ARMS2019: Mentoring Teacher researchers

7th SEP

Understanding and doing teacher research

Seminar on "Mentoring Teacher researchers"

This was held in beautiful premises of EFL university, Hyderabad on 7th September 2019.

 It was inaugurated by Prof.E. Suresh Kumar (Vice Chancellor, EFLU,HYDERABAD), Dr Rama Mathew, and Jason Anderson

  Hon'ble Suresh Kumar sir motivated all the audience to do teacher research by his motivational speech. He shared his struggle for getting an education and how he achieved success of being the youngest vice chancellor in India.

  The plenary session given by Jason Anderson and Dr Rama Matthew was an insightful experience for all of us.They talked about understanding and doing teacher research. It was really helpful for us to understand the key ideas about teacher research. It reinforced my understanding and professional knowledge about Exploratory Action Research. Jason sir elaborated steps of action research, exploratory research and exploratory action research using attractive slides.

 I liked the simplicity of Jason sir, his healthy collaboration with Dr Rama ma'am while presentation.He also ensured if all the things related to presentation are "Ok"! 

He was checking the sound and  video and was looking for well going of the plenary. I truly loved his way of preparing. If you prepare a lot before presentation, you perform better. It makes you more comfortable and confident.

This is my take away. When I have an opportunity to present, I'll follow this way.

I'll do following things before presentation.

1. Do audio, video work?
2. Can a person sitting lastly read the slides?
3. Do QR codes work?

I'll check these things as Jason did.

I liked the introductory activity conducted by Jason sir in which a person had to find one partner sitting to the next, or right or left or behind and introduce to each other and then discuss a few questions related to the topic, 'Understanding and doing teacher research.'

 Everyone in the hall enjoyed this activity. Everyone talked about themselves and discussed and jotted down a few questions about Research. It was quite impressive and interactive way of presenting.

  This is my second take away. Surely I'll conduct this activity with my teachers in teacher training programs.

  Dr Rama ma'am focussed on Teacher research.

"Teacher research is research into something that emanates from the teacher's own work in the classroom."

     One cannot pressurise a teacher into research. It should come out from her own experiences. It should be relevant and useful for her. Therefore, "Teacher research is research done by the teachers and for the teachers."

I found this idea very interesting and striking. 

 Teacher research is useful for

1. Empowering teachers and students
2. Developing reflective and analytical skills of teachers in future
3. And the findings are relevant to the teachers' context

Rama ma'am also introduced qualities of a good mentor which will be very useful for us in a journey of a mentor.

  A mentor should be;

• respectful
• Non-judgemental 
•  Listen to mentees
•  Emphatic
•  Supportive
• A critical friend
• Scaffold mentees
• Be patient
• Approachable
• Helps to ask questions

A person who wants to be a good professional mentor, he/she should have above qualities. This will help him/her to build good rapport with his/her teacher Researchers.

 The plenary given by Rama Mathew and Jason Anderson made quite easy about mentoring teacher researchers. This will certainly help us in our  journey as a mentor. Subsequently, I can support my TRs confidently.

You can download pdf here.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1RSQOlUMpQYdIQbKSWBCjoWZs8AyVtDZr/view?usp=drivesdk

 It was a great day for all ARMS mentors who got an opportunity to share their experiences in front of the students, professors of  EFL-U, Hyderabad.

  Nisar presented on Exploration. What is exploration, why to explore, and how to explore, MUSE strategy while exploration,etc. while I talked about the important role of reflection, when to reflect, some examples of reflection by teacher Researchers, highlights of reflection,etc.

 We did this presentation in collaboration. 3 mentors had to present one topic collaboratively. Each one had to talk only for 4 minutes on allocated subtopic. Here some mentors were very precise about time and their topic discussion. But few of Mentors didn't follow time management. Our super mentor Ravi sir kept on showing sign post of time, but very few responded to him. Overall it was a great experience for us.

 It built confidence about presentation. I understood how preparation, presentation, collaboration and time management skills are important. We should have healthy mutual understanding among co-presenters.

I learnt this from my co-presenters Sutapa and Laxman, as we developed good rapport and trust while preparing our topic and slides. We respected each other. We also considered the inputs suggested by Ravi sir, our mentor.

And it really worked well.

  Panel discussion and a zoom session by Richard Smith sir and Jemima ma'am were quite remarkable. 

Richard sir and Jemima ma'am introduced about a teacher research handbook "Mentoring teachers to research their classrooms:practical handbook" This will help many teacher Researchers and mentors to develop professional understanding about teacher research. It will also help them to identify topic, develop research questions, collect data and analyse it, reflect and evaluate their findings.

After all, it was an insightful experience for us hearing from the expertise in ELT. We enjoyed it a lot.

8th September

 

  We gathered in Trinity hall in Taj Deccan hotel, Hyderabad at 9:30 a.m. 

Ravi sir and Santosh sir encouraged us to reflect on yesterday's experience. Most of the mentors shared their takeaways about plenary, panel discussion and gave feedback to mentors. It was quite positive, productive, encouraging and constructive one.

 Danish sir suggested one thing about giving feedback, that is while giving feedback to a person who has been observed, firstly observer (one who observed) should start with asking questions to observee. And then give him feedback. While giving constructive feedback, use positive remarks like can you please think about time management? 

 One of our mentors said, "Nothing was new. It was already introduced!" 

 But  I like the remark given by Ravi sir, "Everything has something innovative and we should notice it. Find it."  

  This session on reflection on last day made us to recall, think and describe. It helped us to share our ideas and opinions. How to give feedback is also a skillful job! 

   Framing research questions is a challenging job for teacher Researchers and how to support them to frame research questions is also a kind of challenge for both Nisar and me as a mentor. But today we got insights from Santosh sir how to make questions. We got clear idea about it while discussing with mentors and Santosh sir in a group of 8 mentors. 

 Santosh sir was asking everyone, and everyone was sharing his/her one or two Research questions of TRs. The way he was listening, eliciting, improving the questions was quite impressive. It gave us confidence how to support our TRs to frame questions.

 Santosh sir conducted a session on  Qualitative Vs Quantitative data, in which we were asked to work in a pair, get one problem and choose a suitable methods for collecting data.

This was Indeed hands on experience where we chose one issue and practically thought about data collection methods.

Here are some:

1. Interview
2. Questionnaires
3. Focus group
4. Observation of a class
5. Teacher diary
6. Recording
7. Testing a skill or sub-skills
8. Learner diary

We also dived deeper into data analysis. I need to work on this area of qualitative data analysis. 

  Ravi sir started with a question,``Should mentors have an experience of classroom based Research? Do they first work as a teacher Researcher and then work as a Mentor?"

This was responded miscellaneously. Most of the mentors agreed that they should work as TRs first and then as mentors.

But I believe that knowingly or unknowingly we all human beings are Researchers. We daily have many problems and we find solutions over them. We might not know how to collect data or analyse it, but we try ourselves to sort out problems. Even farmers who don't go to school, they do research on their farm. If there is no sign of rain or  less rain, they take crops accordingly. And it becomes habit.

 In this regards, mentors have also experience and they don't worry about not having worked as a Teacher Researcher. 

 But, evolving as a teacher Researcher or a mentor one must have systematic and organized knowledge and insights about teacher research.

    To get the experience of research, we all mentors have to decide on one topic for research. Everyone had to share their topic and Nisar and I shared one,"How co-mentoring is helpful for teacher Researchers to do Teacher research effectively?"

It created a fun as 'co-mentoring' was taken as 'commentary'!

 Finally, I'd say that this workshop reinforced our professional understanding about TR and this would certainly improve our qualities and skills as "A Mentor"!

(Great thanks to the people who continuously  inspire & motivate us)

1. Hon.Dr Subhash Kamble (Dir. RAA, A'bad)
2. Hon. Dr Vaishali Veer (Dy.Dir.RAA, Nashik/Principal, DIECPD, Nashik and EO (Pri.)Nashik
3. Hon.Dr Ujjwal Karawande (HoD, RAA, A'bad)
4. Hon. Yogesh Sonawane (HoD, DIECPD,Nashik)
5. British Council
6. Dr Ravinarayan Chakrakodi, and Dr Santosh Mahapatra.( Super mentors, ARMS2019)
7. RAA , A'bad and DIECPD, Nashik

Regards
Ashok Chavan & Nisar Shaikh
SARP, A'bad &Nashik