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Researcher As Teacher/Teacher As Researcher |
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What Does A "Researcher" Metaphor For
"Teaching" Teach You? |
| One can choose a metaphor for teaching and develop
it
with respect to items like the following: attitude to
learners, communications with learners, expectations of learners, assignments,
assessment, rules, learner
differences, behaviour of learners, nature/nurture, needs, curricular content,
empowerment of learners, homework, teacher's role, record keeping, organization,
activity level, discovery, messiness, artificiality, etc... One can learn
something about teaching from thinking about a particular metaphor for
teaching. One can learn something about research by reflecting on a
metaphor of research-as-teaching. |
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| Is there anything you would add to the
following chart to further develop this particular metaphor? Does the metaphor advance
your understanding of the "researcher?" |
| The Metaphor: Teacher as Researcher |
Suppose the teacher is viewed as a
Researcher.
With this metaphor the students could be viewed as research subjects.
The following chart is developed with this metaphor in mind. It provides the
added advantage of being developed along two different streams... (Quantitative
versus Qualitative
Researcher) |
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| 1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
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setting |
attitude to learner |
communications |
expectations |
assignments |
assessment |
| lab-like... a very controlled
classroom |
an object |
top down |
theory driven - test to
confirm or disconfirm |
systematic, measurable,
diagnostic, prescriptive |
precise, measurable,
detailed, quantitative |
| natural env't,-researcher stands back to
observe |
subject and object |
inference |
none - they emerge from
observations |
probing questions,
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descriptive, verbal,
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7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
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needs of the learner |
learner differences |
behaviour of learners |
nature / nurture |
rules |
curricular content |
| basic, health, safety |
point of interest, source
of error
variance, outliers, |
controlled |
towards the nurture end of
the continuum |
precise, top down |
controlled |
| basic, emergent, novel |
meaningful, a source of
information, source of theory |
natural |
towards the nature end of
the continuum |
student-defined |
natural, constructivist,
authentic |
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13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 |
18 |
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homework |
teacher's role |
empowerment of learners |
classroom organization |
record keeping |
activity level of students |
| controlled, experimental,
instrumental |
controller |
very little |
sterile, clinical |
meticulous, quantitative,
lab notes |
controlled, regimented |
| student determined,
personal interest, or
collaborative |
observer |
very much |
emergent, messy |
descriptive, pages and
pages, stories, messy |
natural |
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19 |
20 |
21 |
22 |
23 |
24 |
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discovery |
messiness |
artificiality |
authenticity |
intelligence |
effort |
| little |
little |
much |
little |
one dimensional |
high if sufficiently
motivated (extrinsic) |
| much |
much |
little |
much |
multiple intelligences |
high if interested
(intrinsic) |
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25 |
26 |
27 |
28 |
29 |
30 |
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reports |
parent involvement |
? |
? |
? |
? |
| quantitative grades |
controlled, discouraged |
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| stories, anecdotal comments |
natural, encouraged |
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| What I learned from reflecting on these two metaphors.
First, that the metaphor of the teacher as
qualitative researcher has more philosophical appeal. An
interesting point for someone who favours quantitative research. Second,
that the nurture end of the nature/nurture continuum seems more congruent
with the metaphor of teacher as quantitative
researcher. It is the quantitative type who is trying to effect
change. I hadn't thought of this before. Third, ... |
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