Asia-Pacific Forum on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 7, Issue 1, Article 1 (June, 2006) Kevin WATSON and Fran STEELE Building a teacher education community: Recognizing the ecological reality of sustainable collaboration Previous Contents Next

Evaluation of the Model - Method

Rationale

The implementation of the model is the subject of ongoing research to evaluate the efficiency and effectiveness of the project in achieving its outcomes and to provide feedback for the ongoing development and refinement of the professional learning process. The main focus of the research presented here is an assessment of the ability of the strategies outlined above to facilitate community building and promote learning.

A qualitative approach to data collection and analysis was used to determine the effectiveness of the community building. As suggested by Denzin and Lincoln (1998) qualitative research involves a variety of data gathering methods so that a tapestry of evidence is pieced together to form a 'bricolage'. The research on the implementation of the model combined data from interviews, observation, collection of documents and questionnaires.

Sample

The project was devised and conducted by two university teacher educators, who were interviewed during the course of the research. Eight schools in a suburban area of an Australian city that were already part of a collegiate agreed to work with the university in implementing the model of teacher education. The schools included four catholic independent secondary schools (two junior and two senior), and four government secondary schools (three junior and one senior). Eight pre-service science teachers participated in the study. The eight pre-service teachers were the entire cohort of students studying only science as their teaching subject. Each of these pre-service science teachers was supervised by a number of teachers within their allocated schools and all supervising teachers were involved in the research project. A total of 14 teachers were interviewed.

All participants were informed of the nature of the research and gave their written permission for all forms of data collection. At all times it was made clear that participation was voluntary and that participants could withdraw at any time.

Data collection

By the beginning of the first block teaching practical eight pre-service teachers, six head teachers and five supervising teachers had been interviewed. This sample represented at least one member of staff associated with pre-service teacher supervision in each school except one, where time constraints prevented any staff from participating. The questions asked were:

• tell me about the way you teach;
• how would you describe good teaching and what do you think are the features of good teaching;
• briefly describe the ways you were taught;
• how does student learning influence the way that you teach;
• what do you think is the relationship between teaching and learning; and
• what do you think are the fundamental issues in education?

These interviews were recorded and transcribed.

The eight pre-service teachers, and seven supervising teachers were interviewed a second time by the end of the study. These teachers included one from each of the seven schools still participating in the partnership (one pre-service teacher transferred out of the eighth school because of lack of transport). Four of the teachers had been interviewed in the first round. Initially, it was hoped that the same sample would be interviewed at the beginning and end of the study but due to the flexible nature of the allocation of supervisors within this model, different staff had taken responsibility for the pre-service teachers at later stages of the project. The questions for the second round of interviews were:

• what do you think the pre-service teacher has learnt about teaching during this project;
• what did the pre-service teacher bring to your school;
• what are your views about teacher training at the end of the project and how have they changed;
• what skills do you think the pre-service teachers have learnt during the project;
• what have been the benefits to your school of being involved in this project;
• have the community workshops contributed to the overall project;
• what are your views of teaching and learning in science; and
• was there a difference in teaching style between your pre-service teacher and you?

Pre-service teachers were asked essentially the same questions as the teachers, with the wording changed as appropriate. All interviews were recorded and transcribed.

At the end of the first semester pre-service teachers were given an open ended questionnaire about what qualities they thought a good teacher needed, how many teachers they had worked with, and how they thought that working with teachers had helped them gain teaching skills.

Formal written feedback was also obtained from debriefing sessions and workshops. In addition, field notes of two debriefing sessions were kept, and all were attended by the researchers. Their recollections from these meetings also inform this study. At the end of each workshop session, participants were asked to record their views of the session in writing. These responses were collected and used as data. Field notes were made at the first workshop. Materials, such as overheads used in presentations, were also collected as data. All data was coded for common themes (Erickson, 1986) and the validity of the assertions derived from these themes was assessed by systematic reference to the original material.

 

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