviews to obtain qualitative data. Setati (2002), Mills (2011), Feez
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and Quinn (2017), all noted that some of the disadvantages associated with interviews are that they are time-consuming, there may be interviewer bias, and this may result in leading questions. This has the potential to negatively influence the type of data that can be obtained. This being the case, the researcher administered interviews with this in mind.
Data collection firstly involved interviewing each of the six teachers once using a structured interview schedule to establish teachers’ perceptions regarding the teaching of life sciences using English. The interviews took up to 15 minutes and since the language aspect was evaluated, teachers’ responses were not confined to English. This allowed the researcher to establish the perceptions of life-sciences teachers in teaching using English. Some of the questions from the interviews were meant to elicit teachers’ perceptions about the SA language policy, the impact of English as the medium of instruction and the various strategies employed by life-sciences teachers in science classes. Once the interviews were conducted, they were transcribed and analysed.
3.4.2 Administration of lesson observations
Mills (2011) described observations as the information collected by the researcher as the event under investigation occurs. In addition, observation allows the researcher to obtain direct information about human interaction and thus provides the researcher with the opportunity for a detailed analysis (Setati, 2002; Patton, 2002; Mills, 2011). In this study, the six teachers were observed once whilst teaching a Grade 11 Life Science topic and this allowed the researcher to correlate the relationship between the interviews conducted and the findings from the observations. In addition, Gudula (2017) postulated that observations allow the study of phenomena at close range with many of the contextual variables present. These contextual variables included the language that was used as the lesson progressed, and how life-sciences teachers experienced the use of English in a life-science class. Observations were suitable for this study because they provided a more detailed analysis on the individual teacher’s use of language in a science classroom. Furthermore, this enabled the researcher to gather comprehensive data about teachers’ experiences in teaching life sciences using English.
To gain insights into teachers’ experiences in teaching life sciences using English, each teacher was observed once whilst teaching a life-sciences lesson to Grade 11 learners. A revised Reformed Teaching Observation Protocol (RTOP) was used to capture the level of both each
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teacher and their learners’ involvement during the lessons (Sawada et al., 2000). In particular, incidences of learner engagement with the content, teacher–learner and learner–learner interactions were captured and scored using the RTOP rubric. Both the interviews and lessons were audio-recorded and video-recorded respectively with permission from the participants. Mills (2011) pointed out that observations allow the researcher to examine non-elicited behaviour as it happens. Hence, this was significant in obtaining a holistic experience on how language is used in the classroom. In the same vein, Creswell (2011) inferred that observations provide a more complete description of the phenomenon that would be impossible by analysing interview documents. The observations allowed the researcher to gain insights into the experiences of teachers and how they teach using English in a life-sciences classroom. The following table 3.2 shows a summary of the lessons observed.
Table 3.2: Summary of lessons observed in the six teachers’ classes
Names Class number Topic
Mulalo 11 A Gaseous exchange: Functioning
of the ventilation system
Zanele 11 C Gaseous exchange: Respiratory
diseases
Sizwe 11 A Excretion: Role of the organs,
The lungs, kidneys and Bladder
Koali 11 D Excretion: Urinary system
Shilubane 11 B Gaseous exchange: The effects
of smoking on gaseous exchange
Phale 11 D Excretion: Nephron structure
and functioning