Communities of practice and ELT teacher research in Cambodia Presented at 12 th CamTESOL Conference, 2016 Phnom Penh, Cambodia Chan Narith Keuk, PhD Department of English, IFL, RUPP

Acknowledgements To Dr. Stephen Moore, Macquarie University, Australia, for his valuable guidance and support for this PhD thesis research.

This presentation is based on my PhD thesis titled “Investigating Communities of Practice and ELT Teacher Research in Cambodia”, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia. Graduation: September, 2015

Aim of presentation Overview of ELT teacher research in Cambodia Overview of the literature Methodology Findings Conclusion Outline

Aim of this presentation The aim of this presentation is to share the findings of my PhD thesis project: What actually counts as ELT teacher research in the context of CamTESOL conference series. Whether ELT teacher research activities are undertaken within a community of practice framework

An overview of ELT teacher research in Cambodia

Review of the literature Current “teacher research” in language teaching Various studies on “language teacher research” have been conducted in: - the worldwide context (Borg, 2009) - China (Barkhuizen, 2009; Barkhuizen & Gao, 2010; Gao, Barkhuizen, & Chow, 2011; Borg & Liu, 2013), - Cambodia (Keuk, 2015; Moore 2011a, 2011b), - Vietnam (Hiep, 2006; Moore, in progress)

Review of the literature (Cont.) Borg (2013, p. 70) “Understanding the conceptions of research held by teachers is important in attempts to engage them with and in research.” Borg’s (2009) baseline research on teachers’ conceptions of research. Moore (2011b, p. 97) “Further studies of this topic in Cambodia should include interviews, and preferably, ethnographic data relating to actual research being undertaken by Cambodian English teachers.”

Review of the literature (Cont.) Wenger’s (2006) notion of communities of practice: Communities of practice are groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly. (See also Wenger (1998) and Wenger, McDermott & Synder (2002))

Methodology 1 The project has two phases: Phase 1: Macro views of ELT research In this phase, I adopted an interpretive paradigm using a focus group discussion and two supplementary individual interviews. Research instrument DurationNo. of participants PseudonymAgeOccupation Focus Group1hr4K1, K2, K3, K420s=1 30s=3 University ELT professionals Individual interview 40mins 2K5, K630s=1 40s=1

Findings 1 1)Cambodian English teachers’ conceptions of ELT teacher research They discussed 10 pairs of research scenarios. In each pair, one scenario was taken from Borg (2009), and the other scenario was contextualised based on the local context and adapted from Borg’s (2010) definition of teacher research.

Findings 1 (Cont.) Borg’s (2010, 2013) notion of ‘teacher research’: o A systematic inquiry (quantitative/qualitative), o being conducted by teachers (individually/ collaboratively) in teachers’ own contexts, o to enhance teachers’ understanding about their practice and perhaps to inform this practice beyond classroom, and o being made public. (p. 395)

Findings 1 (Cont.) ELT teacher research Research Who? Research is conducted by teachers.Research is not necessarily conducted by teachers. In what context? Classroom context.Classroom context and outside classroom context. Systematic?Less systematic.More systematic. Sharing? Not necessarily sharing, but if sharing happens, oral sharing with colleagues is stated. Presented at any conference or written publication in any journal. Scale?A narrow scope.A large scope. What purpose?To improve teaching and learning within the classroom. Expanding purposes to outside the classrooms. What is it related to? Classroom observation, reflection action research, classroom research. Anything – unconstrained. The participants distinguished ‘teacher research’ from ‘research’

Methodology 2 Phase 2: Micro view of ELT teacher research In this phase, I adopted ethnographic techniques to collect data for a case study of (four sub-cases of A1, B1, B2, and B3/B4) individual ELT teacher researchers’ undertaking research projects and presenting them at the 2013 CamTESOL conference.

Methodology 2 (Cont.) Research tools: -individual interviews, -group discussions, -subsequent discussions, -the abstracts that the participants submitted to the 2013 CamTESOL conference, and -the powerpoint presentation slides that they used for presentation at the conference.

Findings 2 Research process (B3/B4’s research project) A research process framework for this analysis is adopted from  Kumar’s (2005) research process (an eight-step model)  Freeman’s (1998) teacher research cycle  Borg’s (2010) definition of teacher research in language teaching

Findings (Cont.) Two composite models of the research process undertaken in an Australian/ western context

Findings 2 (Cont.) B3/B4’s 2013 CamTESOL research process

Findings 2 (Cont.) Analysis of participants’ research abstracts A generic structure of conference abstract was adapted from Hyland (2009) and Swales & Feak (2009).

Findings 2 (Cont.)

Recall: CoPs at three levels

Community of Practice Model (Cont.) Source: (Keuk, 2015b) Characteristics of CoP (Wenger, 1998, 2006 )

Communities of Practice model (Cont.) If a community does not possess these characteristics, it is not a community of practice. It belongs to a different entity.

Community of Practice model (Cont.)

Community of Practice Model (Cont.) For a community of practice to grow, a coordinator plays very important role in facilitating and maintaining CoP activities. (Wenger, McDermott & Synder, 2002)

Findings 3: CoPs at the three levels

Findings 3: CoP at Macro level

Findings 3: CoP at Macro level (Cont.)

Findings 3: CoP at Meso level

Findings 3: CoP at meso level (Cont.)

Findings 3: CoP at micro level

Findings 3: CoP at micro level (Cont.)

Discussion

Proposed CoP model of teacher researchers

References Keuk, C. N. (2015). Investigating communities of practice and ELT teacher research in Cambodia. (Doctor of Philosophy), Macquarie University, Macquarie University. Borg, S. (2009). English language teachers' conceptions of research. Applied Linguistics, 30(3), Borg, S. (2010). Language teacher research engagement Language Teaching, 43(4), Borg, S., & Liu, Y. (2013). Chinese college English teachers' research engagement. TESOL Quarterly, 47(2), Freeman, D. (1998). Doing teacher research: from inquiry to understanding Toronto: Heinle & Heinle Publishers. Gao, X., Barkhuizen, G., & Chow, A. W. K. (2011). Research engagement and educational decentralisation: problematising primary school English teachers’ research experiences in China. Educational Studies, 37(2), Hyland, K. (2009). Academic discourse: English in a Global context. London: Continuum. Kumar, R. (2005). Research methodology: A step-by step guide for beginners. London: Sage. Moore, S. (2011a). The Struggle to Develop a "Research Culture" in a Developing Country. TESOL Quarterly 45(2),

References (Cont.) Moore, S. (2011b). Cambodian English teachers' conceptions of and engagement with research. Selected Proceedings of the International Conference: Doing Research in Applied Linguistics (pp ). Bangkok: School of Liberal Arts, King Mungkut's University of Technology Thonburi. Stewart, D. W., Shamdasani, P. N., & Rook, D. W. (2007). Focus Groups: Theory and Practice (Vol. 20). Thousand Oaks: SAGE. Swales, J. M., & Feak, C. B. (2009). Abstracts and the writing of abstracts (Vol. The revised and expanded edition of English in Today's Research World): The Michigan Series in English for Academic & Professional Purposes. The University of Michigan Press.