Communities of Practice: An Alaskan Native Model for Language Teaching and Learning

7. Conversations

136 chapter seven Conversations Patrick E. Marlow, Marilee Coles-Ritchie, Sabine Siekmann, and Joan Parker Webster This final chapter derives from a three-day summative program evaluation session with the Second Language Acquisition Teacher Education (SLATE) faculty. This evaluation session was conducted in November 2010, six months after the majority of the program participants (seventeen of the eighteen teachers and one of the four PhD candidates) had successfully completed their degree programs. Prior to the evaluation session, the eighteenth and final teacher completed her degree (August 2010) and two additional doctoral candidates successfully defended their theses; the fourth PhD candidate was involved in data analysis. Thus, with the project largely complete, the faculty met to discuss the successes and challenges of the program as well as reflect on what might have been done differently and what the next steps might be. Methodology The entire three-day session included both evaluation and analysis. The evaluation session consisted of five 90–120-minute discussion periods. All discussion periods were recorded, resulting in approximately eight hours of audio files and thirty pages of typed field notes. Although discussions often continued during breaks, no notes were taken and important points were returned to when the session resumed. Although the faculty did not prepare formal questions and no one person was designated the interviewer for the purposes of the sessions, key questions were tacitly agreed Conversations • 137 on (e.g., What constitutes program success? What challenges come to mind for you as you reflect back on the program?), and faculty took turns questioning and encouraging one another to speak. Field notes were taken in turn by each of the faculty members. While taking field notes, faculty tended to adopt the observer role, rejoining the conversation only when they felt particularly compelled to do so. Data Analysis The faculty met on day 3 to review and analyze the compiled field notes. Using a constructivist grounded theory approach (Charmaz 2000), faculty coded the data and began organizing the codes into themes and subthemes. Three primary themes emerged: (1) building a community of learners through research, (2) transforming pedagogy, and (3) defining success. We used initial theme outlines to guide transcription of key sections of the evaluation session. We engaged in a process similar to reconstructive analysis (Carsprecken 1996) in which sections of dialogue were edited, reordered, and occasionally expanded on to create compact and coherent discussions of each of the three major themes. To maintain the integrity of the original conversation, frequent member checks were conducted. This process of data manipulation and review, in keeping with a constructivist grounded theory (Charmaz 2000), provided multiple opportunities for all conversational participants to view the original data and expand on our initial understandings of that data. As a result, new ideas developed and new questions emerged, resulting in recoding of the data multiple times. This process resulted in the refinement of three major themes with twelve subthemes and five recurrent themes. Major themes are seen as primary topics of conversation, and subthemes are seen as subtopics. In contrast, recurrent themes are repeated throughout the dialogue and form linkages between the topics of conversation (major and subthemes). In this chapter we discuss two major themes along with the seven relevant subthemes and three recurrent themes listed in Tables 7.1 and 7.2. Discussion of Themes: Major and Subthemes Building a Community of Learners through Research The Graduate Research Collaboratives (GRCs) were the central design element unique to the SLATE project. Through the GRCs, faculty sought 138 • Marlow, Coles-Ritchie, Siekmann, and Webster to foster research collaborations between and among all members of each of the four GRCs (Pedagogy, Multiliteracies, Assessment, and Language Policy and Planning). As noted many times before, each GRC was headed by a faculty member, and each consisted of one Alaska Native PhD candidate and up to six master’s candidates. GRC meetings were intended to facilitate the development of individual and group research agendas, as well as allow for continued exchange among peers, doctoral students, and faculty members. The GRC design for research reflects the influence of sociocultural Table 7.1. Major Themes and Subthemes Themes Subthemes Description Building a research community Choice of research community “Assignment to” vs. “choice of” GRC affected the development of the research community Peer support Building social connections between the teachers as peers Faculty as outsider The faculty members’ positioning as white academics and outsiders affected the development...