The Proficient Teacher as a Researcher: Drivers, Barriers, and Research Skills
Larry M. Roallos Ed.D
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4861-5840
larry.roallos@deped.gov.ph
Department of Education, Batangas, Philippines
DOI: https://doi.org/10.54476/ioer-imrj/461663
ABSTRACT
There exists a prevailing expectation that educators should assume the predominant responsibility for spearheading research initiatives at the school level. Regrettably, the involvement of teachers in action research is notably scarce, and establishing a research-centric culture proves to be a formidable challenge. An analysis of research endeavors within the Ibaan District illuminates that a paltry percentage of elementary educators (less than ten percent) have undertaken research endeavors. This statistic underscores the exigency for refresher courses to revitalize motivation and instigate active participation in this pedagogical undertaking. Consequently, the present research endeavors to proffer a meticulously designed training framework predicated upon an exhaustive evaluation of teachers’ motivational levels, encountered challenges, research proficiency, and interconnectedness with diverse teacher profile variables. This research utilized a descriptive research design with a survey questionnaire as the data-gathering instrument. One hundred thirty-six randomly selected proficient teachers were the respondents of the study. Results showed that the teachers had inadequate experience in research writing since their employment at DepEd but mostly attended research training, had full-time teaching, and attended lower-level research forums. These teachers were highly motivated in research as a career responsibility, although they were moderately motivated by their growth of knowledge and skills upon doing research. For them, time constraints are a moderate barrier to conducting research. As to research skills, they were moderately skilled in facilitating the validation and reliability testing of the research instrument and in identifying and using appropriate statistical tools. The chi-square test bared that there is a significant relationship between the teachers’ level of motivation and the number of research studies they made, which suggests that more research conducted leads to higher motivation in engaging in research. The proposed training design integrates sessions on enhancing the teachers’ motivation and research skills.
Keywords: action research, research motivation and skills, descriptive survey, Philippines