Collaboration and Teacher Research: A Closer Look at Discourse in a Professional Learning Community

• In Event: 52.080 - Teacher Research and Identity Work: Making Room for the Voices of Teachers

Abstract

Objective:
This study examines how collaboration played a significant role in the construction of researcher identities within a teacher research PLC situated in a public middle school located in rural area of the southeast.

Theoretical Framework:
The term “communities of practice” is most closely associated with the work of Lave and Wenger (1991, Wenger 1998), which examined existing professional communities and how the participants in those communities negotiated their beliefs and understandings. This theoretical framework can help educators better understand how collaborative learning environments foster changes in practices (Darling-Hammond & McLaughlin, 1995). Professional learning communities already bring teachers together for the purpose of studying and improving their educational practices and are the perfect place to include teacher research in school wide teacher research initiatives (Sagor, 2009) which have the potential to enrich veteran teacher’s experiences (Poetter, Badiali & Hammond, 2000).

In recent years, there has been a stronger connection between research and practice and an increased regard for research among practitioners in schools (Coleman, 2007). The effects of professional learning communities may vary (Dufour, 2004) but without community, teaching and research is less effective and lonelier. If collaborative school communities are successful, they can open the doors for educators to truly begin to improve their teaching.
Methods:
This paper highlights the work done at one middle school to create a professional learning community centered on teacher research. Meeting two times a month for six moths, six teachers worked together to generate research questions, collect and analyze data, and share their findings at a local conference. Data from this study included: (1) observations/field-notes from bi-monthly meetings with teachers; (2) activity/research artifacts; (3) surveys; and (4) semi-structured interviews with teachers. Grounded theory (Corbin & Strauss, 2007) and discourse analysis (Gee, 2011) was used to examine the data from the PLC sessions.

Findings:
Group dynamics became a central guiding force in this particular professional learning community as the group co-constructed a central question that was researched by each teacher. In particular two major themes emerged from the analysis: (a) the group members were challenged as they tried to teach their students how to craft constructed responses in their individual disciplines. By sharing the load, the teachers worked smarter not harder, a way of thinking that was encouraged in their school by the principal. However, further analysis reveals that some teachers felt by choosing one question to research, that may have been more applicable to certain subjects, they missed an opportunity to research their own “burning question”; and (b) the group validated and challenged each others’ perspectives and ideas. The PLC provided a unique opportunity for the middle school teachers to work with colleagues from different grade levels and subject areas.

Significance:
Although many schools support professional learning communities, the teacher researchers in this group believe that educators would benefit from learning more about how specific group dynamics shape collaboration between teachers. From that, teacher researchers, like themselves, could learn more about how to create groups that foster the identity work of teachers.

Authors

• Joy Myers, James Madison University

• Helen Miller, Southeast Middle School

• Andrea Stewart, Southeast Middle School