Abstract
Based on the Dialogical Self Theory (henceforth DST), positioning in a pedagogical innovation is defined as a subjective stance taken that has been experienced by the teacher themselves. Thirty Andalusian primary school teachers in seven focus groups reported on five positioning descriptors: agency, ownership, sense-making, emotions and collaborative inquiry. Data were analysed with qualitative and quantitative procedures. The results showed three types of positioning: (1) active, positive and satisfactory positioning (n = 13), with high agency, ownership, sense-making, cooperation and positive emotions; (2) active, efficient and indifferent positioning (n = 8), with medium agency, medium-high degree of ownership, high degree of sense-making, indifferent emotions and a high degree of cooperation; (3) passive, critical and negative positioning (n = 9), with a low degree of agency, ownership, sense-making and cooperation and negative emotions. We provide relevant information to identify the positioning that emerges when primary school teachers participate in a pedagogical inquiry process.
There is currently a surge in studies on teacher-inquirer identity in pedagogical innovation processes (Badia, 2022). The notion of pedagogical innovation is defined as a series of changes that a teacher makes to improve and adapt their educational practices to the characteristics of their students; it has to do with asking questions, examining phenomena and documenting teachers’ perceptions of why things happen in the classroom (Sánchez, 2005).
According to Munthe and Rogne (2015, p. 18), inquiring consists of ‘questioning practices, seeking knowledge and working in evidence-based ways, but not necessarily to conduct research in the scientific terms, with systematic methods and peer reviews’. The activity of pedagogical inquiry involves a set of beliefs, values, attitudes and learning that lead teachers to explore how to teach and learn and how to develop action cycles to transform their teaching. Teacher-inquirers reflect on how to reach different useful perspectives in the acquisition of knowledge and the improvement of their educational practice; they question their efficacy, set short- and long-term goals and base their achievements on evidence.
This study is necessary to further our knowledge of what descriptors are useful to describe different teacher positionings in a pedagogical inquiry process, viewing each position as a particular manifestation of the teacher-inquirer identity according to the specific characteristics of a real innovation project. This knowledge will enable us to assess group dynamics and offer guidelines to improve the results of inquiry-based pedagogical innovation projects.
Two ways to describe teacher-inquirer identity
Until today, studies focused on education inspired by DST (Monereo & Hermans, 2023) have described teacher-inquirer identity in different ways (Badia, 2022) using the concepts of the I-position and types of voices.
Studies that have used the first way of describing inquirer identity construct the repertoire of I-positions of teachers involved in a pedagogical innovation (Badia & Liesa, 2020). Two sets of elements converge in an inquirer I-position: (a) the components of the teacher’s subjective I-inquirer; and (b) the conditions shaping an inquirer position within a pedagogical innovation process (Badia & Liesa, 2020). The components of the subjective I-inquirer include the teachers’ purposes, attitudes and beliefs about inquiry (Avidov-Ungar & Forkosh-Baruch, 2018; Baan et al., 2020; Meijer et al., 2016) and the knowledge and skills needed to inquire (Stewart, 2018). The teachers’ purposes tend to be related to their learning and professional development, the transformation of educational practice and the generation of new knowledge for the professional community (Mertler, 2019). Teachers’ beliefs are relevant in shaping their inquirer I-positions, especially regarding the relationship between theory and practice (Brause & Mayher, 1991). Furthermore, teachers’ knowledge, skills and inquirer attitudes influence their inquiry approach (Healey & Jenkins, 2009). This way of describing inquirer identity enables us to reach conclusions on what I-positions are more or less frequent, but it does not enable us to determine which of these I-positions characterize a positioning with its own descriptors that situate teachers before a pedagogical innovation.
The second way of describing inquirer identity uses empirical data on the existing interrelation between a teacher’s different types of voices when they are participating in a pedagogical innovation process and critical incidents arise. Monereo and Badia (2020) distinguish between internal positions (voices that come from oneself as a teacher, expert innovator, mediator, coordinator, member of an administrative team, etc.) and external positions (voices from others which the teacher takes into consideration). This approach captures the teachers’ voices in relation to critical incidents that emerge in a pedagogical innovation, but it is not so useful in analysing the positioning through an entire educational inquiry process.
Given that our purpose in this study is to describe different teacher positionings in a pedagogical inquiry process, we need to be able to explore a new way to describe inquirer identity that meets the following condition: to describe a specific personal, temporal and spatial inquirer position which has taken place in a real temporal and spatial context. In this study, the context is created via the implementation of a real inquiry-based pedagogical innovation project.
This context comes with specific institutional and contextual conditions, which include the degree of control imposed by the educational administration (Dyer, 1996), the values and principles promoted by the innovation (Ketelaar et al., 2014), the nature of the pedagogical changes and innovations (Luttenberg et al., 2013) and the way the innovation project is implemented (Rom & Eyal, 2019). It also includes social pressure and the way educational culture in general and the culture of the school in particular value educational innovation (Uiterwijk-Luijk et al., 2017), the resources provided by the educational setting (Geijsel & Meijers, 2005) and the existing classroom design and rules (Naraian, 2010).
Descriptors of teacher-inquirer positioning regarding a pedagogical innovation
According to DST, we believe that a teacher’s positioning in a pedagogical innovation is a contextually situated expression of their inquirer identity, and that it can be described by analysing the set of voices that the teacher uses to either position themselves or describe what their positioning was like. In other words, these inquirer voices can refer to both the process and the result of the teacher’s positioning. The content analysis of these voices is the empirical data that enable us to describe each type of positioning.
To date, the existing research in this field has identified many descriptors of teacher-inquirer identity based on an analysis of inquirer voices such as agency (Toom et al., 2015), ownership (Breiting, 2008), sense-making (Ketelaar et al., 2014), emotional experience (Day & Gu, 2013) and collaborative inquiry (DeLuca et al., 2017).
We define agency as a teacher’s perception of the degree of control they have over decision-making in a pedagogical innovation project (Toom et al., 2015). A teacher’s degree of control is delimited by the characteristics of the innovation project defined by the educational administration, the way the project is organized institutionally and the type of leadership promoted in each innovation group (Brill, 2023). The literature has stressed that the higher the teacher’s perceived degree of agency regarding a pedagogical innovation, the higher their commitment and motivation with this innovation (Pyhältö et al., 2015).
Ownership is the degree to which teachers identify with the project and feel that it is part of them as a person and their professional identity as a teacher (Breiting, 2008). Therefore, teachers with a high ownership feel pride over the innovation in which they are participating, sense a need to make changes in their practice and are willing to invest their time and energy in the innovation and share the results by communicating their individual experiences with their colleagues. Consequently, there is a higher likelihood that the innovation is sustained over time and becomes part of the teacher’s professional identity. Studies have shown that the higher the teacher’s perceived ownership of the innovation, the stronger their commitment (Ketelaar et al., 2014).
According to Ketelaar et al. (2014, p. 316), sense-making is ‘an active cognitive and emotional process in which teachers attempt to relate the information derived from the innovation to their existing knowledge, beliefs and experiences [...]. This process is dynamic, as teachers use their own identity or frame of reference as a lens to make sense of the innovation [...], but at the same time their identity or frame of reference can change in the process.’ The literature has stressed that the more sense teachers find in an innovative practice, the stronger their perception of achieving their pedagogical objectives (Soini et al., 2018).
According to Day and Gu (2014, p. 107), emotional experience is ‘teachers’ reaction or reactions to personal, relational and organisational situations, as a dynamic component that can be influenced by contextual factors’. Studies have found that teachers who perceive the innovation to be congruent with their educational beliefs and principles experience positive emotions. Conversely, teachers who believe that the design of the innovation has not taken their beliefs about education into account experience negative emotions (Van Veen & Sleegers, 2006).
Finally, collaborative inquiry encompasses the entire set of interpersonal cooperation processes that the professor engages in within a pedagogical innovation project (Baan, 2020). This cooperation is related to the school organization, the amount of time invested in an innovation, the work climate, the capacities for inquiry-based work and the teacher’s access to document sources. The literature has stressed that a supportive climate among teachers and a suitable inquiry structure at school affect teacher cooperation when implementing pedagogical innovations (DeLuca et al., 2017).
With this study, we aim to identity the types of positionings of primary school teachers participating in inquiry-based pedagogical innovation projects using the following descriptors of that positioning: agency, ownership, sense-making, emotional experience and collaborative inquiry. Specifically, we seek to answer the following research question: What types of positionings emerge when primary school teachers participate in a pedagogical innovation process?
Design
We have used a qualitative and quantitative design via focus groups (Vaportzis et al., 2017) based on the participants’ verbal declarations and the voices that describe how they position themselves. These voices were analysed according to five aspects that acted as descriptors of the positioning: the degree of agency, ownership and sense-making, and the type of emotional experience and collaborative inquiry. The results also made it possible to compare the participants by adopting common categories of analysis (DeLuca et al., 2017). Furthermore, this design has also been useful in checking the results against existing empirical evidence in this field of study (Nelson et al., 2010).
Context of the study
The data collected from the participants came from two training actions that were used in schools publicly funded by the Ministry of Educational Development and Professional Training of the Government of Andalusia (Spain), Working Groups and School Training, which are self-training strategies used by primary and secondary schools. In this study, we only chose primary school projects and teachers affiliated with Andalusian schools.
Working Groups and School Training are annual training actions related to ongoing teacher training and involve the implementation of a pedagogical innovation project at each school. The projects presented in accordance with these training actions have to be based on teamwork, cooperative learning, professional commitment within groupwork and activities related to inquiry-based work such as: processes of reflection, analysis and improvement of teacher skills; methodological and didactic updates; and curriculum-related innovation actions.
Teachers interested in getting involved in an innovation project can join these training actions by requesting them at their reference teachers’ centre following clearly defined assessment, support and monitoring mechanisms. The innovative intention and functions of each member participating in the group must be included in the proposal. Between three and 10 teachers have to participate in the Working Groups, and at least 50% of the teaching staff in the School Trainings, one of whom serves as the coordinator, while the rest are participants, who can be from one or more schools. The number of participants can be increased on an exceptional basis if the project warrants it.
Teachers are expected to achieve the following goals through the design and implementation of innovative practices within these training activities: (a) achieve their purposes when implementing an innovation; (b) identify with the practices designed within the project; (c) perceive that the project responded to their students’ pedagogical problems; (d) state how students’ school outcomes have improved; (e) feel positive emotions for most of the duration of the project; and (f) attribute the project’s success to the cooperative work of all the teachers.
Participants
Thirty primary school teachers, active members of seven innovation projects, participated in this study. The participants’ sociodemographic data are included in Table 1; 66.6% of them are women, with an average age of 42.77 years. Most of the participants have a diploma or bachelor’s degree (80%). The majority of teachers (73.2%) are specialists in physical education, music education and foreign languages (English and/or French). Almost all the participants had previously coordinated an innovation plan and/or project (96.6%); 76.6% teach first, second or another grade in primary school. The innovation projects lasted one school year, and most of the participants worked at the same school (73.2%).
Sociodemographic data of the participants (n = 30).
To guarantee their status as active teacher-inquirers at the time the study was conducted, the participants self-selected through an intentional sampling strategy using three criteria: (a) they had to be part of an innovation project; (b) the innovation project had to entail a true change in educational practice; and (c) only participants who pledged in writing to participate in the focus group were included in the study.
Data collection
We collected data via seven focus groups from May to July 2022. We chose seven focus groups and a total of 30 participants in order to have as wide a range of different types of positionings regarding the same type of innovation project as possible. The teachers from each Working Group or School Training were different. The participants in each focus group were part of a pedagogical innovation project which they had implemented together. The process started with the researcher in charge of organizing the focus group getting in touch with the project coordinator to set up a remote appointment. Each project coordinator received the link, which they were to share with the other participants so they could connect to the video conference.
The focus groups lasted approximately 90 minutes and were divided into two parts. The first part, which lasted around 20 minutes, began by defining the concept of inquiry, inquiry group and practices informed by educational research. In order to avoid interfering in the participants’ responses, we did not explain the meaning of: agency; ownership; sense-making; positive, negative and indifferent emotions; and collaborative inquiry. After that, we asked the participants a series of questions: the degree to which they identified with the practices designed within the project, their perception of whether the project had responded to their students’ pedagogical problems, the degree of improvement of school outcomes after implementing the project, the emotions they felt throughout most of the project, the degree to which they would attribute the project’s success to the teachers’ individual or cooperative work, the purposes of inquiring, the decision-making process, their interests and motivations for improving their teaching and their degree of identification with and commitment to inquiry.
Data analysis
We conducted a qualitative deductive-inductive analysis (Armat et al., 2018) using MAXQDA software (version 22). The data analysis process had eight phases: (a) We transcribed the seven focus groups; the transcriptions were initially read several times. (b) We established and defined five analytical dimensions that describe the teachers’ positioning regarding a pedagogical innovation: (1) agency; (2) ownership; (3) sense-making; (4) emotions; and (5) collaborative inquiry. (c) We categorized the content of the text into thematic units; each thematic unit corresponds to a text fragment that refers to one of the five aforementioned dimensions (Badia & Becerril, 2016). To categorize a thematic unit, we marked a beginning and an end via an identification number (ID) and four other numbers; for example, the thematic unit coded as ID54, 4, 38, 35–37 was produced by the teacher with ID54 in focus group number 4 in text fragment number 38 and in paragraphs 35–37. In the majority of cases, the categorization of each thematic unit matched a single position. (d) Next, we inductively established the ordinal qualitative categories within each dimension. The result was high, medium and low for agency, ownership and sense-making; positive, indifferent and negative for emotions; and individual or collaborative for collaborative inquiry. Table 2 shows the definition of each of these categories.
Definition of the categories used to analyse the descriptors of the teacher-inquirer identity.
(e) We coded the data taking the codification scheme used in the study by Badia (2022) as our reference. (f) We obtained a total of 1,142 thematic units with an average of 9.28 per participant. The length of the text of each thematic unit ranged between 21 and 235 words. (g) We conducted an interjudge reliability study. The agreement among evaluators was acceptable for all the descriptors, with Cohen’s kappa values of .83 and .80. (h) We analysed the data using the programme R and the cluster test for qualitative data. After that, we compared the three resulting clusters using the SPSS program (version 26) applied to the Pearson Chi-squared tests and Fisher’s exact test for qualitative data.
Results
Table 3 shows three types of teacher positionings adopted regarding a pedagogical innovation process.
Descriptive data on the number and percentage of teachers who took at least one individual stance in each positioning. Comparison of the three clusters of participants (n = 30).
Note: (1) Pearson’s chi-square test / Fisher’s exact test
p < .001; bp < .01.
The first inquirer positioning in a pedagogical innovation, described as ‘active, positive and satisfactory’, was taken by 13 teachers. In this positioning, the teachers expressed that they achieved their purposes to a high degree when implementing an innovation in the classroom, controlled decision-making throughout the project (100%), felt ownership of the innovation and identified with the pedagogical practices of the inquiry project (100%), felt that the pedagogical practices implemented within the project responded to their students’ pedagogical problems and contributed to improving their school outcomes (76.9%), felt positive emotions (100%) and worked as a cooperative team (100%).
The following text extract is a prototypical example of the inquirer voice of a teacher who positioned himself as ‘active, positive and satisfactory’ in a pedagogical innovation.
We met, and at first I was able to contribute my ideas to the project: what I wanted to achieve with my kids, my goals ... plus I was never told no; we debated and reached a consensus. And then I was also able to take my own decisions in my classroom. For example, I remember a music activity that didn’t go well, so I changed it. I brought that up with them and we all changed it [...]. In this project, when we got to the school we teachers all had to be trained. Oral expression was done one way from first to sixth grade [...]. And we would meet and offer our ideas for the project and do useful practices we had all designed together. And another thing is that we were all doing the same practices in the classroom. So, what I mean is that all the teachers who joined the project worked in unison. And we were new. And there were temporary, interim teachers; there was a bit of everything [...]. In this profession, we shouldn’t be pigeonholed into the traditional method; we have to constantly seek training and update ourselves [...]. If we’re working on this, we have to adapt to the needs of the school where we’ve landed and the students. With this project, I got the students to improve their grades and helped the kids with the most difficulties [...]. In my case, for example, this project gave me lots of positive emotions. The fun of sharing trips with my colleagues, learning about other places, teamwork. I think these years have been a great experience for me and I’ve learned a lot as a teacher with all of you [...]. A project works as long as everyone works as a unit with great leadership with super-competent and super-engaged people. A lot of unity and cooperative work is needed. And here we’ve always had it. That’s why anything we do is so successful. (ID120, 7, 71, 77–82)
The second inquirer positioning in a pedagogical innovation, described as ‘active, efficient and indifferent’, was adopted by eight teachers. In this positioning, the teachers state that they have somewhat met their goals of implementing an innovation in the classroom and had control over the decisions taken in the project (75%), felt ownership of the innovation and identified to a mid-high degree with the project’s pedagogical practices (75%), perceived that the pedagogical practices implemented within the project have responded to their students’ pedagogical problems and have contributed to improving their school outcomes to a mid-high degree (100%), felt positive or indifferent emotions (87.5%) and mostly worked as a cooperative team (75%).
The following text extract is a prototypical example of the inquirer voice of a teacher who has positioned himself as ‘active, efficient and indifferent’ in a pedagogical innovation.
The project did what we wanted to do, which was ultimately introduce a new methodology into class. But of course, the practices were conditioned from above and we were unable to take decisions to change them because it could no longer be properly justified. Those of us who did the project in the classroom clearly knew that it came down to us, and we did it our own way, but with the activities that they told us to use. That meant that sometimes we didn’t agree or we didn’t think that they were the best practices. Plus, they were able to fit the activities into the school level, but at the classroom level we had to change many practices that couldn’t be done here. So it’s true that broadly speaking we did the project in our own way. Let’s say that we brought it to our own turf in almost every way. But we couldn’t change some practices and they couldn’t be done well here in Spain [...]. On the one hand, the project was very satisfying because the kids learned and the colleagues worked well together collaboratively, as my colleague said before. But sometimes, I’m not quite sure how to put it, you felt somewhat indifferent to some of the practices that the administration presented because you were unable to implement them well in your class. (ID16, 3, 89, 108–109)
The third inquirer positioning in a pedagogical innovation, described as ‘passive, critical and negative’, was adopted by nine teachers. In this positioning, the teachers stated that they did not achieve the goals of implementing an innovation in the classroom and they had little control over the decisions taken in the project (77.8%), had a mid-low perception of ownership of the innovation and of identifying with the inquiry project’s pedagogical practices (88.9%), had a mid-high perception that the pedagogical practices implemented within the project responded to their students’ pedagogical problems and contributed to improving their school outcomes (66.7%), felt negative emotions (100%), and the project was primarily conducted on an individual level without collaboration with the group members (88.9%).
The following text extract is a prototypical example of the inquirer voice of a teacher who has taken a ‘passive, critical and negative’ positioning in a pedagogical innovation.
In the projects, even though there are teachers who may individually want to change their way of teaching a bit and go further, ultimately the schools continue their own distribution. For example, ultimately you are ruled by what the school does in this project and you can’t contribute much, neither your ideas nor your own practices. This was a major limitation [...]. Honestly, the project made no sense in my classroom and couldn’t be rolled out properly. Doing some of the activities cost me blood, sweat and tears, and obviously, half the time they did not meet the standards. But the fact is I didn’t really understand why they were doing a project like that, so structured and with so little practical meaning [...]. If I’m honest, this project did not meet our kids’ needs, among other reasons because nobody asked them. And it didn’t improve outcomes, either. I mean, I assume that’s what they wanted. But nothing was achieved. Plus, like I said, in my classroom we needed not to work on that but on other things [...]. Ultimately you feel all alone. The coordinators only tell you to fill out papers and more papers, and that’s stressful because I also have to keep my class moving. And you can’t do everything at once with so much work and so much bureaucracy [...]. It was a written project created like that, but ultimately the training goal was for the school to have a project, and it did. The document is there, and now it needs to be put into practice [...]. But the proof that the project wasn’t suitable is that ultimately everyone did it their own way in their classroom. There was no, shall we say, consensus in doing the activities. The project was done, but each person did it individually the way they wanted to in their classroom. (ID112, 6, 90, 98–99)
Conclusions
In this study, we set out to further our knowledge of teacher-inquirer identity and determine how this identity can be expressed through different kinds of positionings regarding a pedagogical innovation project. This knowledge will enable us to reflect in the future on the way to promote positive, effective teacher positionings and prevent critical, negative or passive positionings. We believe that the data obtained in this study provide enough empirical evidence to draw four conclusions.
First, the data showed that the notion of positioning taken from DST was extremely useful in describing the different ways in which teacher-inquirer identity can be expressed regarding a specific, real innovation project. The way a positioning is analysed, using a person-oriented approach for qualitative research, was crucial in keeping the unity of the teacher’s subjective identity, which would not have been possible had we used an approach based on analysing variables (Vanthournout, 2011).
Secondly, we have revealed that the notions of agency ownership, sense-making, emotional experience and collaborative inquiry have proven to be very useful in describing each positioning and distinguishing among three types of positioning. We believe that this result, along with the first one, is a novel, original contribution to this field of study, given that we are not aware of any prior studies on this specific topic.
Thirdly, the empirical results are complementary to other existing results. For example, some authors (DeLuca et al., 2017; Soini et al., 2018) have shown that some of the variables analysed, like agency, ownership and sense-making, positively correlate with an effective, successful pedagogical innovation process. Our study not only adds two new aspects analysed but also shows that this positive correlation between ‘variables’ can be considered a description of teacher-inquirer identity.
Fourthly, we want to highlight the identification of the teachers’ second positioning regarding a pedagogical innovation, given that research in this field reveals the difficulty of finding intermediate positionings using descriptors (Assen et al., 2018; Badia, 2022; Ketelaar et al., 2014; Monereo & Badia, 2020). The results reveal the crucial role potentially played by intermediate power levels between the educational administration and the individual teacher, which can create new conditions (either favourable or limiting) that have a decisive influence on the way teachers position themselves regarding an innovation project. Some examples of intermediate power levels can be the way the educational administration determines the conditions for implementing innovation projects at schools, the way the projects are coordinated and the way the administrative team manages the school and influences the educational innovation leaders and/or the coordinators of teaching teams in the design and implementation of innovation projects.
Finally, we want to mention three limitations of this study. The first is the use of focus groups with members from the same school. In this case, the teachers were quite willing to verbalize their experiences in a pedagogical innovation project, which may condition or conceal the statements of some participants (Buss et al., 2013). Secondly, all the participants are from the same geographic area with a particular educational culture, and therefore the results should only be considered types of positionings of the participating teachers. The third limitation we wanted to underscore is the restrictions on identifying clusters with such a small sample size.
We are convinced that future studies in this field will enable us to further our understanding of three aspects in relation to improving the implementation of educational innovations and their impact on classroom educational practice: (a) the factors that facilitate or hinder the appearance of certain teacher positionings; (b) the meaning of the positionings found in this study in other settings; and (c) the impact of the teachers’ positioning on real educational practices implemented in the classroom.