Jonathan Tummons

Institutional Ethnography and Actor-Network Theory: A Framework for Researching the Assessment of Trainee Teachers.

This article provides an analysis of assessment practices on one university-led teacher-training course in England, delivered across a network of further education colleges. After establishing that assessment practices are bound up in texts of different kinds, this article draws on two theoretical frameworks – institutional ethnography and actor–network theory – in order to explore how the work done by tutors and students on the course is mediated by texts. Through analysing the ways in which texts are used and the ways in which students and tutors respond to them, the paper suggests that assessment practices are in fact characterised by complexity and contingency which are masked by the dominant discourses of quality assurance and managerialism.

Theoretical trajectories within communities of practice in higher education research

In this article, the role of theory in higher education research is problematised using a communities of practice framework. Drawing on a case study derived from the authors own published work and doctoral study, the article concludes that the differential uses of theory within communities of research practice can be fruitfully explored, in part, through a consideration of the ways in which the explicit use of theory by newcomers to the community is, or is not, sustained as community membership deepens. The article concludes by suggesting that the differential use of theory amongst communities of educational researchers constitutes a problematic object of practice that requires critical exploration.

‘It sort of feels uncomfortable’: problematising the assessment of reflective practice

This article forms part of an exploration of assessment on one part‐time higher education course: a professional qualification for teachers and trainers in the learning and skills sector, which is delivered on a franchise basis across a network of colleges in the north of England. This article proposes that the validity of the assessment of reflective practice, a key component of many higher education programmes in addition to the course being researched here, is contestable. Through an analysis informed by social practice accounts of literacy, the article suggests that the ways in which reflective practice is assessed, and the ways in which the crucial requisites of validity are assigned to it, mask complexities and contradictions in both how students write reflective assignments, and how tutors read them. This article argues for a new, critical analysis of the assessment of reflective practice and raises a number of questions about the validity of the process.

The assessment of lesson plans in teacher education: a case study in assessment validity and reliability

This paper forms part of an exploration of assessment on one part‐time higher education (HE) course: an in‐service, professional qualification for teachers and trainers in the learning and skills sector which is delivered on a franchise basis across a network of further education colleges in the north of England. This paper proposes that the validity and reliability of portfolio‐based assessment, a key component of many HE programmes in addition to the course being researched here, is contestable. Analysis of the processes of compiling portfolios for assessment, through the conceptual framework of the New Literacy Studies, suggests that the ways in which portfolios are assessed and the ways in which the crucial requisites of validity and reliability are assigned to them, mask complexities and contradictions in their creation by the student. This paper argues for a new, critical analysis of portfolio production and raises a number of questions about the validity, reliability and authenticity of the assessment process that the portfolios reify.

Using Software for Qualitative Data Analysis: Research Outside Paradigmatic Boundaries

Abstract Purpose This chapter aims to explicate the use of computer software for qualitative data analysis. Drawing on both a review of relevant literature and a reflexive commentary on an ongoing ethnography, this chapter argues that the use of computer software for qualitative data analysis facilitates rigour and reliability in research, whilst also contributing to wider debates regarding the distinctions made between different research paradigms. Design/methodology/approach The chapter is divided into two sections. In the first, a review of literature pertaining to the use of computer software for qualitative data analysis is reported. The key themes to emerge from this review are then explored in the second section, which consists of a reflexive commentary on the use of computer software for qualitative data analysis within an ongoing three-year Canadian/UK research project. Findings The chapter concludes firstly by foregrounding the methodological benefits of using computer software for qualitative data analysis, and secondly by commenting on wider debates relating to the historical distinctions between quantitative and qualitative research paradigms. Practical implications The chapter suggests that the uptake of computer software for qualitative data analysis should be considered as an integral element of the research design process. Originality/value The originality of this chapter rests in its focus on methodology rather than method, on a reflexive discussion of the place of computer software within the research process rather than a technical description of how software should be used. This chapter is of value not only to researchers who are using or considering using software for their research, but also to researchers who are engaged in wider methodological discussions relating to qualitative and quantitative research paradigms, and to research quality and generalisability.

Repositioning professionalism: teachers, mentors, policy and praxis

This article reflects on the interplay between the recommended policy of providing mentors for PCET ITT (Post-Compulsory Education and Training Initial Teacher Training) students and the praxis or application of this policy. The findings are based on questionnaire data that has been gathered from 80 PCET ITT students and their mentors alongside semi-structured interview data from eight mentors. The research has been funded by the UK Higher Education Academy via ESCalate’s Developing Pedagogy and Practice research grant scheme. There appears to be a repositioning of professionalism because the ideal of a mentoring relationship that is developmental may become in reality a process that is judgemental in nature. The research data sheds new light on the work of Michel Foucault by viewing PCET ITT mentoring through this theoretical lens.

Dominant discourses of pre‐service teacher education and the exigencies of the workplace: an ethnographic study from English further education

The placement in colleges is a crucially formative experience for trainee teachers on pre‐service Further Education (FE) initial teacher training courses. A project at the University of Huddersfield researched these placements in four colleges in the north of England and the relationships that were formed between the trainees, their mentors, other staff and students. Where the trainees were placed and who they taught were often matters of expedience, and their individual circumstances were contingent upon diverse, often local, factors. As such, the picture that emerged of the lived experience of placement defied simple classification and explanation. Drawing on data gathered during the project this paper argues that the experience of placements is characterised by confusion, insecurity and marginalisation on the one hand and integration, enthusiasm and development on the other. Regardless of their individual experience, however, there is evidence that the trainees learnt to cope and even that messiness may be useful preparation for the unstable FE workplace. The paper problematises the developmental basis for placements and questions what constitutes a successful placement before considering how trainees can be best prepared to teach in the FE sector.

The textual representation of professionalism: problematising professional standards for teachers in the UK lifelong learning sector

The problematisation of the professional standards for teachers in the UK lifelong learning sector tends to focus on the discourses that the standards embody: discourses that are posited as being based on a restricted or technicist model of professionalism, that fail sufficiently to recognise the lived experiences of teachers within the sector both in terms of professional knowledge and competence, and professional development. This paper takes a different approach, drawing on social practice theories of literacy in order to shift the locus of problematisation away from what the standards might mean, to how the standards are physically assembled or instantiated in documentary form. The paper concludes by suggesting that a first point of problematisation rests not in the discourses that the standards embody, but in the inherent fragilities of any text-based material artefact that has the intention of carrying meaning across spatial, institutional or temporal boundaries.

Higher Education in Further Education in England: An Actor-Network Ethnography

abSTraCT The provision of higher education courses within further education colleges in England poses particular questions for the researcher. This article argues that the complexities of the relationships between colleges where courses are run, and the universities that supply these courses, can be fruitfully explored using actor-network theory. This article provides an actor-network account of one teacher-training course as an example of the ways in which both people and text-based artefacts are coalesced and coordinated so that the course functions across institutional and spatial boundaries. Assessment has been chosen as a specific focus several reasons: it must be performed in certain ways and must conform to particular outcomes that are standardised across colleges; it is an established focus of research; and it is a focus of specific observable activities. The article concludes that assessment processes are regulated and ordered in complex ways for which actor-network theory provides an appropriate conceptual framework. [Article copies are available for purchase from InfoSci-on-Demand.com]

Ethnographies across Virtual and Physical Spaces: A Reflexive Commentary on a Live Canadian/UK Ethnography of Distributed Medical Education.

This article draws on an ongoing ethnography of distributed medical education (DME) provision in Canada in order to explore the methodological choices of the researchers as well as the wider pluralisation of ethnographic frameworks that is reflected within current research literature. The article begins with a consideration of the technologically mediated ways in which the researchers do their work, a way of work that is paralleled within the DME curriculum that forms the focus of the ethnography. The article goes on to problematise relationships amongst the researchers and between the researchers and the field of research, and to consider the ways in which methodological choices are mediated. In so doing, the article proposes an acceptance of methodological pluralism that is tempered by the need to acknowledge the sometimes-slight differences that distinguish ethnographic paradigms.