Abstract
The objectives of this study were to explore teacher student’s views on the research training they receive and know their suggestions for improving it. This was a qualitative study conducted on students in the teacher training programs of a Chilean public university who were distributed into nine focus groups. The findings showed that the students have a rather critical view about the training they receive, particularly due to the lack of continuity of research-related courses and their limited participation in research activities. Regarding how to improve their training, the students suggest providing one research-related course each year, having researchers as teachers, and giving greater visibility to the educational research produced within their university. The study concludes that it is important to promote participation in educational research and that university teacher educators and the entire university community must adopt a broad-ranging view on this subject.
Highlights
The presence and importance of educational research in professional training is an issue that has attracted the interest of governments, political decision-makers, and researchers all over the world (Griffioen, Groen, & Nak, 2019), and of teachers and students
The results showed that the future teachers have positive views about the educational research training they have received, especially as a tool for professional development and teacher empowerment
Consistent with the semantic categories identified in the data analysis, the findings are analyzed from three perspectives: the usefulness of educational research, the critical view on educational research training, and the suggestions for improving that training
Summary
The presence and importance of educational research in professional training is an issue that has attracted the interest of governments, political decision-makers, and researchers all over the world (Griffioen, Groen, & Nak, 2019), and of teachers and students. Teacher training has not remained indifferent; quite the contrary, educational research is gaining stronger relevance within teacher training programs This increased interest has motivated studies into the future teachers’ views on educational research (Haberfellner & Fenz, 2017; Perines & Murillo, 2017) and the students’ views on research-related courses (van der Linden, Bakx, Ros, Beijaard, & Vermeulen, 2012). Such studies and relevant theoretical reviews have found that educational research is poorly represented in teacher education curricula (Perines, 2018; Perines & Campaña, 2019) to the point of being mostly invisible (Cain & Allan, 2017). They note the importance of achieving early literacy in educational research during the first years of study (Anwaruddin & Pervin, 2015; van der Linden et al, 2012) and that research activities that are linked to the teaching practice are more relevant for students
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