TESOL FRANCE 2016: Teacher-researcher journeys in EP: puzzles & PEPAs

EAP Lecturers – Marianna Goral & Chris Banister Regent’s University London

(teachermatch.org, 2015)

Overview • Learning, teaching, research context• Motivation• Key principles of Exploratory Practice

(EP)• Puzzles and Potentially Exploitable

Pedagogic Activities (PEPAs)• Conclusion: benefits and transformations

of EP

WHY?

(antlantablackstar.com, 2012)

Learning, teaching and research context:

• 2014-2016 Language Teacher Research (LTR) Project at Regent’s Institute of Languages and Culture

• Collaborative: Lecturers/Teachers of English, Italian, French and Spanish• Our background: Marianna: 16 years of ELT in Poland and the UK, Cross over to

Academia 7 years ago. Currently a Senior EAP Lecturer. Chris: EAP Lecturer with 19 years of ELT experience (Turkey and the UK)

• Learners: Undergraduate exchange students, Business English at Upper Int (ENG5A1) & Advanced (ENG6A1)

• Module: 3 hrs p/w, student-led and generated components, blended aspects.

Motivation

Personal reasons for participation: • A chance to truly explore and reflect on some issues that have

come up in our classes over the years• Pursuing our own personal and Continuous Professional

Development (CPD)• Confidence and reassurance - guided and collaborative project

Institute’s reasons:• To encourage more language teaching staff to become engaged

with research: ‘the university is aiming for a ‘student-centred approach where Regent’s is a teaching focused institution but research-informed and engaged.’

Key Principles of Exploratory Practice1. ‘Quality of life’ first for language teachers and learners 2. work primarily ‘to understand’ classroom life prior to bringing any

change3. ‘Involve everybody’ in the work for understanding4. The work needs to serve to bring teachers and learners together

(collegiality)

5. The work needs to be conducted in the spirit of mutual development (inclusivity)

6. Integrate the work for understanding into classroom practice (use of normal pedagogic activities as investigative approaches). Teaching getting done at the same time as research.

7. Make working for understanding a continuous enterprise (sustainability)

(Allwright, 2003)

Puzzles EP centres around teaching and learning ‘puzzles’ (= counter-intuitive phenomena)

Marianna Why can student presentations and discussion boards work well?

ChrisWhy don't I get meaningful feedback and evaluation of the learning experience from students?

What would be your puzzle?

Write them down on a post-it

(freecoloringpages.c.uk, 2015)

Approaching the puzzle

Research tools:

• Lesson videos• Peer observations• Personal reflection• Discussions with other LTR members/project leader and students, focus

groups • Potentially Exploitable Pedagogic Activities (PEPAs) (Allwright and Hanks

2009; Hanks 2015): Familiar, non-disruptive classroom activities-teaching getting done at the same time as research.

• Initially: surveys, questionnaires=relatively straightforward, Later: greater creativity e.g. Review Collage (Banister 2016)

• Driven by EP principle of adopting learners as co-researchers

PEPA 1: Converting research into a classroom activity

Background and aims• Inspiration: Rowland (2011):

conversion/integration of language learning research into classroom activities

• Comparison of student experiences with research findings/recommendations

• Familiar ELT frame: reading into discussion

• Vocabulary, online discussion boards, obtaining learner feedback in HE

• Doubts: our learners?(Adapted from Williams and Brennan 2004)

PEPA 1: Converting research into a classroom activity

Extract Discussion Questions• Which of the above points do you

agree with? Why/not? (explanation, knowledge, personal experience, etc.)

• Can you think of any other potential advantages and disadvantages of these ways of collecting student feedback?

• Do you like being asked your opinion? Why/not?

• Which mechanisms do you personally prefer? Why?

• Do you always tell the truth when asked for feedback/evaluations by teachers or institutions? Why/not?

Understanding• Level of learner insights=a critical moment: sowed the seeds in my mind

of learners as true co-researchers

Advantages• Marrying of research and pedagogy: motivating, especially in an HE

context, but need to provide background, i.e. outline the LTR project and puzzle

• Treated as a regular classroom speaking activity-e.g. delayed feedback given on language use, students “reap the double benefit” (Rowland 2011: 258)

• Written follow-up: obtains permanent data for analysis, opportunity to display/expose students to alternative vantage points

• Leveraging our privileged position• Playing to strengths as a teacher-researchers• Room for teacher creativity through familiar techniques and steps (e.g.

text sourcing, discussion questions, whole class feedback)

PEPA 2: Converting research into a classroom activity

• Students not contributing to the discussion board: ‘Why?’

• Inspired by Chris’ activity• Inspired by Sutherland-Smith

(2002) article on ‘Student Evaluation of Discussion Formats’

• Comparing student experience with Sutherland-Smith’s research.

• Awareness of classroom time required and overload. ‘Teaching getting done at the same time as research’

Extract from Sutherland-Smith 2002 journal article.

Incorporation of: • Reading and in-class discussion • Self-reflection • Students asking themselves the

question ‘Why?’

• Understanding/recommendations – obtaining data for analysis/reflection

Considerations for the latest phase 2016 -

• Build on new conceptions of learner-practitioner (co-researcher)

• Focus on learner puzzles alongside teacher puzzles

• Further opportunities for creativity and collaboration

• Ethical aspects: using regular and familiar classroom activities, not imposing too heavy a load on teachers or students

PEPA 3: Preparing the ground for exploration of learner puzzles (Upper-Int Level)

• Finding a connection/relevance between classroom research and Business English module

• Informed students about my research via in–class poster presentation

• Inspired by Hulse’s (2016) ‘The why of the World’ article

• Reading and Listening (TedTalk) comprehension

• Encouraging students to make connection

• Questions to stimulate discussion• Self-reflection• Students exploring their own

puzzles

PEPA 4: Preparing the ground for exploration of learner puzzles (Advanced Level)

• Build on Marianna’s ‘find’• Differentiate for the level• Second text: an open letter

(Allwright and Hanks 2009)• Jigsaw reading: share info from

the two texts, identify common theme: deeper exploration and understanding via ‘why’

• Facilitated: exploration of learner puzzles

• Currently making progress with learner puzzles alongside my teacher puzzle

All about the PEPAs!

• A nexus of research, learning, teaching-content (e.g. business) and language (e.g. business English)

• The positive ripple effect of collaboration and collegiality

• Getting research done locally at the same time as teaching and learning for the benefit of all

Conclusion: benefits and transformations of EP

• Boosts teacher self-efficacy beliefs (Wyatt and Dikilitas 2015) regarding their practice

• Transformative for the teaching-research relationship. Classroom events become a “legitimate source of research knowledge about teaching and learning” (Borg 2010:418)

• Brings participants together, “collegially supportive environment” (Slimani-Rolls and Kiely 2014:433) by foregrounding improvements to classroom quality of life and fostering creativity (Hanks 2016)

• CPD benefits: confidence to give papers, workshops, submit articles, access to research/teacher research communities of practice

The Regent’s EP group

Forthcoming book (Palgrave 2017) based on the LTR project: full details of how teachers explored their puzzles and gained understanding that boosted classroom quality of lifeFeel free to get in touch:goralm@regents.ac.ukbanisterc@regents.ac.ukcostantinoa@regents.ac.uk

A final thought…

For the puzzle(s) you identified earlier:• what kind of PEPAs might you want to use?• Do you have any potential materials/resources

in mind?

Thank you and questions

Thank you very much for listening.

?

Reference: Allwright, D. (2005) ‘Developing Principles for Practitioner Research: The Case of Exploratory Practice.’ The Modern Language Journal, 89 (3): 353-366.

Allwright, D. and Hanks, J. (2009) The developing language learner: an introduction to exploratory practice. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan.

Banister, C. (2016) Review Collage, English Teaching Professional, 105, July 2016: 38-39.

Borg, S.(2010) ‘Language teacher research engagement.’ Language Teaching Research, 43 (4): 391-429.

Hanks, J. (2015) ‘Language Teachers Making sense of Exploratory Practice.’ Language Teaching Research, Jan 2015: 1-22.

Hanks, J. (2016) ‘ “Why Exporatory Practice?’”A collaborative report.’ ELT Research 31 Feb 2016 IATEFL Research SIG (resig.iatefl.org.)Available at: http://HYPERLINK "http://resig.weebly.com/issue-31.html"resig.weebly.com/issue-31.html [Accessed on 17th May 2016].

Hulse, T (2016). The Why of the World. Business Life. Available at: http://businesslife.ba.com/Ideas/Features/The-why-of-the-world.html [Accessed 27/09/2016] Rowland, L. (2011) ‘Lessons about learning: Comparing learner experiences with language research.’ Language Teaching Research, 15 (2): 245-267.Slimani-Rolls, A. and Kiely, R. (2014) ‘We are the change that we seek’: developing teachers’ understanding of their classroom practice.’ Innovations in Education and Teaching International, 51 (4): 425-435.

Sutherland-Smith, W. (2002) ‘Integrating Online Discussion in an Australian Intensive Language Course’. TESOL Journal, 11(3): 31-35.

Williams, R. and Brennan, J. (2004) 'Collecting and using student feedback: A guide to good practice.' Open Research Online. [PDF] Available at: http://oro.open.ac.uk/11875/1/Collecting_and_using_student_feedback_a_guide_to_good_practice.pdf [Accessed 20 Feb 2016]. 

Wyatt, M. and Dikiltas, K. (2015) ‘English language teachers becoming more efficacious through research engagement at their Turkish university.’ Educational Action Research, DOI: 10.1080./09650792.2015.1076731 [Accessed 7 July 2016].

Images:

Atlantablackstar.com (2012) Image of teacher at desk. [Online image]. Available at: http://atlantablackstar.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/frustrated_teacher2.jpg [Accessed 15/11/2016]

Freecoloringpages.co.uk (2015?) Image of puzzle piece. [Online image]. Available at: http://freecoloringpages.co.uk/?q=puzzle+pieces [Accessed 12/04/2015]

Teachermatch.org (2015) Image of wordle. [Online image]. Available at: https://www.teachermatch.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/bigstock-Research-Word-Shows-Gathering-98225042.jpg [Accessed 15/11/2016]