According to Erickson (1986) and Rose (1982), in reporting field work, one is to describe the purposes of the research, and how it developed over time, to include details of field work, data collection and methods for keeping field notes, but also an account of the process of data analysis. In this section, I outline the research process as conducted in this study.
The whole process of data collection was conducted for a period of two months (one month in each college) during the second term of the residential course. It was an intense period of data collection. This field work assisted me in extrapolating from various texts the “knowledge about moments of a social practice: (…) its social relationships and processes as well as values and desires of the participants” (Chouliaraki & Fairclough, 1999, p. 62).
My visit to the first college (CTTC) provided me with an insight into the reality of mathematics classrooms at TTCs and the concrete insights into how the student teachers are trained to teach mathematics in primary schools. Therefore, this helped me to be more focused in my questions when I went to KTTC. It also convinced me of the importance of discussions as a useful tool through which the meanings underpinning the interactions and actions recorded from lesson observations could be recorded by the mathematics teacher educators themselves. As agreed, the classes were to run normally and I had no specific topic to observe. All I wanted was to observe how they prepare the student teachers for primary mathematics teaching.
The data collection was in four stages: the pre-observation interviews; the classroom observations; reflective interviews; and lastly the focus group discussions. I shall now present the research process as conducted at the research sites. Before I do that, I discuss briefly the pilot stage that I conducted before the actual data collection.
Pilot
Before conducting the pre-observation interviews, I drafted the interview guide that helped me on the sequencing of the questions during the interviews, that is the order in which I would ask the questions. The interview questions were then piloted on a different mathematics teacher educator who was not involved in this research. The aim of this pilot was to determine the appropriateness of the interview questions as well as to refine the questions to be answered. It also sought to assess the structure and clarity of the interview questions as well as other issues such as layout and time. This led to some amendments in the interview questions.
Conducting the pre-observation interviews
The process of conducting the pre-observation interviews included two basic steps: first, I had an initial meeting with the principal of the college and then with the mathematics teacher educators at their institutions. The aim was to introduce myself to the participants and brief them on the nature of the study. This was done to establish convenient dates and time for the interviews and also personal relationships with the participants.
Secondly, I conducted the pre-observation interviews with the mathematics teacher educators in their colleges some hours before lesson observations. Each mathematics teacher educator was interviewed separately. The interview was conducted within one and a half hours with each mathematics teacher educator. The interview started at around 7:30 am in both colleges as the mathematics teacher educators were free during this and the followed period.
As explained in section 5.3.1, all the questions posed were semi-structured, with possibilities for further probing where necessary. All the mathematics teacher educators were asked the same set of key questions though sometimes in a different order according to how they answered a particular question. The flow of what information each mathematics teacher educator gave shaped the interview. Therefore, this pre- observation interview was a “talk to some purpose” (Hitchcock & Hughes, 1995, p. 79).
During these interviews, the mathematics teacher educators were allowed to use local languages, which both of us could understand, and English. This chance was given to allow them to express their views fully without language limitations. However, most of the interviews were done in English with very minimal use of the local language.
These pre-observation interviews were conducted in the months of January and February 2007 as shown in table 5.2.
Table 5.2: Dates of Pre-observation interviews Name of the
mathematics teacher educator
College Date of the interview
Mrs Joshua KTTC 08/01/2007 Mr Lukhere KTTC 9/01/2007 Mr Salama KTTC 22/01/2007 Mr Otani CTTC 5/02/2007 Mr Kandiya CTTC 5/02/2007 Mr Chipasula CTTC 12/02/2007
The interviews at KTTC were conducted in a staff common room, which is used by all college teacher educators. During each interview, there were a number of interruptions as other teacher educators entered into the room. There was evidence reflecting the mathematics teacher educators’ discomfort with being in their offices because of how it looked and because they were sharing and did not want us to disturb their colleagues.
In contrast, in the other college (CTTC), the interviews were conducted in what was supposed to be the deputy principal’s office where the tables and chairs were arranged as in a conference room. This was so because all mathematics and some science teacher educators were sharing one big office. In the deputy’s office, it was quiet with no disturbances by other college teacher educators or student teachers. All in all, these colleges were calm, orderly, and functioning.
In terms of order, the principal at KTTC never minded to introduce us (me and the photographer) to the mathematics teacher educators to be involved in the research. She
communicated with the mathematics teacher educators and let us meet the mathematics teacher educators and introduced us to them. In the mathematics classes, we were introduced to the student teachers as visitors. This kind of introduction made us to be very free with the mathematics teacher educators, because there was no protocol to be observed. We could go to the offices of the mathematics teacher educators without a feeling of breaking the protocol and so we were like co-workers. As a result of this, the process of data collection went on smoothly without going through hierarchical stages. In the other college, (CTTC) it was orderly, and all protocol had to be observed. We were first introduced to the head of the mathematics and science department, by the principal himself and later to the mathematics teacher educators by the head of the science and mathematics department. With this protocol at CTTC, we were careful not to break the protocol and so we had to ask before we could do anything. And this restricted our movements in the college and we felt that we were visitors on the campus. However, in the classes it was a bit different, in the sense that we were introduced as colleagues in the field of teaching by the mathematics teacher educators. This made a big difference as we were free inside their classrooms.
Apart from discovering things, I found that, in asking many of the questions, I encouraged some of the participants to reflect critically on their own discourse practices as they prepare the student teachers in their mathematics classrooms.
After the pre-observation interviews, mathematics lessons were observed where I was the key instrument as a researcher and interpreter of the data collected.
Conducting the classroom observations
Each of the four mathematics teacher educators was video recorded for five consecutive lessons of one hour each. There were no double lessons. The observations took place in January and February 2007. The photographer was instructed to focus on the mathematics teacher educator and his/her interactions with the student teachers. The aim was to capture the mathematics teacher educators’ actions. However, in some cases the approach by the mathematics teacher educators seemed to be more learner-centered. So, besides focusing on the mathematics teacher educator practices in the classroom,
sometimes the photographer focused on what the student teachers were doing at a particular time.
It was agreed that the lesson to be video-taped should be part of the normal programme of teaching. As an observer, I did not participate in any classroom activities; each lesson was filmed by a professional photographer. We did not make any arrangements about the topics and areas being taught; however, according to their practice, all the mathematics teacher educators in all the TTCs were teaching almost the same topic, at the same time, and all the mathematics teacher educators were teaching the same level. Mrs Joshua and Mr Lukhere were video recorded teaching fractions, while Mr Otani and Mr Chipasula were video recorded teaching decimals. Besides observing the mathematics teacher educators’ actions and practices in their classrooms, the student teachers’ involvement was also observed.
Conducting reflective interviews
The reflective interviews were conducted with each mathematics teacher educator separately after all the classroom observations. Each interview took about one hour to one and a half hours. At KTTC, I did the reflective interviews with one mathematics teacher educator (Mr Lukhere) after three days of observing his lessons. The interviews were conducted in the student teachers’ computer room, because, during that time, there was no class. There were no disturbances, it was quiet and calm. The second mathematics teacher educator, (Mrs Joshua) was sick for more than two weeks, and had to go to the Malawi Institute of Education for curriculum review soon after her recovery where she stayed for another two weeks, so I was unable to do the reflective interview with her.
At CTTC, I did the reflective interviews with the two mathematics teacher educators separately. One of them refused to go to the same place where we did the pre- observation interviews because he said it was far away and instead we did the reflective interviews in their office. During this interview, there were so many interruptions that we both would forget what we were discussing. There were a number of student teachers coming in and he preferred to attend to the student teachers first and then we
continued with the interview. This went on for the whole period of the interview. The other mathematics teacher educator suggested that we go to the deputy principal’s office where we did the interviews. In this office, there were no disturbances.
Each of the three reflective interviews was tape recorded and took place as presented in table 5.3.
Table 5.3: Dates of Reflective interviews
NAME DAY DATE
Mr Lukhere Friday 19/01/2007
Mr Otani Monday 12/02/2007
Mr Chipasula Monday 19/02/2007
The reflective interviews were more complex. It was difficult to choose the video clip that would facilitate the interviews because they were many (5 lessons per mathematics teacher educators, one hour each). It was not possible to see all the video clips on their discourse practices in their classes because of the short time for the reflective interviews (one to one and half hours) for the mathematics teacher educators’ feedback. However, the incidents that I thought as having particular relevance in relation to the aims of the study were discussed. For example, I looked at how the lessons were presented, their sequencing, the language used, verbal expressions, the way they controlled the lessons and turn-taking in their classrooms. Probing these issues helped me to gain an insight into the social dynamics of the classroom to add meaning to the video recordings, and to get clues about the social identities and positions which were created by and with texts.
Just as with the pre-observation interviews, these interviews were also tape recorded.
Conducting focus group discussions
The discussions in KTTC were conducted with two mathematics teacher educators two weeks after the lesson observations; one was involved in the classroom observations, while the other one was not involved. This was so because of the illness of one of the mathematics teacher educators involved (as described above). The discussions were initiated by showing the mathematics teacher educators some of the video clips of the
mathematics teacher educators who was available for the discussions. Before these discussions, the mathematics teacher educators were asked if we could use their class video clips separately. The interviews took place in the mathematics teacher educator’s office. It was quiet and calm.
In CTTC, I conducted the discussions with the two mathematics teacher educators involved. The discussions went well although it was mostly a two-way discussion (Mr Chipasula and I). The other one was very quiet and did not contribute much because he said I was asking difficult questions which he would not be able to answer. I tried to explain the questions further but still he was quiet. His contribution was very minimal.
As in all other interviews, the educators were allowed to use any language that everybody would understand. In CTTC, it was mostly Chichewa that was used, while at KTTC it was mostly English.