Preparation for Inquiry-Based Working as an Aspect of Quality Teacher Education

• In Event: Instruments for Measuring Quality in Teacher Education

Abstract

Objective
Inquiry-based approaches are growing in importance in the professional development of teachers (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 2009). To prepare candidates for inquiry-based teaching, programs with an academic orientation have been developed in several countries (Darling-Hammond, 2017). In the Netherlands, regular teacher education programs for primary education are bachelor programs housed in institutes for higher professional education. However, academic bachelor programs have recently been established at universities, with the aim of educating inquiring teachers who can use research and study their own practice (Van der Wal-Maris., 2017). In this paper two studies are presented measuring to what extent these programs succeed in achieving these qualities. The first study investigated differences in the inquiring attitude of candidates in professional and academic programs. The second study focused on the extent to which graduates are involved in inquiry-based teaching in the first years after their studies.

Theoretical Framework
The integration of research in the curriculum of teacher education is supposed to contribute to the inquiring attitude of candidates and to their inquiry-based teaching (Maaranen, 2009; Schulz & Mandzuk, 2005). We follow Jacobi and Van der Rijst (2010), who distinguished six aspects of an inquiring attitude: the inclination to be critical, to share, to know and understand, to achieve, to innovative and to take responsibility. Inquiry-based teaching is used as a broad term, referring to a) systematic reflection on one’s teaching, b) reading and using research, and c) conducting research.

Methods and Data Sources In the first study a questionnaire (Cronbach’s alphas .90 to .91) was used to measure the inquiring attitude of teacher candidates. Candidates in the final years of an academic program (n=30) and four professional programs (n=230) indicated whether they were capable of 49 competences, derived from the six aspects of an inquiring attitude. The questionnaire in the second study measured the involvement in inquiry-based teaching of in-service teachers. Graduates (now beginning teachers) from four professional programs (n=113) and six academic programs (n=89) indicated to what extent they were involved in activities related to inquiry-based teaching (Cronbach’s alphas .70 to .91). For both questionnaires, a one-way between-groups multivariate analysis of variance was performed to compare the two groups.

Results
Results of the ‘inquiring attitude’ questionnaire revealed that candidates from the academic program scored significantly higher on the scale inclination to be critical than candidates from the professional programs. Contrary to our expectations, the results of the ‘inquiry-based teaching’ questionnaire showed no differences in the involvement of the two groups in systematic reflection, using research and conducting research. However, academically educated teachers did report being more ‘critical’ in their approach of literature and regarding their own teaching, and felt more confident they had the skills for inquiry-based teaching.

Significance
More and more programs in teacher education describe themselves as ‘research-based’. Preparing candidates for inquiry-based teaching is an aspect of what many programs aim at. The instruments discussed in this paper try to operationalize what that means and may help teacher education programs evaluate how well they succeed in this aim.

Authors

• Jan Baan, University of Amsterdam

• Lisa Gaikhorst, University of Amsterdam

• Monique L. Volman, Universiteit van Amsterdam, Research Institute Child Development and Education