Education: Research Characteristics

Education: Research Characteristics

1. Researching Pupils

   • Power & Status
     • Less than adults
     • Difficult to state esp challenging views & attitudes to adults
     • Schools = hierarchical
       • Teachers use power to inf students selected to promote good image
     • Formal struc int & questionnaires reinforce power diff
       • Researcher determines q & how ans formulated
       • Group int > one-to-one help overcome
         • Some differences still remain
     • Student attitudes affect how relate to researcher
       • Resent = less cooperative
       • Empowered = express true feelings
   • Ability & Understanding
     • Vocab, powers of self-expression, thinking skills, confidence more limited esp abstract ideas
     • Care in wording
     • Limited understanding = informed consent prob
     • Young = more time to understand; use lang in diff ways
     • Less developed memory = prob recall
     • Class, age, gender, ethnicity = diff in e.g. lang/speech codes
       • Try to match researcher
   • Vulnerability & Ethical Issues
     • ^ vulnerable Psych/phys harm
     • Is young pp necessary?
     • Parental/teacher consent not enough; young pp aware too
       • Difficult to exp + not mature enough to understand
     • Child protection imp e.g. personal data not kept unless vital
     • Consider form & stress of research e.g. length of time q
     • More 'gatekeepers' controlling access
       • Parents, heads, teachers, local auth, school board of gov
   • Laws & Guidelines
     • Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Act 2006
       • Operates a vetting & barring scheme on adults working in schools
         • Req researcher to have Disclosure & Barring Service (DBS) checks; delay or prevent
     • Unicef, Barnado's & National Children's Bureau developed special codes of practice for researching young
       • Take British Sociological Association's ethical research guidelines further
     • Legally attend school = easy to find target group
       • Research into anti-school = hard; oft truent
       • Only in day & term time

2. Settings in Edu:

   • Pupils
   • Parents
   • Teachers
   • CLassrooms
   • Schools

3. Researching Teachers

   • Power & Status
     • Age, experience, responsibility
     • Legal responsib & duty of care
     • 'My classroom'; research = trespasser
       • Heads, gov, parents & pupils all constrain what teachers do
     • Covert = cover as supply teacher or classroom assistant
       • Access but groups oft lower status
   • Impression Managment
     • Used to being obs & scrutinised = more willing
     • Teacher role = 'put on an act' for pupils & others
       • Goffman: 'impression management' = manip impression of others
         • Researcher needs to get behind
     • Goffman: social actors therefore behave when acting role 'front stage'
       • Some study 'backstage' staffroom
     • Staffroom access = problem
       • Small social space; newcomer will stand out
     • Aware critical comments could affect career prospects
       • Reluctant to ans q honestly
         • Overcome by obs method
     • Head teachers inf which staff selected; not rep

4. Researching Classrooms

   • Closed setting; clear physical & social boundaries
   • Highly controlled
     • Layout & access, pupil's time, activities, noise levels, dress, lang
     • Rare to exp same surveillance level elsewhere
   • Classroom obs may not rep reality of feelings/thoughts; impression management used by both pupils and teachers
   • Simple social setting: 2 roles; interaction straightforward to obs & analyse
   • Gatekeepers
     • Heads, teachers, child protection laws
     • More = harder to obtain & maintain access
   • Peer Groups
     • Insecure about identity & status
     • Sensitive to peer pressure & conformity
       • Affect response
     • May need to supervise filling in q to prevent inf
     • Group int: true attitudes hidden by dom attitudes of peers

5. Researching Schools

   • Many diff types of school; obs methods risks being unrep due to limited time
     • Overcome by large scale surveys or official stats; may lose insight
   • Takes limited time to identify research pop
     • State publishes list of schools, locations & type
   • Schools' Own Data
     • 'Data-rich': lots of secondary data - exam results, league tables, Ofsted reports, gov inqu, school policy doc
       • Researchers can use but limited access to confidential school records
     • Truancy prob - may falsify attendance fig to present good image
     • Legal duty to record all racist incidents - may play down to maintain + public image
     • Official stats on exam performance - may make changed to curric to improve results & create image school improving
       • e.g. entering into easier qualif
   • The Law
     • By law requ to attend
       • Only other similar institution is prison
     • 'Captive population'
       • Know where everyone is at given moment
       • Heads may see involvement as interfering with edu
     • Requ to collect info on attendance, achievement etc.
       • Useful to socio
       • Duty of care may restrict access
   • Gatekeepers
     • Heads & governors power to refuse access
       • If believe will interfere with work of schools or undermine teacher authority
     • Roland Meighan & Harber: heads view research neg
       • Meighan wanted to research about consulting students about teaching
         • Views:
           • Dangerous to involve pupils in commenting on teachers
           • Discipline would be adversely affected
           • Bad for classroom relationships
           • Children not competent to judge
     • Some situ 'off limits' e.g. head int with parents
     • Beynon & Atkinson: gatekeepers oft steer researcher away from sensitive situ such as classes w/ poor teacher control
   • School Organisation
     • Schools formal organ with rules & hierarchies
       • Researchers may become part of hierarchy:
         • Students see as teachers
         • Teachers see as inspectors
           • 'The enemy'
     • Single sex = prob is researcher opposite gender; may become focus of attention when need low profile in pp obs
     • Large scale, complex, highly organised; daily & yearly timetables, management struc, meeting sched ect
       • May affect when/how carried out
         • Holidays, exam periods etc. limit activities
     • Size & complexity = difficulties finding out places & who does what

6. Researching Parents

   • Parents can influence edu by:
     • How bring up children
     • Involvement in school via parent-teacher contacts, parent gov, attendance at parents evenings
     • Marketisation policies encourage parents to see self as consumers
   • Hard to study:
     • Not single homogenous group: class/gender/ethnicity may affect willingness to pp
       • Pro-school m/c > return questionnaires = unrep
     • Parental permission needed; depends on sensitivity & potential benefit of pp
     • Impression management: + by exaggerating involvement e.g. lie about parents evening attendance = invalid
   • Access to parents
     • Child-parent interaction at home = priv setting; hard to obs
     • Mostly physically located outside school so harder to contact
     • Names & addresses not released by schools
       • Could send letters or questionnaires home
         • Wouldn't guarantee received or returned

7. Researcher's Own Experience of Edu

   • When formulating hypotheses of interpreting data
   • Familiarity could dull awareness of how diff edu environ from other social settings
     • 'Natural'
     • Need to be aware of taken for granted assumptions
   • Likely to have been successful = hard to empathise with underachieving anti-school
   • Class, gender, ethnic differences between researcher & pupils
   • Political issue: diff political parties, pressure groups & indiv = conflicting views
     • Aware political context - may become part of wider political & media debate