Investigating student teaching supervision: a case study at Faculty of Education, Burapha University

This case study action research investigated student teaching supervision at\ud Burapha University’s Faculty of Education. It had three phases. In Phase I, the\ud researcher used quantitative methodology - surveys – to reach 155 student\ud teachers (ST), 147 school (SCHS) and 56 university (BUUS) supervisors to\ud gauge perceptions of issues in student teaching supervision during the\ud university’s teaching practice program between November 2003 and February\ud 2004. The overall response rate was 61.17 percent. Survey data were reported as\ud descriptive case studies for each population separately and for respondents as a\ud whole. In Phase II, a small group of volunteer SCHS and BUUS, who were\ud majors in English deliberated on these data in workshops and drafted a\ud supervision guideline to address issues. The researcher facilitated this\ud development, documenting it as a case study of ‘participative action research\ud (PAR)’. Facilitation continued in Phase III with the researcher arranging to trial\ud the guideline at three separate school sites between November 2004 and\ud February 2005. Supervisors from school and university (N=6) who had\ud contributed to its development were paired to supervise three final year ST, also\ud majors in English who were enrolled in the project subsequent to giving their\ud informed consent. Each functioning group of supervisors and ST at each site\ud constituted a ‘triad’. The researcher evaluated the trial, observing ST classroom\ud teaching and post-lesson discussions with supervisors. She also conducted\ud individual focused interviews with the triad to elicit their perceptions of the\ud impact of the guideline on quality of supervision. Reports for each site were\ud compiled; since the trial ‘replicated’ the same process at three separate sites a\ud cumulative report of the experience was provided. Findings from this\ud ‘formative’ evaluation were that supervisors had implemented some guideline\ud recommendations with fidelity and in full, including creating an atmosphere of\ud ‘amicable’ supervision, other recommendations to some extent and a few not at\ud ii\ud all, in part because of logistical problems that prevented some university\ud supervisors in particular from participating in recommended activities. Analysis\ud showed that the guideline was perceived to be ‘useful’ for improving some\ud aspects of the quality of supervision. However, it did not address all issues of\ud concern and was hampered by the Faculty’s lack of an articulated model of\ud teaching practice. Limitations include the single university program studied, that\ud only English majors were involved in designing the guideline and that\ud developers were also those who trialed it. Recommendations for improving\ud teaching practice and further research are made to appropriate agencies