THE STUDENT EXPERIENCE

Before conducting the focus group and interviews to gain a student (emic) perspective on their experience, I informed the students that their qualification had been completed and their results had been recorded. This was an important distinction as I did not want to confuse my role as teacher and researcher. I provided them with an information sheet (Appendix 1) detailing my research and their involvement in it, my contact details and information regarding withdrawing from the research at any time. They were also provided with a consent form to be completed and signed by them. Ethical issues require consideration throughout the entire research process and not just at the time of providing information and completing forms. A procedure for

withdrawing from the research process was detailed on the information sheet and students were encouraged to speak to me at any time if they had any concerns about their involvement or confidentiality. They were familiar with my email address and a bond of trust had developed during my period of teaching the students. I felt confident they would express any concerns to me directly however I also encouraged them to speak with a fellow student who could report back to me if any student felt vulnerable. I trusted that the students would be respectful towards

me and each other. I encouraged them to speak honestly and told them that the qualification they were undertaking was now finished and I wanted to learn from their experience to assist further groups of students. Their comfort in participating in this research was paramount in my explanation to them. Smith (1995) discusses not only considering how the participants might feel during the focus group but also how they might feel in the aftermath of disclosures by other students. What participants might find distressing is likely to be a personal matter and because of the nature of the open group discussion, anticipating distressful experiences could be challenging. Accounts of experiences during the period of teaching might also upset the researcher as she might hear things about the way she handled the group which may cause regret. I sought the students’ permission to have my colleague present during the focus group and explained her role in recording the proceedings of the focus group. I also offered her presence as a means of either the students or myself needing to discuss, in private, issues as they arose which might affect our ability to continue in a professional manner with the collection of data.

Debriefing at the end of the focus group and interviews was given due consideration, and time was given to allow participants to consider the impact the discussion in the focus group and interviews had on their observations of their time in Australia. Students were invited to discuss any issues which might have arisen from these discussions with me or my colleague. The duration of the focus group was just under three hours with one fifteen minute break in the middle, although some students remained at the end to continue discussion with me. The duration of each interview was generally around one hour.

6.2.1 Focus group

Conducting cross-cultural focus groups for the purpose of research has been the chosen method of many studies (Adderley-Kelly & Greene, 2005; Colucci, 2008; Knodel, 1995; Strickland, 1999; Yelland & Gifford, 1995). Most discuss the need to address the specific cultural norms of participants when conducting the focus groups so these differences can be catered for throughout the process. For example, Strickland (1999) exposes the custom for the elders in Pacific Northwest Indians to be the last to speak at a gathering which affected the essential interactivity of the discussion. Adderley-Kelly and Greene (2005) list amongst their lessons learned that a trusting relationship is vital to the success of focus group research and yet it can take time to build trusting relationships across cultures because of the differences in communication. All authors speak of the need for respect for cultural differences. Several factors in relation to the TL students need to be considered in my data analysis. Firstly, a trusting relationship had been developed over the year I had been teaching these students. Secondly, their exposure to cultural customs in Australia during their three month stay in

Melbourne had influenced their approach to communication with me as their teacher. I no longer felt like the authority figure (teacher) they had been taught not to question when they were in school in TL, but rather I sensed a willingness to engage in more open discussion. They had adopted the concept of critical thinking during their study in Melbourne and had been exposed to the notion of evidence based practice through research. There was little to fear for them as

they were well known to each other, and had developed trusting relationships with both myself and my colleague as well as each other. In fact their exuberance in discussing the particular challenges identified during the focus group often brought laughter and smiles to their faces.

It was important to me as the researcher to gain honest and spontaneous data in the focus group before exploring how particular difficulties were perceived. To achieve this I sought a free flow of responses in conversation style initially, before involving the students in activities designed to induce deeper reflection. My colleague took notes during the free flow of conversation and, with student permission, I recorded the discussion on a digital recorder. Together with the students we grouped their responses under themes which we wrote on individual pieces of butcher’s paper and stuck on the walls around the room for all to observe. The students were then given stick-it notes to record individual observations and invited to stick them on the butcher’s paper under the appropriate themes. To avoid disadvantaging students whose English skills were poor, I encouraged discussion in Tetun and allowed small groups to chat together before providing their feedback. Stick-it notes were a deliberate choice for

individual feedback in point form, so that students did not feel overwhelmed by having to write in English. Discussion on the points made on the stick-it notes was also encouraged in Tetun with those more proficient translating into English. This allowance provided richer data more

representative of the group as a whole, not just from those with more proficient English.

6.2.2 Semi-structured interviews

During the focus group all students had been encouraged to reveal their personal experiences of their study in a developed country setting, however the further purpose of the semi-structured interviews was to provide an opportunity for individual students to reveal more openly their coping strategies and how they perceived the development of their relationship with the teacher. Whilst each of the four volunteer students appeared eager to share their experiences, their limited English language skills restricted their ability to find the vocabulary to describe their experiences. Patton (2002) describes how cross-cultural interviews can add layers of difficulty to the already complex interactions of a semi-structured interview as both the interviewer and the interviewees grapple with limited vocabulary to describe complex responses,

misinterpretations of responses and further questioning from the interviewer to clarify responses that the interviewee has no language to describe. However the interviews between myself and these four students had the advantage of being grounded in the long-term relationship we had developed with each other and the level of trust which had developed between student and teacher. They were also assured that anything they revealed in the interviews would not affect the gaining of their qualification as results had already been recorded. The students were familiar with the interview questions as they had been given these questions at the

commencement of the focus group before they accepted the invitation to be interviewed. They understood the nature of the research and its purpose which had been explained to them at the time they received their information sheet before the focus group.

6.2.3 Data analysis techniques

In analysing the data from both the focus group and the interviews, I looked for themes in student experiences which indicated a co-relation between their individual experiences and their group experience. This homogeneous sample of international students with similar cultural backgrounds had varying levels of experience in international travel and diversity in study experiences. Nonetheless the majority of their experiences followed similar themes as they dealt with cultural change, extreme weather conditions, new learning conditions and techniques, and language difficulties of varying degrees. In fact, as noted in 6.2.1 above, in the focus group the students themselves assisted in identifying themes before they went through the exercise of using stick-it-notes to explore more fully their experiences. In re-assembling the data under the themes identified by the students, I present the data as expressed by the students in the focus group and in the interviews and then progress to a discussion and analysis referring to the literature to assist in the sense-making of the data. I present the researcher comments and direct quotations from student data in italics.

6.3

DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION