RUNNING HEAD: Bridging the gap

Bridging the gap: Communities of discourse and practice in conflict

By Sarah Fehrman
Purdue University

Bridging the gap: Communities of discourse and practice in conflict

Bridging the gap

This isnt the paper I was supposed to write. Most of the semester, Ive
been working on something else. I collected data for something else. I read
literature about something else. I wrote a research proposal about something
else. I did my research presentation about something else. In all of the work I
have done on this original project though, I have been continually frustrated,
and have continually run up against walls that seemed unscalable. So, I am
writing a different paper than I intended. A paper about how I couldnt write
my paper.
My original idea was to look at the intersection of curriculum design
and classroom instruction. This was a complex project. It involved multiple
identities, lots of data, putting things together that are normally separated
and trying to understand them. I knew that it was an ambitious project, but it
was also a project that was important to me. It wasnt just a research
assignment for a class, it was the reality of my everyday life. I am a
curriculum designer. I am also a classroom teacher, and a program assessor.
Somewhere in the mix, I am a graduate student, but since this is a
temporary state, and a means to an end for me, it rarely factors into my
identity in the same way that these other roles do. These are all ways that I
think of myself, that I see my place in my professional world, that I
understand the things that I do and the influences that shape me. Within
these various roles, there are the things that I do. I develop and validate
rubrics and testing items for a new standardized test. I read and write
papers. I do needs analysis for my curriculum and my classroom, and I read

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widely on theory to find ways to help my program and my students in the

best ways I can. All of these activities fall under the broad umbrella of
research, yet I do not think of myself as a researcher. Research is something I
do, its not who I am. I am not alone in this self-perception, according to
Healey, who states that it is often challenging for teachers to perceive
themselves as researchers (2005).
This perception of my world is normally fine. In my professional life, I
am surrounded by people who also sometimes do research, but dont see
themselves as researchers. It is the norm in the world that I primarily inhabit.
But when I cross over into the world of graduate school, however temporarily
or superficially I may be part of this world, everything changes. I am
surrounded by people who have made significant investments of time and
resources to further their skills and identity as researchers. In this world, I am
the outsider. I am the one who is out of sync with everyone else. Or at least,
thats how it often seems. I value research and researchers. I think that
exposure to this world can make me better at my job. I chose to take courses
in both quantitative and qualitative research because I wanted to understand
more about these methods, I wanted to be a better reader, and I wanted to
gain understanding that could help me be better at my job. I have learned so
much from the courses I have taken and the conversations I have had with
fellow graduate students. I hope that these things will make me a better
teacher. But this is the source of conflict or difference I look at research as
a means to an end (being a better teacher) not as an end in and of itself.

Bridging the gap

When I was thinking about my project this semester, my goal was to conduct
research that was useful to me as a teacher, as a curriculum designer, that
would be useful to my colleagues as they interact with my curriculum, and in
their classrooms, and that would help me learn more about how to conduct
qualitative research. In that order. And in the end, this approach caused me
to fall into the gap between teaching and research, and I havent yet figured
out how to escape this gap, or how to live in this gap.
Methodology
Instead of writing a paper about teaching or curriculum, I want to
explore this question of the gap that exists between teachers and
researchers. In order to do this, I will conduct an autoethnographic study of
my own experiences as both a teacher and a researcher. I will primarily focus
on the time period between August and December, 2016. I want to tell my
story about membership in both of these communities, because Bygate
states that storytelling is a more accessible method of distributing research
findings to teachers (2005). Narrative is a powerful tool for distributing
information, but it is also an important component of finding information,
and, as Freeman asserts, is beneficial in allowing teachers to understand and
analyze their work (1994). Webster and Mertova believe that narrative is
well suited to addressing the complexities and subtleties of the human
experience in teaching and learning (2007, p. 1). Lyle also believes that there
is great value in reflecting on stories, because teaching and teacher
development are rooted in the personal, reflexive inquiry involves the study

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of how the personal influences the professional (2009, p. 295) and therefore
positions practitioners to explicate the nuances of schooling experiences as
they inform praxis (2009, p. 295). This is not just a narrative, or a reflection,
but it is an autoethnography. The purpose of autoethnography, particularly
narrative reflexive autoethnography is to document ways a researcher
changes as a result of doing fieldwork (Ellis, Adams, and Bochner, 2011).
Teaching and research are both about learning, which is an important end in
and of itself, however Wenger argues that learning is not merely the
acquisition of a body of knowledge, but a journey of the self (2011). Using
autoethnography, I would like to go on a journey to learn about the tensions,
benefits, and challenges of existing as both a teacher and a researcher.
Positionality
I have talked about a number of roles that I view as more or less
important in my world, but I want to take some time to more fully explain
who I am, what I do, and what I hope to accomplish in this paper. I have two
primary affiliations with Purdue University, and one secondary affiliation. The
most significant affiliation is that I am a full time continuing lecturer (CL) with
the Purdue Language and Cultural Exchange (PLaCE), which is a two
semester course for international undergraduate students with developing
language proficiency. PLaCE courses teach a combination of language and
culture, with a primary focus on developing tools for language fluency and
cross-cultural interaction and competency. I have been a CL with PLaCE since
its inception in fall 2014. During that time, I have filled a number of roles. I

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have taught courses for graduate and undergraduate students, I have tested
textbooks and online homework systems, I have developed and worked to
validate rubrics and items for a standardized language test that is still under
development, I have been involved in hiring staff, building partnerships
across campus, and doing program-wide and classroom based needs
assessment. In summer of 2016, I was asked to develop curriculum for the
entire program. I took some ideas and materials that my colleagues and I
had used in the past and created additional materials to develop a course
structure, course reader, and instructor manual. I have continued this work in
creating structures and materials for the second course in the PLaCE
sequence, which will be taught in the spring semester. An additional
responsibility that grew out of the curriculum development was training and
mentoring other CLs on how to implement the curriculum, and supporting
them in their individual teaching practice. This has become an increasingly
large component of my job, and has helped me grow and develop in the way
that I think about designing curriculum for a program as opposed to
developing lesson plans for my own classes. I now inhabit a role that is
somewhere between just teaching and program development and
administration. In all of these duties, research is a component. However, the
research enables me to fulfill my duties, rather than being the duty itself.
My secondary role at Purdue is that of a graduate student. While I work
full time, I am only a part time graduate student. I take two courses each
semester, and am completing my third semester of the Masters program in

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Second Language Studies/ESL, and I plan to graduate in December, 2017. I

do research for each of my courses, usually to fulfill course requirements. I
am also in the early stages of researching and writing my thesis project.
These roles are more closely aligned with what is perhaps traditional for
researchers. I am dealing with theory, literature, and in some small way,
trying to make contributions to the field of SLS. Beyond this, my role in the
world of graduate students is somewhat complicated. In many ways, I simply
dont fit in this world. I am a part time Masters student in a world of full time
PhD students. I do not teach first year composition, like so many of my fellow
students, and I have an office in the basement of Heavilon Hall, as opposed
to sharing office space with other graduate students on the third or fourth
floor of Heavilon. My goals in pursuing graduate study also seem to be
different from many of my grad school colleagues. While I have certainly
learned much through my courses, and have been exposed to a great
number of theories and researchers throughout the process, I am more or
less approaching graduate school as a professional development exercise to
allow me to continue to advance on my chose career path. This description
fits all of us, I think. But my chose career path is completely centered on
teaching undergraduate students. I anticipate that any research I do in my
future will be for the purpose of classroom and program development, not
with the goal of contributing to the field of knowledge. I do not want to
pursue a PhD at this point in time, and I do not have a desire for a tenure
track professorship. Of course, I admire and support my fellow graduate

Bridging the gap

students who do want those things. I respect their hard work and sacrifice to
accomplish their goals. These are just not the goals that I have, and this
means I am often at odds with other students in this program.
My final connection with Purdue University is less important for this
project, but it is part of my identity in this context. In spring of 2007, I
transferred to Purdue University as a junior, and in spring 2009, I graduated
with a BA in classical studies from this university. As an undergraduate
student, I experienced a number of different classroom situations where
research played a larger or smaller role in the classroom dynamic. There
were some experiences with professors, TAs, and researchers that were
positive, but there were also some negative experiences where I felt there to
be a conflict between teaching and research, and where research seemed to
win. To my 20-something year old self, it felt like there was a gap between
the people who valued teaching more, and the people who valued research
more.
Finding the Gap
This gap between teachers and researchers exists outside of my 20
year old mind. There is a growing body of research detailing the problem,
and some likely causes. There is less said about possible solutions at this
point. Pennycook wrote about this gap, and posited that it was caused by the
incompatibility of discourse styles between teachers and researchers (1994)
while Wallace thought that it was simply because teachers and researchers

Bridging the gap

come from different frames of reference (1991). Freeman and Johnson took
this a step further, asserting that there was a lack of deep understanding
and appreciation of teacher knowledge (1998, p. 399) and research
knowledge does not articulate easily and cogently into classroom practice
(1998, p. 399). Ellis believes the lack of consensus about the relationship
between research and teaching continues to remain a complex and
multifaceted nexus of sometimes conflicting positions on whether or not the
research findings are applicable to teaching (2010, cited in Tavakoli, 2015, p.
39). Borg stated the problem quite simply, that teacher research remains
largely a minority activity in the field of language teaching (2010, p. 391)
and Nassaji found that even action research is not widely practiced by
teachers (2012). Perhaps this is because research and teaching have often
been seen as mutually exclusive activities (Montgomery and Smith, 2015, p.
110). This reality of mutual exclusivity isnt the goal of research, according to
a statement issued by the NCTE that states the ultimate goal of research in
English language arts is to enable teachers, teacher educators, and
institutions to make sound decisions about the educational activities and
experiences that will best serve students (2008).
There is great benefit to be found in teachers grounding their praxis in
high quality research, so why is this not happening? Tavakoli analyzed data
from a number of questionnaires in England, and found that participants
perceive teaching and research as two different CoPs (Communities of
Practice) and that the membership to one may not only limit but sometimes

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exclude a membership to the other (2015, p. 45). She further found that it
was a continuous challenge to attempt to balance membership in multiple
communities (2015, p. 45). This seems to be because teachers often
perceive research as irrelevant, unhelpful and too theoretical (Rahman and
Pandian, 2016, p. 163), feel frustrated with how out of touch academic
articles seem to be with the day-to-day realities (Montgomery and Smith,
2015, p. 100) teachers face in their classrooms, and experience research as
overly philosophical, theoretical, or wishy washy (Montgomery and Smith,
2015 p. 102).
Meanwhile, researchers face a different set of challenges and concerns,
as they still write predominately for an audience of their university peers,
namely those individuals who may be called upon to serve as reviewers of
their work about what is considered acceptable by those peers in terms of
content, conventions for communicating that content, and the standards for
judging that content (Montgomery and Smith, 2015, p. 102) therefore
following specific conventions about exploring in great detail the history of a
problem or the design of a study (Montgomery and Smith, 2015, p. 103)
rather than things that would be of more interest to most teachers.
According to Rahman and Pandian, researchers tend to focus on and value
explicit and technical knowledge (2016, p. 163) rather than the practical
knowledge that reigns in the classroom. In fact, researchers can by
mystified by the strong, negative response (Montgomery and Smith, 2015,
p. 102) many teachers have to their research. Teachers can benefit from

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11

research, by grounding their practice in a professional stance in which the

rationale for their instructional decisions is thoroughly grounded in the
collection and analysis of information from research findings, and from
careful analysis of their own classroom practices (Montgomery and Smith,
2015, p. 100), but this is not what seems to usually happen. Some
researchers might therefore conclude that classroom teachers are simply
narrow-minded, inflexible, unintelligent, or unwilling to experiment with
anything that might challenge their existing practice (Montgomery and
Smith, 2015, p. 102), but this hasnt been found to be true.
In actuality, most teachers are quite invested in developing as teachers
and becoming better at their jobs. According to Tavakolis research, teachers
recognize the usefulness of theory and research, but they argue that it is
the learning as and through participation in the situated contexts of their CoP
that gives them the ownership of knowledge and establishes them as a
legitimate participant of the teaching CoP (2015, p. 47). This CoP enables
teachers to share ways of doing things, anecdotes, and stories they
exchange, resources available to them and conversations in staff common
rooms (Tavakoli, 2015, p. 45) and further equips teachers to learn from
other colleagues or from supplemental teaching materials rather than from
substantive interaction with research literature (Montgomery and Smith,
2015, p. 100). There are other reasons why teachers seem to avoid engage
with published research the use of research may even seem purposefully
designed to deliberately exclude people who do not hold advanced degrees

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12

from participating in important conversations (Montgomery and Smith,

2015, p. 102) particularly in the context of K-12 schools.
Living in the Gap
This well-established gap between teaching and research is one that I
continue to experience as a graduate student and CL. The most recent
manifestation of this was on December 8th, 2016 when I gave a presentation
on my final project in ENGL 619. I have struggled all semester to find a way
to make sense of my project, of my data, within the necessary structures,
formats, and conventions required of traditional research. In my research
presentation, I talked about my teaching, my curriculum, some of the
differences in how I approach this data in my two primary roles as a
curriculum designer and an instructor. I used a theoretical framework of
insider/outsider research to organize this information. I knew that my project
still needed work, but this framework was the only thing I could find that
even began to make sense with what I was wanting to do. I had been
searching for relevant literature and a solid framework for months. When I
wrote a project proposal in October, I had a few ideas about how to do this,
but I wasnt sure if they would work. I had been keeping a teaching journal
since the beginning of the semester, with the goal of using it to improve my
teaching, improving my classes, and going back and making revisions to the
curriculum. I also thought that it would make an excellent source for data on
a research project about the interaction between teaching and curriculum
design. There is a significant amount of data in the teaching journal,

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especially in conjunction with interactions (both over email and in person)

with other CLs who are teaching this same curriculum, and the details that I
wrote in the instructor manual. I found that I couldnt actually use this data
for a research project though, because I was unable to find literature or
frameworks to make sense of it. As a tool for revising the curriculum and
informing my teaching, however, it has worked beautifully. I felt significant
amounts of frustration over the weeks as I read, and searched, and thought,
and reorganized, and tried to find some way to make this project work in an
academic context. But there was simply no way to follow the required
conventions of academic research and look at the whole scope of what
needed to be looked at. I could have chosen a particular component of this
data, or just looked at one identity, and done something with it. But that isnt
a reflection of my reality, and isnt the project that I was interested in. As
both a teacher and a researcher, I felt excluded from having conversations
and exploring ideas by the conventions identified by Montgomery and Smith.
In conversations with my PLaCE colleagues, I was able to share what I had
learned, and learn from my colleagues. But I have not found a way to
translate that into an academic context, because I lack the framework that is
necessary.
This experience was replicated in other ways, big and small,
throughout the whole semester. In mid-November, 2016, one of my ENGL
619 classmates led class discussion. She had given us some articles to read,
and then had arranged a skype call with the author of these articles. It was a

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very interesting and informative use of class time in a number of ways. Yet,
as I was thinking through this gap between teachers and researchers, and
the ways that I feel torn and caught in the gap, I realized that this skype
conversation was a perfect example. When it was time to ask questions to
the researcher, my question was about his students. I wanted to know about
the culture influences in his students lives and his classroom that might
have influenced the data he collected, his analysis, and his results. He very
graciously answered my question, but it was a relatively short answer where
he said he didnt consider it, and didnt think there would be any influence.
Meanwhile, at least two of my classmates had specific questions about the
theoretical framework he used, how he chose that specific framework, and
what other frameworks he might have considered or used. The questions we
asked showed the different approaches we took to this skype interview, the
articles we had read, and perhaps even to the class itself. There was one
student in the class that I became friends with, and we often sat together
and worked together. In mid-September, 2016, he and I were talking. He is
not a student in SLS, so I asked him why he was taking this course. He told
me that he was taking the course because he wanted to do research in the
future, and this class was the first step to becoming a better researcher. I
took this course because I wanted to be able to read research more
effectively, and understand it more quickly. At this point, I dont have a
significant interest in doing research of this sort beyond this class. I was
surprised when I was asked what journal I was considering publishing my

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final paper in, because it had never even crossed my mind to think about
publishing my final paper in a journal.
I feel like I am torn between two worlds, between two identities, and
this is sometimes difficult to deal with. When I am in PLaCE, as a teacher or
curriculum developer or program assessor, my colleagues and I sometimes
discuss research. We all engage in various kinds of professional
development, which includes reading journal articles. However, we mostly
discuss what we tried, what worked, what didnt work, and why it didnt
work. This is, of course, a form of action research. But it would never be
considered acceptable action research, because it is a story, not data. When
I am with my grad school colleagues, we sometimes discuss teaching. My
fellow graduate students are dedicated teachers, and they genuinely care
about their students and try to do their best. But teaching is usually not what
they want to talk about. Grad students want to talk about what they are
reading, or the data they are collecting, or the new framework they just
discovered. I can participate in these conversations, but it often feels foreign
to me. This is not the world that I live in, this is not the world that I have
chosen to spend most of my time in. It is difficult to be a teacher, rather than
a researcher, at a research university. Even the director of PLaCE doesnt
entirely believe me when I say that I like teaching more than research. She
tells me that I may enjoy teaching now, but its only because Im young. Ill
eventually get tired of teaching, she says, and then Ill fall in love with
research. Teaching does not seem to be a valid or valuable choice, unless I

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am sequestered in the basement of Heavilon with my PLaCE colleagues. Of

course, this isnt true of everyone that I have encountered at Purdue, and
there are truly excellent educators on faculty at this university. However, I
can think of multiple, specific examples, from a variety of contexts, in the
last few months that create a culture where research reigns. In fact, as I read
the articles for the literature review for this paper, I noticed that almost
everything was written from the perspective of the researcher, trying to
understand what the teachers were thinking, and why the teachers werent
engaging with the research. Researchers conducted interviews or sent out
questionnaires to hear from teachers, but the voice of the teachers was only
present through the analysis of the researchers.
Escaping the Gap
This gap exists. It exists in the literature. It exists in my experience. It
exists in what I hear from my colleagues at PLaCE. This gap is also
problematic. It hurts both teachers and researchers, because we should be
working together, but we arent. It hurts those of us who are caught in
between the two sides, and feel like we cant fully participate in either. So
the big question is, what do we do now? Researchers have asked that very
question, and come up with a number of responses. Tavakoli offers two
suggestions first that teachers knowledge and experience, developing
through practice in their CoP, should be acknowledged and valued more
intensely by the research community (2015, p. 49) and second, a call for
researchers and teachers to build joint communities and to engage in

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mutual activities that can bring a research and a practice focus together
(2015, p. 49). Rahman and Pandian encourage researchers to consider not
just the explanatory power of theory, but also its relevance to second
language pedagogy (2016, p. 163-64) and pilot research that is closely
related to classrooms and practices (2016, p. 166). Montgomery and Smith
think that research need not be esoteric and disconnected from the
classroom. In this age of assessment, research really can be as simple as
investigating ones own teaching to find ways to better help ones students
(2015, p. 105) and when these findings are shared with others, the
individual insights teacher-researchers discover can benefit a wider
audience (2015, p. 105). This sounds very simple, but is in fact quite a
difficult thing to do. As Tavakoli said, it is difficult to balance membership in
multiple communities (2015). Block, a long-time teacher who transitioned to
university work, wrote that the discourse community to which I belong and
owe allegiance is that of academics and not that of language teachers. And
the voices with which I speak and write are now more loudly and prominently
in unison with the long list of authors whom I have cited throughout this
paper than with my former colleagues in the staffroom (2000, p. 141). And
therein lies the problem. Montgomery and Smith believe the first step that
both teachers and researchers can take toward bridging the gap between
research and practice in world language education is to begin to see
research through the eyes of those who work in other contexts (2015, p.
104).

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As one set of eyes who works in both contexts, I find these solutions
nice, but ultimately unhelpful. I simply cant see any way to make them work
in real life. And if I, someone who is ostensibly a member of both
communities, cant find a way to bridge the gap, is it even possible to bridge
it? Based on what these researchers say of the challenges teachers perceive
in engaging in research, such as irrelevant content, difficult or unhelpful
structures, and too much theory with too little practice, a major overhaul of
the conventions and expectations of academic research, university
promotion criteria, and perhaps even researcher training would be required.
Meanwhile, for teachers to benefit from the research, they have to become
experts in a set of terms and structures that are not related to what they
actually do with their (already) limited time and resources, and have to take
research that is based in theory and find ways to translate that to their
classroom context. Either of these options would require significant time,
cooperation, and change across entire disciplines. If such a thing is even
possible, it would take years before it actually happened.
If the solutions offered in the literature are unhelpful or impractical,
then I must look at my own context and consider my options. First, I could
choose to prioritize my identity as a teacher at the expense of research. I
could look at the work I do in graduate school, and the research components
of my job as necessary evils, required tasks that I must complete so a
mythical someone is satisfied, and I can do what I actually care about in
my classroom with my students. Or, another option is I can somehow find a

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way to be a perpetual outsider in both the teaching and researching

communities. I can set up shop in the gap, try to find some way to reconcile
this bifurcated reality, and take the best from both worlds. I suppose my final
option is to mount a revolution against either pedagogy or research (or
both?) and try to enact change in the way that each side looks at the other.
While a revolution might be the best option if my life were the script for
an inspirational made-for TV movie aired on a Tuesday afternoon, but is
hardly practical in the real world. It would require invalidating important
parts of what it means to be both a teacher and a researcher. Similarly, Im
not happy with the first option, even though it is perhaps closest to what is
happening in my life right now. I think that there is tremendous value in
reflection, in telling stories, in looking at data, in hearing and reading about
what other people are doing. But in the day to day reality of managing
curriculum, programs, and 50 students across three sections, it just doesnt
seem possible to do any sort of formalized data collection or analysis. Living
in the middle seems like a good option, but again, as Block discovered, this is
simply impossible. Communities, either of practice or discourse, are real.
They are important. It takes time to understand and integrate into these
communities, and trying to switch back and forth between two communities,
even two communities as closely related as PLaCE and SLS, often makes me
feel like Im going crazy.
So. Here I am, at the end of my story. If Wenger is right, and learning is
a journey of the self (2011) then what have I learned about myself? I am

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more aware of the differences between the two communities that I am trying
to shuttle between. I still feel a sense of frustration that Im writing this
paper, rather than the paper that Ive been working on all semester. But I
also feel that I am able to put voice to that frustration more clearly. Its not
just that I feel frustrated. I feel frustrated because my data and my
research questions were grounded in one community, but the structures and
conventions I needed to use to appropriately communicate those ideas were
grounded in the other community. I have learned that I do not possess the
knowledge, tools, or skills to bridge this gap in my own teaching or research
practice. Perhaps I will someday be able to come back to this data and make
something of it, but for now, I have to be content with achieving my goal in
taking a class on qualitative research methodology. I may not be able to
conduct the research that I want, but I do understand more when I read, and
I have more tools that I can use in the future, no matter which community I
ultimately find myself a part of.

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