UNDERSTANDING TEACHERS’ ENGAGEMENT IN INQUIRY-BASED PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

UNDERSTANDING TEACHERS’ ENGAGEMENT IN INQUIRY-BASED PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT Subhi Ashour (BA, M.Ed, MRes) Thesis submitted to the Open University in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Faculty of Education and Language Studies July 2016 ABSTRACT This study investigates how a UK Secondary School introduced inquiry as a form of teacher professional development and focuses on the levels of engagement by the teachers in this type of development activity The approach taken in this investigation centres on a qualitative case study focusing on a deep understanding of teachers’ beliefs, conceptions and experiences of inquiry engagement Data was collected over an academic year by interviewing nine teachers and a senior member of the school leadership team at different stages throughout the academic year; by observing teachers in some of their classes and the staffroom; and by collecting internal documents and external public reports related to the school and the inquiry programme The data was analysed using thematic coding which facilitated the identification and comparison of significant themes across all data sets Findings from the research reveal that despite the school’s attempts to engage teachers in inquiry, the latter found it challenging to so due to various factors The analysis reveals the emerging factors of the conceptualisation of inquiry, availability of resources and ownership of the inquiry initiative and the impact of school culture on teachers’ inquiry engagement The question of the appropriateness of inquiry as a form of professional development and the way it is facilitated in school emerges as a key theme The study claims three main contributions to the field of teacher inquiry Firstly, it proposes incorporating a micropolitical perspective of the school culture to investigate the realities of teachers’ inquiry work The study argues through empirical illustration that such a perspective is likely to provide us with invaluable insights necessary to understand teachers’ conceptualisation of inquiry and their inquiry engagement Secondly, this study proposes a categorisation of various types of teachers’ inquiry engagement Such categorisation is likely to help us understand how and why teachers engage in inquiry and therefore the best ways to facilitate this type of professional development Finally, the current study advances a framework illustrating various processes, interacting factors and main considerations in the context of inquiry as a form of professional development for teachers The framework explains how teachers respond to an inquiry programme and the conditions that facilitate their inquiry engagement or otherwise This contribution has practical implications for schools and practitioners interested in undertaking inquiry as a form of professional development It is argued that the practical implications are likely to improve the planning and implementation of inquiry programmes in schools Page | Table of Contents Abstract Table of Contents List of figures List of tables LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS 10 INTRODUCTION 11 1.1 Setting the scene for the study 11 1.2 Motivations to undertake the study 12 1.2.1 A longstanding personal interest 12 1.2.2 An active role of the teacher .13 1.2.3 A bottom-up approach .14 1.3 Context of the study .14 1.3.1 The Academies Programme 15 Types of Academies 16 Greenleys Park Academy 18 1.4 Aims and objectives 19 1.5 Research Questions 20 1.6 The focus of the study .21 1.7 Organisation of the thesis 22 Literature review 23 2.1 Introduction .23 2.2 School Culture 24 2.2.1 Macropolitics of the school: standards, accountability and performativity 24 2.2.2 The Micropolitics of the School 26 Understanding school micropolitics 27 Power 31 Change .34 Resistance and Conflict 35 2.3 Summary of school culture 36 2.4 Continuous Professional Development 37 2.4.1 Defining CPD 37 2.4.2 Models of CPD activities 39 2.5 Varieties of Teacher Research Approaches .40 2.5.1 Introduction to action research 43 2.5.2 Origins and Development of action research 45 Page | Kurt Lewin 45 Stephen Corey 49 Lawrence Stenhouse 50 John Elliott and others in the UK .50 Stephen Kemmis 51 Cochran-Smith and Lytle 51 2.5.3 Characteristics of Action Research .52 Small-scale 52 Practical .53 Reflective 54 Change-oriented 55 Collaborative 55 Values and beliefs-based 58 2.6 Teachers’ Beliefs and Conceptions 59 2.6.1 Significance of teachers’ beliefs 59 2.6.2 The relationship between beliefs and practice 60 2.7 Chapter Summary 61 Methodology and methods 62 3.1 Introduction .62 3.2 Research design: description and rationale 62 3.2.1 Qualitative Research 62 Conceptualising qualitative research 62 A rationale for taking a qualitative approach .65 3.2.2 The case study approach .67 Case study as an appropriate approach in this study 67 The messiness of locating the case in case study research 69 3.3 The Research Process 70 3.3.1 Negotiating and gaining access to the school 70 3.3.2 Pre-entry and workshops .72 3.3.3 Selecting the participants 73 3.3.4 The structure of the inquiry programme 75 3.3.5 Positioning 77 3.4 Data collection and analysis 78 3.4.1 A note on ‘data collection’ 78 Interviews 81 Documents 82 Surveys 84 A summary of the data collection process 85 Data analysis 87 3.4.2 Ensuring research trustworthiness .90 Page | 3.4.3 Ethical considerations 92 Informed consent .93 Power relationships 93 Problematising anonymity and confidentiality 95 3.5 Chapter Summary 96 The inquiry Programme 97 4.1 Introduction .97 4.2 Description of the inquiry programme 97 4.2.1 Rationale .97 4.2.2 Structure 99 The Deputy Head .99 The group leaders 100 The group members 100 4.2.3 Phases 101 4.2.4 Commentary 102 4.3 Chapter summary 103 Development of Beliefs and Understandings about Research & Research Engagement 104 5.1 Introduction 104 5.2 Teachers’ beliefs about research engagement .104 5.2.1 Beliefs and understandings of inquiry .105 The ‘ideal’ teacher 107 Summary of the ‘ideal’ teacher 110 The ‘real’ teacher .111 5.2.2 Critical factors in the development of beliefs about inquiry .127 Workshops .128 Time 130 Communication 133 Collaboration 138 Power relationships 140 Understanding of research .144 5.3 Inquiry engagement .148 5.3.1 Types of inquiry engagement 148 Purposeful engagement 149 Sceptical engagement .150 Strategic engagement .151 ‘Sailing with the tide’ engagement 152 Coasting engagement .154 5.3.2 Summary of types of inquiry engagement 155 Page | 5.4 Research outcomes 155 5.4.1 Outcomes related to students 156 5.4.2 Outcomes related to the school 158 5.4.3 Outcomes related to individual goals 161 5.5 Conditions for inquiry engagement .163 5.5.1 Physical environment of the school 163 5.5.2 Conceptualisation of inquiry 164 5.5.3 Communication 165 5.5.4 The micropolitics of the school 167 5.6 Chapter summary 168 Discussion and Implications 169 6.1 Introduction 169 6.2 A Critical Assessment of the First Year of the Inquiry Programme 169 6.2.1 Teachers’ experiences .171 Teachers’ attitudes 171 Teachers’ learning 175 6.3 Threats to inquiry engagement 177 6.3.1 Communication and understanding 179 6.3.2 Support and Resources 181 6.3.3 Practicality and follow-up 183 6.3.4 Buy-in and ownership .185 6.4 A framework for engaging teachers in inquiry 185 6.4.1 Micropolitics .186 6.4.2 Resources 190 6.4.3 Ownership 193 6.4.4 Conceptualising inquiry 196 6.4.5 Summary of the framework of engaging teachers in inquiry 197 6.5 Implications for School culture research .200 6.6 Implications for CPD .202 6.7 A School Checklist 203 6.8 Chapter summary 206 Conclusion 207 7.1 Introduction 207 7.2 Reviewing the Research Questions .207 7.2.1 RQ 1: To what extent and how teacher’s beliefs and perceptions about inquiry change after engaging in a school-supported inquiry project? .208 7.2.2 RQ 2: What teachers perceive to be the outcomes of carrying out their own inquiry projects? 209 Page | 7.2.3 RQ 3: What aspects of context affect teachers’ active engagement in inquiry? How? 210 7.3 The Contributions of this study .211 7.3.1 Types of teacher research engagement 211 7.3.2 A framework for conceptualising teacher inquiry engagement 211 7.3.3 School-friendly checklist 212 7.3.4 Employing a micropolitical perspective to investigate teacher inquiry engagement 212 7.4 Limitations of the study 213 7.5 Future research and final thoughts .214 7.6 Final Reflections 214 References 215 Page | LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1.1 Types of academies (Husbands et al., 2013, p 22) 17 Figure 1: Aspects of school micropolitics 31 Figure 2: the action research spiral (Kemmis et al., 2014, p 19) 45 Figure 3: Action research cycles (Elliott, 1991:71) 46 Figure 2: Gaining Access process 72 Figure 3: The structure of the action research programme 76 Figure 4: Types of documents used in this study 83 Figure 5: Example of document produced by the researcher 84 Figure 6: A 6-phase process for doing thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2006) 88 Figure 7: Memos in Nvivo 89 Figure 8: Codes in Nvivo 89 Figure 9: Code properties in Nvivo .90 Figure 1: The Structure of the inquiry programme .99 Figure 1: Sources of data about teachers’ beliefs and understandings about inquiry 106 Figure 2: Building work 123 Figure 3: Example of the sharing culture 125 Figure 1: A Timeline of Teachers' Attitudes towards the Inquiry Programme 173 Figure 2: Sources of threats to inquiry engagement 178 Figure 3: Patterns of communication in the inquiry programme 179 Figure 4:Micro and macro levels of educational policy 187 Figure 5: Micropolitics as a main consideration in teacher inquiry 188 Figure 6: Resources as a main consideration in teacher inquiry 191 Figure 7: Ownership as a main consideration in teacher inquiry 194 Figure 8: Conceptualisation of inquiry as a main consideration in teacher inquiry 197 Figure 9: A Framework for Conceptualising Teacher Inquiry Engagement .199 Page | LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Reasons behind teachers' resistance 36 Table 1: workshop contents 73 Table 2: Interview participants .77 Table 3: A timeline of data collection 86 Table 4: Criteria for judging qualitative research (Trochim & Donnelly, 2007, p 149) 90 Table 1: Examples of teachers' lack of expertise in doing research 115 Table 2: Teachers' extracts about practicality and buy-i .120 Table 3: Instances of communication issues .136 Table 4: Various understandings of inquiry 147 Table 5:Examples of sceptical inquiry engagement 151 Table 6:: Empirical evidence of coasting engagement .155 Table 1: checklist of main considerations in engaging teachers in inquiry 205 Page | LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ALS: Action Learning Sets CAQDAS: Computer Assisted Qualitative Data AnalysiS DfE: Department for Education Ed.D: Doctorate in Education EEF: Education Endowment Foundation Ofsted: Office for Standards in Education BERA: British Educational Research Association CPD: Continuing Professional Development IBPD: Inquiry-Based Professional Development NFER: National Foundation for Educational Research OU: the Open University PGCE: Post Graduate Certificate in Education RQ: Research Question TTA: Teacher Training Agency UK: The United Kingdom Page | 10 ... theoretically possible if inquiry is incorporated into teachers’ professional development and the realities of teacher inquiry engagement were, and indeed still are, what kindled my interest in this type... influence in facilitating or impeding a professional development activity becomes more prominent and this leads to not only understanding these roles but also designing and facilitating the professional. .. learning process resulting from meaningful interaction with the context (both in time and space) and eventually leading to changes in teachers’ professional practice (actions) and in their thinking