Section archive - Research Methods

In the self-study reported here, the aim was to acquire a deeper understanding of the challenges and opportunities that teacher educators and student teachers encounter while working with, and learning about, ICT as a tool for learning. This learning interest focused on both the practical aspects highlighted during the course and the more theoretical perspectives of knowledge and learning that emerge when technological aspects and tools are included in the process of teaching, learning, and assessing. One of the learning interests of this self-study was to analyze how the authors elaborated and developed their understanding of the theoretical framework of Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK).

In this article, two educational researchers explore the development of their understanding of collaboration in self-study of teacher education practices research using of the metaphoric tool of topography. The researchers communicate their perceptions through the presentation of four topographic moments. Each topographic moment is represented by a poem and the analysis of the poem. The four moments explored include the self in collaboration, the positioning of the self and the other on the landscape of collaboration, the way in which collaboration impacts research methodology, and the role of representation and community.

A new book by Leah Shagrir describes a researcher's journey to carry out an ethnographic study. The book describes how the various stops along the way allowed investigation of the research area from a variety of viewpoints, in order to fulfil diverse roles, and to present the research findings in a range of voices: the voice of the teacher educator, the voice of the faculty member, the voice of the ethnographic researcher, and the voice of the student. Using the voice of each role to present the issue allows one to examine it from a unique perspective and to get a broad and deep picture of the research population, process and results. Such a multi-dimensional perspective enables the presentation of a whole; emphasizing experiences, perceptions, values, world views, rules and regulations, culture and life style, interpersonal and intrapersonal relations.

In this article, the authors argue Experience-sampling methods (ESM) can be particularly enriching for education research by enabling us to ask new and interesting questions about how students, teachers, and school leaders engage with education as they are living their lives and thus help us to better understand how education contexts shape learning and other outcomes. They highlight the value of these approaches for addressing new and exciting questions they may help education researchers to answer as they allow us to uncover experience in new ways.