Selection of the participants

According to the principles of Critical Discourse Analysis, the researcher must be self- conscious, and write his or herself as a distinctive and recognizable voice into the study alongside his or her informant (Waller, 2006). I, therefore, drew on my experiences working as a mathematics teacher educator. I believe that such exposure positions me to be able to explain the language practices of the mathematics teacher educators well. Such an approach helps me to make sense of how the participants interpret and socially construct reality and the possible influences which may have contributed to such constructions.

The sample was based on four mathematics teacher educators from the two TTCs, two mathematics teacher educators from each college. From a CDA perspective, the sample size is enough to provide insights into the specific cases from which one can construct an understanding (rather than a statistical explanation) of broad phenomena. This implies that the sample size used in this study, though apparently small, was sufficient to generate substantial quality information needed to answer the research questions for this study.

These participants were chosen according to the following criteria:

1. Each mathematics teacher educator had to have a tertiary mathematics qualification to ensure that he or she has at least a high level qualification. This

was done to rule out the possibility that their practices might be due to not being well-qualified for the profession.

2. Each mathematics teacher educator had to have at least three years of teaching experience at college level in order to rule out the possibility that their discourse practices might be due to lack of teaching experience.

3. They were also selected on the basis of their willingness to participate in the study.

On the issue of participants, as I have already pointed out, it was supposed to be two mathematics teacher educators from each college. However, one of the two mathematics teacher educators selected from KTTC, got sick after the lesson observations. She was unable to speak and did not report for work for two weeks. This meant that we could not have reflective interviews with her and so there was no chance for her to comment about her actions. Her absence, however, meant that I had to conduct the focus group discussions with one participant which was not possible because that would be the same as having reflective interviews with him which we had already done by that time. Therefore, I included one of the mathematics teacher educators who was available at that time. This was a difficult decision to make but I wanted to find out different perspectives and to understand what mathematics teacher educators perceive about the discourse practices that they do in their lessons.

At the other college (CTTC), one of the two mathematics teacher educators who was involved in this study was later chosen by the college administration to go for a curriculum review workshop as he was the one involved in those issues at the college. So, he dropped out after the pre-observation interviews and after observing his two lessons. This meant that I could continue with one participant or choose another one. Since I wanted to have a balanced view and a fair representation of what the mathematics teacher educators do, I started the whole process again with another mathematics teacher educator. However, this change did not have a significant effect on the data that was collected since this mathematics teacher educator satisfied all the requirements that I used in choosing the participants. The effect was that it took me

more days to finish data collection than planned which had a bearing on the cost as well. In the next section, I present the brief description of all the mathematics teacher educators who were involved. The names that have been used are not real ones.

Background of the mathematics teacher educators Mrs Joshua

Mrs Joshua comes from the northern region of Malawi where her home language is Chitumbuka. She did her tertiary education at the University of Malawi – Chancellor College in Zomba district where she graduated with a Bachelors degree in Education majoring in mathematics in the year 2002. She worked as a secondary school mathematics and geography teacher at one of the secondary schools in Malawi from 2002 to 2004. Then she joined Kachere TTC where she had been teaching mathematics and life skills for three years.

While working as a mathematics teacher educator at KTTC, Mrs Joshua attended two professional developmental courses. The first one was in 2005 at the same college. The focus of the course was on the implementation of the Initial Primary Teacher Education (IPTE) programme which had just been introduced. The training was conducted by the Ministry of Education through the Malawi Institute of Education. After that, she attended another course on Primary Curriculum Assessment Reform (PCAR) in 2006 which was also conducted by the Malawi Institute of Education. Besides being a mathematics teacher educator, she was the Deputy Head of the social and environmental science department and the initiator of the mathematics club for female student teachers. Mrs Joshua was involved in Pre-observation interviews and classroom observations only because of the reasons discussed earlier.

Her mathematics class involved in the research had 47 student teachers of whom nine were females and thirty eight were males. The age range of the student teachers was 20 to 35. In her class, there were three major languages: Sena, Lomwe and Chichewa, and two other minor languages. However, everybody could speak and understand Chichewa.

Mr Lukhere

Mr Lukhere, like Mrs Joshua, comes from the Northern region of Malawi and his home language is Chitumbuka. He did his Bachelors degree with the University of Malawi – Chancellor College where he graduated in 2001 with a Bachelor’s degree in Education, majoring in geography, and with mathematics as a minor subject. In the same year, Mr Lukhere started teaching at one of the urban secondary schools in the capital city of Malawi. He taught for four years and then joined the KTTC in 2005 January where he was teaching mathematics and life skills.

Mr Lukhere attended a number of workshops on the campus focusing on different areas which were mostly conducted by the donors through the Ministry of Education. In 2004, he attended an in-service training course which was conducted by the Malawi Institute of Education focusing on the orientation of the new primary school curriculum (PCAR). This was initiated by the change of curriculum at primary school so it meant change as well at the teacher training college.

Apart from teaching at the college, he also held other responsibilities at the college. He was the vice chairman of the assessment committee where he was involved in the planning and administration of end of term examinations, and processing grades for various subjects at the college. In addition, he was also a member of a computer committee where he taught the student teachers basic computer programmes for literacy.

His mathematics class in this study had 48 student teachers of whom 14 were females and 34 males. The age range of the student teachers was 20 to 35. The majority home languages included Sena, Lomwe, Chichewa and Yao. Chitumbuka was a minority group.

Mr Salama

Mr Salama came from the southern region of Malawi where his home language was Lomwe. He held a senior primary (T2) teachers’ certificate and a Diploma in Education. He obtained the T2 certificate in 1981, from Lilongwe TTC in the central region of

Malawi. After obtaining this certificate, he taught as a T2 primary school teacher from 1981 until 1989. He then went to the University of Malawi – Chancellor College to upgrade his qualifications; he obtained a Diploma in Education in 1989 with a major in Mathematics. Then, he was promoted to teach as a secondary school mathematics teacher. He taught at the secondary school for a year and then joined the teacher training college where he has been teaching mathematics from 1990.

Mr Salama has attended a number of workshops conducted by different departments in the Ministry of Education and other agencies such as Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) - Malawi. From 2001 to 2003, he attended a professional development course which was conducted by the British Council in Malawi. The focus of the course was on primary community teacher training of trainers. Apart from that, he also attended an in-service training course at the same college, which was conducted by GTZ, focusing on learner-centered education methods. Besides being a mathematics teacher educator, he was the head of the science and mathematics department, and he was also a member of the assessment committee of the college. In this study, Mr Salama was involved in pre-observation interviews and focus group discussions only.

His class had a total number of 50 student teachers of whom 34 were males and 16 were females. Their ages ranged from 18 to 30. The student teachers’ main languages in the class included Lomwe, Yao, Sena and Chichewa. He shared the home language with one major group in his class.

Mr Kandiya

Mr Kandiya comes from the southern region of Malawi. His home language is Lomwe. He holds a Bachelors degree of Education, majoring in mathematics obtained from the University of Malawi, in 1995. Immediately after college, Mr Kandiya started working as a mathematics and physical science teacher at one of the secondary schools in Malawi until 2003. In 2003, he joined the TTC where he was teaching Mathematics.

Apart from being a mathematics teacher educator, he was appointed the head of the mathematics and science department and served for two years at the TTC. While at secondary school, he was the acting head and served as a boarding master.

His mathematics class that participated in the research had a total number of 45 student teachers where 19 were females and 26 were males. Their ages ranged from 24 to 35. The student teachers’ main languages included Chichewa and Chitumbuka while the speakers of Yao and Lomwe were a minority. He did not share his home language with the majority of the student teachers in the class.

Mr Otani

Mr Otani comes from the central region of Malawi, where his home language is Chichewa. He had eleven years experience of teaching. He started teaching at primary school in 1993 where he taught for two years. By then, he had a T2 certificate in education obtained from one of the TTCs in Malawi. In 1996, he was transferred to teach at one of the secondary schools in Malawi where he taught from 1996 to 2004 even though he did not have the necessary qualifications, for example a Bachelors degree or Diploma in Education2. While teaching at secondary school, he obtained a certificate in special education from Montfort College of Education. He then joined the TTCs in 2005 where he was teaching mathematics. Mr Otani did not have any further responsibilities at the College.

His mathematics class that participated in the research had 50 student teachers of whom 16 were females and 34 were males. Their age ranges varied from 19 to 35. The student teachers’ main languages included Chichewa, English, and Chitumbuka. There were also speakers of Tonga and Yao, but in a minority. He shared his home language with most of the student teachers in his class.

2

In Malawi, the normal education level for secondary school teachers is either an undergraduate diploma or a bachelors degree in ones area of specialisation.

It is worth pointing out here that Mr Otani did not meet one of the criteria that I had put in place as he did not have a Bachelors degree. However, as I explained ealier, I had to include him as he was the only mathematics teacher educator left on campus after one of the participants withdrew. I feel that his experience in the teaching profession to some extent overrides the fact that he had no Bachelors degree.

Mr Chipasula

Mr Chipasula is a mathematics teacher educator who comes from the central region of Malawi where his home language is Chichewa. He held a Bachelors degree in Education, majoring in mathematics obtained from the University of Malawi – Chancellor College in 1995. After his graduation, he taught as a secondary school mathematics and physical science teacher in Malawi for five years. In the year 2000, he joined the TTC where he has been teaching for over 6 years. His teaching subject has always been Mathematics. Since he joined the TTC, he has never attended any professional developmental course, apart from workshops.

Besides being a mathematics teacher educator, he was deputy chairman of the assessment committee at the College where he was responsible for the planning and administration of examinations and the assessment of the grades at college level. He was also the head of the mathematics and science department.

His class had a total number of 48 student teachers where 10 were females and 38 were males. The ages ranged from 20 to 35. The student teachers’ main languages included Chichewa and Chitumbuka, and he shared his home language with most of the student teachers in his class.

Table 5.1 shows the profiles of the mathematics teacher educators and their classes in summary.

Table 5.1: Profile of mathematics teacher educators and a summary of their classes in summary Name Highest Academic Qualifications Teaching experience at TTC Teaching Subjects at the TTC Age Number of student teachers Female student teachers Male student teachers Mrs Joshua BEd (Mathematics) 3 years - Mathematics - Life Skills 28 47 9 38 Mr Lukhere BEd (Mathematics) 3 years - Mathematics - Life Skills 29 48 14 34 Mr Salama Diploma in Education (Mathematics) 11 years - Mathematics - Life Skills 48 50 16 34 Mr Kandiya BEd (Mathematics) 4 years - Mathematics 39 45 19 26 Mr Otani - T2 certificate in Education -Certificate in Special education 3 years - Mathematics 41 50 16 34 Mr Chipasula BEd (Mathematics) 6 years Mathematics 38 48 10 38