Factors affecting teachers’ emotion in teaching a narrative inquiry at a high school

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES NGUYỄN THỊ THU UYÊN FACTORS AFFECTING TEACHERS’ EMOTION IN TEACHI

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES

NGUYỄN THỊ THU UYÊN

FACTORS AFFECTING TEACHERS’ EMOTION IN TEACHING:

A NARRATIVE INQUIRY AT A HIGH SCHOOL

( Nghiên cứu về cảm xúc của giáo viên đối với hoạt động dạy học qua tự thuật

của giáo viên trung học phổ thông )

M.A Minor Thesis

Field: English Teaching Methodology

HANOI - 2020

Số thứ tự:……

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES

NGUYỄN THỊ THU UYÊN

FACTORS AFFECTING TEACHERS’ EMOTION IN TEACHING:

A NARRATIVE INQUIRY AT A HIGH SCHOOL

( Nghiên cứu về cảm xúc của giáo viên đối với hoạt động dạy học qua tự

thuật của giáo viên trung học phổ thông )

M.A Minor Thesis

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 8140231.01

Supervisor: Assoc Prof Dr Lê Văn Canh

HANOI – 2020

Số thứ tự:……

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I wish to thank all of those who helped me complete this study

First, I would like to express my deepest appreciation to my beloved supervisor, Assoc Dr Le Van Canh, for his enthusiastic and careful guidance as well as his encouragements he gave me while I was doing this study Second, I would like to take this opportunity to express my sincere thanks to my respectful lectures in Faculty of Post-Graduated Department at University of Languages and International Studies for the devotion and their useful lectures

Last but not least, I would also like to thank all of the participants in this study, who took time from their busy schedules to take part in my research

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ABSTRACT

The study aimed to provide an in-depth analysis of the causes that were influential towards emotion of the teachers who were selected from different high school The study was adopted as a qualitative research method and the narrative inquiry was used The data of the study were collected with participants‟ narratives Content analysis method was used in analyzing the data

In accordance with the research aims, this study identified 4 themes As a result

of the coding of the data obtained at the end of the research, the following 4 themes (1) Professional commitment, (2) Students, (3) Collegiality, (4) Financial were determined as the four themes of the study Through all these can

be illustrated the role of emotions on the teaching work They are part of working environment and definitely affect with various ways Either positive either negative its research help to elicit the keys for success and to avoid non desired results on workplace

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION vii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Rationale for the study 1

1.2 Aims of the study 2

1.3 Research questions 2

1.4 Scope of the study 2

1.5 Significances of the study 3

1.6 Structure of the thesis 3

CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW 4

2.1 Defining emotion 4

2.2.Teachers‟ Performance 5

2.3 Teachers‟ emotion and its effect on teachers‟ performance 5

2.4 Previous studies on teachers' emotion 6

2.5 The previous studies on factors affecting teachers' work performance 9

2.5.1 Lack of interest in teaching profession 9

2.5.2 Inadequate Salary and other Benefits 10

2.5.3 Characteristics of the school work Environment 13

2.6 Narrative Research Tradition 15

2.7 Summary 18

CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY 19

3 1 Research Methodology 19

3.2 Qualitative Research Design 19

3.3 What is narrative inquiry? 19

3 4 The Reason and Context for Using Narratives 22

3.5 Researcher‟s Role 23

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3.6 Area of study 24

3.7 Sample Design 24

3.7 1 Participants 25

3.7 2 Sample Size 26

3.8 Data Collection 26

3.9 Data Analysis 27

3.10 Coding of the data into themes 28

3.11 Reliability and Validity Validation 29

3.12 Summary 30

CHAPTER IV: DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS 32

4.1 Data analysis of the four themes 32

4.1.1 Theme 1: Professional commitment 32

4.1.2 Theme 2: Students 33

4.1.3 Theme 3: Collegiality 34

4.1.4 Theme 4: Financial issues 35

4.2 Findings and discussion 36

4.2.1 Professional commitment 36

4.2.2 Students 37

4.2.3 Collegiality 37

4.2.4 Financial 38

4.3 Summary 38

CHAPTER V: CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 40

5.1 Recapitulation 40

5.2 Concluding remarks 40

5.3 Limitation of the current research 42

5.4 Recommendations 42

5.4.1 Recommendation and policy implications 42

5.4.2 Recommendations and suggestions for future research 43

REFERENCES 44

APPENDICES I

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APPENDIX A IEmail to Potential Participants IAPPENDIX B IIInformed Consent to Participate in a Research Study IIAPPENDIX C VParticipants‟ narratives VAPPENDIX D XVThank You Email to Participants XV

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LIST OF TABLES

Table 3.1 Participant profiles (All names are pseudonyms) 26 Table 3 2.Codes, Categories, and Themes 28

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CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION This part introduces the rationale, the aims, the research questions, the methods and the scope of the study It also concludes with a presentation of the organization of the thesis

1.1 Rationale for the study

Education is one of the most important elements that energize the development

of society It is a base for socio-economic, cultural and political development of

a country It enables individuals to acquire knowledge, skills, ability and attitudes and make them full participate in the development process of a country

To gain the development of the country, each nation has its own strategies but none of them care for education Education is considered as one of the most important keys to the development One of the integral elements contributing to

a good education is teacher Teachers are dedicated professionals who have a lasting impact on students "Being a teacher means allowing a person to leverage strengths and passion as a leader and organizer in the education field As a guider and role model, students will be inspired by teachers' commitment to helping them develop their unique talents and intellect (Kelly S, 2018)".While the majority highly consider knowledge, abilities and skills as the most essential parts of successful lessons and promotion of teaching quality, teachers' emotions themselves still play an important role

The teachers, who play an important role in the productivity and quality

of the educational organizations, are humans rather than machines and also these directly serve the business of the country and develop the behaviors of the social life According to the criteria of the staff, educational, scientific, cultural, artistic, sportive activities and central examination system, the teachers who start from teaching have the right to progress in national education career stages (Boyacı, 2016) It has not been organized in any exam for career stages about 10 years Therefore, the teachers are waiting for their career steps On the other

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hand, „teachers‟ professional development‟ is accepted as the primary factor affecting school development and students‟ success (Canales & Maldonado, 2018) Determining the factors affecting their emotion is thought to be an important issue by the researchers In Vietnam, according to the recent records, the factors that effect, in particular, the emotions, which is still an practically and theoretically unfamiliar aspect, are gaining popularity Studies on emotions

of teachers nowadays still emphasized on reality but have not made any breakthrough so they limit the result in synopsis Especially, finding out the factors affecting teachers' emotion by their narrative seem not to be implemented Therefore, it is essential to promote more and more the deeper studies on this issue in order to enhance and develop the standard of education

1.2 Aims of the study

The aim of this study is to investigate factors affecting high school teachers' emotion through their own narratives The findings of the study will give suggestions for educators more information to improve the working condition for teachers Thus, it enhances English language teaching and learning and teachers' challenges will be addressed

1.3 Research questions

In order to achieve these aims, a question is:

What factors affect high school teachers' emotion in teaching?

1.4 Scope of the study

Teachers' emotion in the field of second language teaching is a wide topic However, this is just a minor thesis so the thesis topic is narrowed to facilitate the research Also, the researcher is concerned with factors effecting teachers' emotion by analyzing their narratives The participants of study include a small number of teachers from a high school Thus, the results of study might not be generalized to all teachers

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1.5 Significances of the study

This research was designed as the narrative approach based on qualitative research method The narrative approach aims to have an in-depth and detail view of what we have noticed as facts Phenomenological study aims to acknowledge perceptions, perspectives as well as understandings of people related to a particular event by in-depth and unstructured interviews or narrative The sample size commonly ranges from 5 to 25 individuals (Leedy & Ormrod, 2001) The subject of current research is to determine the factors affecting the emotion of the teachers working in a high school In relation to this subject, the study aims to acquire comprehensive, in-depth and systematic information on experiences and perceptions of teachers on work-emotion

1.6 Structure of the thesis

The thesis is composed of five chapters These chapters are:

Chapter I: Introduction covers the rationale, the aims, the research questions,

the methods and the scope of the study and the organization of the thesis

Chapter II: Literature review

- A review of the relevant literature, i.e., previous studies on teacher emotion, for the construction of a theoretical framework of the study

Chapter III: Methodology

- Presents the context, the rationale for the adoption of the methodology

used in this study, which is a narrative inquiry

Chapter IV: Data analysis and Findings

- Consists of a comprehensive analysis of the data

Chapter V: Conclusion

- Offers a summary of the findings, recommendations, limitations, and

future directions for further study

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CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter reviews the theoretical relevant issues related emotions, teachers' emotions, factors affecting emotions

2.1 Defining emotion

Emotions are biological states associated with the nervous system brought

on by neurophysiological changes variously associated with thoughts, feelings, behavioural responses, and a degree of pleasure or displeasure There is currently no scientific consensus on a definition Emotions are often intertwined with mood, temperament, personality, disposition creativity, and motivation ( Damasio AR, May 1998)

To define emotion is obviously difficult and there has still been quite little agreement across disciplines The term "emotion" is used as ways reflecting their different theoretical points of view including philosophical, physiological, historical, organizational sociological, anthropological, psychological and feminist perspectives (Oatley, 2000) Moreover, defining emotion has still remained challenging, although there appears to be agreement on the function and framework of emotion (Izard 2010) There are now some of agreement that emotion is of multi-componential; in other words, "there is a number of more or less collections of components unordered in each emotion"(Scherer, 2000) Though different term is mentioned basing on theoretical perspective, almost of the scientists express similar, or the same components For illustration, two educational psychologists define components of emotion as physiological change subjective experience, appraisal, action tendencies and emotion expressions (Sutton and Wheatley, 2003) While another psychologist, Izard (2010), refers to similar components as neural systems, response systems, antecedent mental appraisal, expressive behaviour, feelings or a feeling state and cognitive interpretation The two psychologists, Sutton and Wheatley (2003) also accentuated the fact that the elements that influence each other are partly

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independent, moreover Izard (2010) argued that the component should be seen

as socially constructed instead of purely individual and psychological To understand deeply emotion the most important thing is to find out how the

„biological‟ and the „psychological‟ components of emotion interact with others

in term of the social domains (Corcoran & Tormey, 2012) A psychologist, Zembylas (2004) determined emotion as evaluative, relational and political and shaped by the power relations and politics within a school and broader society,

so therefore need to be seen through such a view

2.3 Teachers’ emotion and its effect on teachers’ performance

Would a class be “happy” when its teacher is in bad mood? The burdensome curriculum as well as examinations put pressure on bọth students and teachers Teachers themselves have to “fight” to convey to students to keep pace with the progress but still remain the standard of lessons This kind of pressure invisibly makes them become stressful and worried, and there appears

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durably insecurity While the majority highly considers knowledge, ability and skills as the most essential parts of successful lessons and promotion of teaching quality, teachers' emotions themselves still play an important role When mention the process of enhancing the standard of teaching of which the main subject is the teachers, what people prefer to rate are experience, skills, and knowledge However, a critical factor which is often overlooks is the felling(s)

So, what is exactly the felling? Chubbuck & Zembylas (2008) supposed that teachers' emotion does not only simply develop in his personal psychological revolution but also relate to the reaction among the individuals and is influenced

by social environment Schools and classrooms are settings where teachers have

to experience sophisticated emotions of a large number of subjects: students, parents, colleagues and superiors A large range of questions merge in their mind: “whether my students comprehend the lessons or not?” “Do they do their homework?” “Do they follow my guides?” Still get round and round Then, the take up a habit of control their students in a strict, even harsh way It seems that teachers are in an "awkward" status to understand and manage their own emotions in many different situations If teachers are negative and annoyed, would their student be comfortable and happy, or these bad feelings could

“spread” among their students The prerequisite condition of a teacher is that to know exactly his emotions, to figure out the role of emotions in teaching and create friendly atmosphere in classroom How to integrate the emotion factor with experience and specialty in teaching process is also a question to answer for any teacher Since the late 20th century, reports and studies on emotions have drawn more and more public attention from all over the world Especially

in schools Almost every writer and author often identifies the emotional expressions as well as their reasons and skills to control them in general way

2.4 Previous studies on teachers' emotion

Twenty years ago, researches on teacher emotions were limited One explanation for this lack of research on teacher emotions is the prejudice against

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emotion in Western culture (Zembylas, 2003), stemming from an understanding that emotions are complex and difficult to understand Also, emotions are related to women and feminine philosophies as well as have therefore lack of importance as research foci (Zembylas, 2003) Two spychologists, Sutton and Wheatley (2003) also identified that the word "emotional" has had negative relationship with words like irrational, also emotions have been viewed as

“destructive, primitive, and childish, rather than thoughtful, civilized, and adult” (p 328) Teacher emotion is now viewed as an important field of research because of a number of reasons In the first place teacher emotional wellbeing has become critical in the context of high rates of teacher attrition Emmer (1994) identified that "teachers experience negative emotions more often than positive ones" When being asked to assess their own teaching outcomes, teachers mentioned feelings of inadequacy and failure, along with anger towards their student (Lortie, 1975) Poor emotion and stress management is known as to rank as the main reasons why teachers quit the profession "Darling-Hammond (2001) and Woolfolk Hoy (2013) argued that teachers are “neither warned about nor prepared” (p 264) for the emotional demands of their chosen career, sometimes resulting in decisions to leave the profession (Richardson, Watt & Devos, 2013)" In an effort to better understand teacher's attrition, researchers have explored teacher burnout (Høigaard, Giske, & Sundsli, 2011; Akın, Aydın, Erdoğan & Demirkasımoğlu, 2013; O'Brien, Goddard & Keeffe, 2008), and teacher resilience (Day & Gu, 2009; Hong, 2012), teacher wellbeing (Martin, Parker, Colmar & Liem, 2012) The teacher resilience literature suggested that emotions play an important role in a teacher‟s capacity to thrive, not just survive

in their professional life (Mansfield, Beltman, Price & McConney, 2012) In addition, teachers‟ work has become increasingly driven by accountability and highs take testing Policy debates have even included discussion about connecting teacher pay with some measure of „merit‟ This focus has impacted

in various ways on the classroom emotional climate, through influencing the nature of student/teacher interactions and behaviours (Schreder, 2006) Although

or inhibiting learning (Greenleaf, 2002) Linnenbrink and Pintrich (2002) acknowledged, for example, that negative teacher emotions contribute to negative student emotions and lessen the probability students will use cognitive strategies for deeper, more elaborate processing of information Furthermore, it has been argued that emotions shape cognition (Mesquita, Frijda & Scherer, 1997) and therefore may have an important influence on motivation (Pekrun, Goetz, Titz & Perry, 2002), efficacy beliefs and goals (Kaplan, Gheen & Midgley, 2002) Indeed, not only do emotions influence academic performance via their effect on cognitive resources, learning behaviours and motivation, but the reverse is also true (Frenzel & Stephens, 2013) These connections between emotions and learning, together with the obvious inter-relationship between student and teacher emotions, further illustrate the need to study teacher emotion Historically, emotions and emotional experiences have been

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conceptually elusive and what is now required is the development of a conceptual model of teacher emotion This view is shared with authors such as Meyer and Turner (2006), who advocated the need for a conceptual framework and a common vocabulary to underpin teacher emotion research Similarly, Hargreaves (2005) stated that in the context of teachers‟ work, some clarity of emotion terms is required in order to discuss and analyses their emotional experiences Linnenbrink-Garcia and Pekrun (2011) also argued the necessity for conceptual clarity so that emotion research encompasses the complexities of emotion and facilitates productive discussions on teacher emotion Furthermore, another research reported that the pattern of emotion includes 5 factors: happiness, love, sadness, anger, and scare Love means the contentment of teacher‟s results from the appreciation from society towards their passion for the career, the stability of work and progression of their students Sadness means the status of hopelessness of being underestimated by their superiors or unfriendly and uncooperative attitude inside the class Anger mentions the irritation caused

by stress in school as well as the weakness of students Scare relates to problems such as students troubles or competitiveness among co-workers and the over-expectation from the authorities and parents, or even the imbalance amid their current life and job (J Chen 2016)

2.5 The previous studies on factors affecting teachers' work performance 2.5.1 Lack of interest in teaching profession

According to the teacher retention model of Gardy and Figueriaas cited in Manna and Tesfaye (2002), there are four stage processes that will help teachers

to choose to stay or leave their profession Of which selection is the stage, in which teacher first show their interest towards the profession It is widely argued that the status of teachers in most countries, both developed and developing, has declined substantially during recent decades (Bennel, 2004) However in Tesfaye and Demewoz (2004) in their study explained that inclination towards the teaching profession took a rain check over the last forty years mostly due to

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the status attached to theprofession According to (Esteve), as cited in Getachew,

1999, teaching is profession that people join when they are not capable of finding an alternative job which pays more In this regard Motuma (2006) and Mulugeta (2010) also confirmed that most teachers enter in to the profession because it is easier to get than other jobs or to make money (their earning) out of

it till they get another job among other reasons Commitment refers to the attachment and loyalty As defined by (porter et al., 1974 cited in Armstrong,

1995, commitment is a relative strength of the individual‟s identification with, and involvement in, a particular organization Moreover, a review by Armstrong (1995) mainly North American literature, led him to the conclusion that: “high organizational commitment is associated with higher motivation and good performance” One of the causes of organizational commitment is job satisfaction People who are satisfied with their job are more committed to their organization than those who are less satisfied (Mueller,Boyer, Price, & Iverson, cited in Taye, 2011.Shukla (2009) demonstrated a high positive relation between professional commitment and job satisfaction Sylvester (2010) held that the factors like location of institute, educational qualification and years of teaching experience of teacher educators have impact on their attitude towards teaching profession as well as level of job satisfaction Attitude measurement has very wide currency, particularly in social psychology the new curriculum emphasizes that a curriculum should be based on the students' learning interests, life experience and cognitive levels, and that it can promote more educational processes of participation, communication and, enable specific learning targets

to be followed

2.5.2 Inadequate Salary and other Benefits

Teacher salary scale has an intimate connection with teacher retention patterns When salary levels drops in relation to the level which pertain for similar qualified personnel, this gives rise to teacher dissatisfaction and less performance which, if unresolved can cause long duration difficulties and lack

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of motivation (Coolahan, 2003) Coolahan argued that, from a variety of perspectives the establishment of appropriate salary provision for teacher will have short-term and long-term effects on teachers‟ retention pattern Problems in work places occur due to wrong perception of employees or their lack of understanding about how organization link performance and pay system Armstrong (1995) stated that problems arise in work place due to inequitable or unfair pay systems In this regard, Vroom‟s expectancy theory suggests that a pay-performance link is essential for motivating performance According to Fisher et al as cited in Befikadu(2001), the expectancy model has three major components, each of which based on a series of fairly straight forward observations Expectancy: the individual‟s perceptions of the probability that effort will lead to task accomplishment or performance, Instrumentality: perceptions of the probability that performance will result in receiving rewards (such as pay or recognition), Valence: the subjective value or desirability that the individual places on the attainment of a certain reward As per Fisher et al (2006) explanation of the theory, “high performers will tend to gain a large share

of compensation resources and thus be motivated to stay with the organization with better performance

Below-average performers will become discouraged and will tend to leave the organization “They continued by stating that, however, reward system that are not linked to performance tend to have the opposite effect and thus result in the worst of both possibilities Well paid poor performers may stay with the organization: they are well rewarded and will not be sought by other organizations By contrast, top performers feel under-rewarded and will be sought by other organizations that appropriately value their contributions There is considerable evidence that wages are almost equally important to teachers in their decisions to leave their jobs as they are to workers in other occupations There is also an indication that teachers tend to give up their work

or weak performance if their salaries are low relative to alternative wage

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opportunities Especially teachers at the start of their career are highly influenced by wage discrepancies However, it does not imply that experienced teachers are not affected, because higher salaries also appear to attract better-prepared and higher-quality teachers (NCTAF,as cited in Getachew 1999).Inadequate salary has been mentioned as the main cause of teachers‟ lack

of motivation indifferent studies (Getachew, 1999; Manna and Tesfaye, 2000, Darge, Tesfaye and Demewoz,2004 and Motuma, 2006) In addition to being the main cause of turnover, low pay is also put asone of the highest ranking reason for their departure (Motuma, 2006:97) Despite the revision of teacher‟s salary and career structure in 2007, inadequate salary has remained to be the major problem in Ethiopia (VSO, 2007) Similarly, (Bobbitt et al., as cited in Burns, 2001) stated that teachers leave for higher paying jobs in other professions Although teacher salary have improved in recent years, they remain low compared to those of other similarly educated workers (Ingersoll, 2001) Overall, teachers in the United States earn much less than other workers with the same amount of education and experience Same is true in Ethiopia; teachers are paid less than others in non-teaching profession with the same experience and qualification In addition, Ayalew(1991), (cited in Darge, 2002), identified that low and inequitable salary and inequitable chance of career advancement as critical matters in teachers‟ job dissatisfaction In addition to salary, fringe benefits like housing, free health care service and opportunities for further training or education plays major role in teachers‟ retention as it creates belongingness and commitment in the minds of teachers (Darge, 2002) On the contrary, there is evidence that teachers‟ satisfaction was poorly related to salary and other benefits (Nces, 1997, cited in Motuma, 2006) Money does not augment the intrinsic nature of work Indeed, in the most extreme cases it will not affect the employee‟s motivation at all (as with voluntary work, where the driving forces it related with commitment or Vocation)

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According to Armstrong (1995), lack of commitment and dissatisfaction, which is the main road to poor performance, can arise from very lack of clarity about performance, lack of group cohesion and dissatisfaction and conflict with managers and supervision It is stated by Greer and Lortie cited in Aleazar (2007) that teaching is career less and dead end job in USA as compared to other careers The number of positions in the upper ladder as compared to the existing teachers are limited, consequently the difficulty for the advancement leave teachers no choice but to abandon their profession in search of advancement Armstrong (1995) argues that dissatisfaction with career prospects is a major cause of weak performance To certain extent, this has to be accepted More and more people recognize that to develop their careers they need to move

on and there is little that employers can do about it Moreover, promotion criteria are also still based on qualification and years of service alone In Ethiopia also teaching was career less job with only in the last few decades (Aklilu, 1967).Motuma (2006) identified that inadequate salary and lack of motivation including low base salaries, limited non -financial benefits, inconsistent implementation of career structure, lack of faire payment for work done to extra time and lack of compensation such as; bonus, fringe benefits, incentives and rewards were the major causes of teacher‟s dissatisfaction in government secondary schools of Oromia regional state

2.5.3 Characteristics of the school work Environment

School working conditions contribute to teacher commitment levels and perseverance in a challenging placement (baker, 1988: Dove, 1982; Hurst and Rust, 1990, Tatto, 1997:148, as citedin Motuma, 2006:32) In both less and more industrialized countries, poor levels of organizational support have been found

to be a power full reason for qualified individuals not taking a position or leaving it permanently Teachers with inadequate resources and professional isolation during their first years of teaching are particularly vulnerable (Baker,

1988 MooreJohnson, cited in Tattoo, 1997, in Motuma, 2006) According to

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(Dunham,Kyiriacou andSutcliffe, 1979 cited in Getachew, 1999), poor working conditions include problems such as inadequate equipment, poorly maintained buildings, lack of space, poor quality furniture, lack of suitable premises and poor staff room facilities In some countries, working conditions such as class-size, insufficient or defective amenities and equipment, inappropriateness of teaching assignments and volume of non-teaching assignments are some of the worst problems be setting teachers today (ILO, 1991) With regards to working environment, Bennel (2004) stated that teachers as compared to other professions do not have the chance to enjoy the same work environment Muluken et al as cited in Arega (2007) and also recommended that upgrading the work environment and working conditions for teachers is a favorable act towards increasing teacher motivation, making the profession more attractive, enhancing retention of teachers, and improving the quality of teaching and learning Although it may always require a substantial amount of money, changes in this area may be cheaper and more effective than an overall increase

in teachers‟ salaries They further stated that increasing teacher salaries may seem apparent in reacting to attrition problems However, Macdonald, as cited in (Muluken et al., 2007) stated that improved working condition and environment play their own role by improving school buildings and teachers‟ accommodation, increasing teacher responsibility for educational decisions, reducing class sizes increasing parental community support, promoting collegial relationships among teachers and administrators, providing teacher support and recognition, and providing teacher counseling and medical care Girmay (2011)

is pointed out those teachers who were stressed due to the various aspects of the school environment reported less satisfaction and commitment in their job There appears little doubt that one of major adverse influences on job satisfaction, work performance and productivity, and absenteeism and poor performance is the incidence of stress at work (Mullins, as cited in Girmay, 2011) Kyriacouas cited in (Getachew, 1999) also underlined that in every day work execution, teachers face a variety of difficult situations like tight deadlines

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given to a specific task that may be source of stress Getachew (1999) also stated that time pressure and poor working condition will create stress on teachers Another environmental

factor that causes teacher dissatisfaction is socio-economic status With regard

to the socioeconomic status, the lower the socio-economic class of the teacher‟s family, the more likely the person is to remain in teaching; the higher the socio-economic status, the more likely the person is to leave teaching (Boland and Selby, cited in chapman, 1994) In connection with this Tesfaye and Demwoze (2004) affirmed that “the teaching profession is accorded with low socioeconomic status in Ethiopia promoting negative attitudes towards the profession which in turn result in little or no respect to those in the profession by the community (parents, student, concerned government parties…)” In this respect Getachew (1999) recalled the few years earlier teaching was a respectful occupation both socially and economically However, these days, people started

to attach status with money earned rather than knowledge and sacrifices which resulted in the low status rendered to teaching profession in the recent decades

2.6 Narrative Research Tradition

A narrative study is a study of “the ways humans experience the world” (Clandinin & Connelly, 1990, p 2) It gives researchers insights into the phenomenon (Creswell, 2012) Creswell (2012) noted, “For educators looking for personal experiences in actual school settings, narrative research offers practical, specific insights” (p 502) The focus of narrative research can be on the experiences of one or more individuals

In an educational research effort, a narrative study is used to explore the experiences of an individual; the narrative design was most suitable for this study because it allowed the researcher to explore the teachers‟ emotion and the factors affect their emotion in teaching

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Narrative research comprises many procedures; including gathering data through the collection of individuals‟ stories, reporting their experiences, and chronologically ordering the meaning of those experiences (Creswell, 2013) There is a wide variety of narrative approaches The well-known approaches are briefly described below

a) A biographical approach is a narrative study in which the researcher writes and records individuals‟ life experiences

b) An auto ethnography approach is one in which the subject of the study writes

or records her own experiences

c) A life history approach explores an individual‟s entire life in multiple episodes d) An oral history approach gathers personal reflections of events from one or several individuals

Although there are many narrative approaches, their different elements can

be combined (Creswell, 2013), and the combination can cover the entire lives of individuals or specific life events (Lieblich, Tuval-Mashiach, & Zilber, 1998) This study uses an oral history approach to gather personal reflections of events,

in this case, leadership development experiences

The model developed by Lieblich et al (1998) is used in data analysis The model suggests four types of narrative analysis

1) Holistic-Content focuses on the content derived from the entire narrative 2) Categorical-Content focuses on specific content themes within the narrative 3) Holistic-Form focuses on plots or the structural components of the entire narrative

4) Categorical-Form focuses on specific forms of linguistics, such as metaphors used in discrete sections of the narrative This study employs Categorical-Content to focus on specific content themes within the narrative

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Researcher‟s Role The researcher plays an important role in qualitative research methodology because the researcher is the primary data gatherer (Lincoln & Guba, 1985) Creswell (2013) noted the researcher is a “key instrument” (p.45)

In his words,

The qualitative researchers collect data themselves through examining documents, observing behavior, and interviewing participants They may use an instrument, but it is one designed by the researcher using open-ended questions They do not tend to use or rely on questionnaires or instruments developed by other researchers (p 45)

Since a researcher is a primary data collector, developing a bond with the participant becomes an inevitable task For this study, the researcher did

“establish a close bond with the participants” (Creswell, 2012, p 502) With the researcher‟s background in education and her experiences from her professional role as instructor in many educational institutions, the researcher could relate to the participants‟ stories, establish credibility with participants, and understand the context when interpreting data The researcher informed participants of her background and introduced herself as a female in the education field before the interview

Collaboration between researcher and participants is also critical in collecting and analyzing narrative data (Creswell, 2012) The researcher actively collaborated with participants and carefully listened to their stories not only hoping to make them feel their stories were important and they were being heard (Creswell, 2012), but also to work with the participants to reduce the gap between the stories told and the narrative reported (Clandinin & Connelly, 2000) The researcher collaborated with the participants throughout the process

of research from “formulating the central phenomenon to deciding which types

of field texts will yield helpful information to writing the final restored story of

individual experiences” (Creswell, 2012, p 512)

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Although bonding and collaborating with participants are essential in qualitative research, the researcher needed to be cautious about the authenticity of the data Data distortion may occur when the participants do not tell the real story for one

or more reasons such as fear of telling the true story or simply because of memory errors (Creswell, 2012) The researcher‟s goal was to uncover stories told, but the researcher had to be careful about the possibility of data distortion

To establish a relationship with participants, so they provided authentic and truthful responses, the researcher set up an initial fifteen-minute interview prior

to the actual interview to have a casual conversation with each participant During the initial interview, the researcher explained participants‟ right to refuse

to answer questions during the actual interview, the right to withdraw at any time during the study, and the anonymity of their identities; and informed participants about the usefulness of the research findings to other women who want to step up to leadership position

2.7 Summary

This chapter covered the foundational literature that informs the current study, including theories about emotion, teachers‟ performance, teachers‟ emotion and its effect on teachers‟ performances, as well as a literature review and empirical studies about factors that affect teachers‟ emotion

Given the preceding review of the literature and current research, the next chapter reviews the methods used to explore factors affecting teacher‟s emotion Chapter three discusses the research methodology, population, and data collection and analysis, as well as limitations and ethical guidelines

3.2 Qualitative Research Design

The key characteristics of qualitative research are: (a) the researcher seeks

to understand how people make sense of their experiences; (b) the researcher is the primary instrument of data collection; (c) the process is inductive; and (d) the final product is richly descriptive (Merriam, 2002)

A qualitative researcher attempts to understand and make sense of phenomena from the participant‟s perspective (Merriam, 2002) Since this study seeks to uncover the factors affecting teachers‟ emotion, the study is interpretive and descriptive by nature Therefore, a qualitative research design is appropriate for this study

3.3 What is narrative inquiry?

Polkinghorne (1988) traces the use of narrative in the human sciences, psychology in his particular example, as a way of understanding human experience, as far back as John Stuart Mill in the 1850s when debate called for a new science that would enable the study of the human character The most influential movement in the social sciences in the late 19th century, however, was one that took an objective stance enabling researchers to treat human experiences „as if they were physical things‟ (Pinnegar and Daynes, 2007, p.9)

In the 36 1920s anthropologists used life history approaches whilst narrative analysis was used by Freud and the Chicago School (Hatch and Wisniewski, 1995) By the 1950s the social sciences had taken an almost exclusively

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positivist turn and the focus became the study of observable behaviours through scientific method (Polkinghorne, 1988) It was not until the late 1970s that social scientists found a renewed interest in human experience and turned once again

to narrative as a methodology (Polkinghorne, 1988) Narrative methods range from autobiography to case study and have been used in many disciplines (Hatch and Wisniewski, 1995) Genres have become blurred and conceptual borders crossed, but perhaps, as feminist theory suggests, dichotomised classifications are not helpful anyway (Clandinin and Rosiek, 2007) In their research Hatch and Wisniewski (1995) seek a distinction between life history and narrative; the discussion is interesting but there is no real consensus Their results suggest a possible taxonomy where life history is identified as a sub-set

of narrative, whilst another possible distinction is purpose, „narrative focuses on making meaning of individuals‟ experiences; life history draws on individuals‟ experiences to make broader contextual meaning‟ (Hatch and Wisniewski, 1995, p.116) The wider historical, political and social context as a retrospective means

of making sense of personal experience, therefore, it would seem, are important

to life history, whereas a life story is “the story we tell about our life” (Goodson,

1992, p.6 cited in Hatch and Wisniewski, 1995, p.125) Their research suggests agreement that life histories are concerned with „the history of a single life‟, whilst „narrative is characterised as “a way of knowing”‟ and as such narrative analysis of the way a story is told becomes significant for some narrative researchers (Hatch and Wisniewski, 1995, p.115) But that is not to say that narratives are not used by life history researchers as a means of knowing Searching for a distinction between life history and narrative Hatch and Wisniewski (1995, p.126) offer: The processes of doing narrative inquiry involve sharing narrative knowledge through the telling of stories; the products are the stories of self we choose to tell Narrative as a way of knowing is important to life history research; it defines narrative inquiry Whereas Bill Ayers, one of their research respondents, contributes this in response to the question: What, if any, distinctions can be made between “life history” and

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“narrative”?: This is not a useful distinction to me Both approaches to inquiry are unabashedly genre blurring They tear down walls – anthropology, sociology, history, linguistics – and why should we resurrect them? (Hatch and Wisniewski, 1995, p.118) Pinnegar and Daynes (2007) place the historical developments of narrative within a philosophical context detailing not a history

of narrative inquiry, but the necessary positions narrative researchers take and the development of an environment conducive to such moves A move to post-modernism and a dissatisfaction with positivism calls into questions those positionalities, but as Pinnegar and Daynes (2007, p.7) argue: We become narrative inquirers only when we recognize and embrace the interactive quality

of the researcher-researched relationship, primarily use stories as data and analysis, and understand the way in which we know is embedded in a particular context, and finally that narrative knowing is essential to our inquiry Over the last thirty years narrative inquiry has emerged as a complex field with many strands (Clandinin and Rosiek, 2007) Clandinin and Rosiek (2007, p 37) offer one constant; the „study of experience‟ They use Dewey as a means of understanding experience as „transactional‟, „always more than we can know‟,

„continuous‟, and „social‟ (Clandinin and Rosiek, 2007, p 39-41) Narrative inquiry takes many forms with many different approaches to data collection, analysis and representation being practised (Trahar, 2008) and notions of

„purpose‟, „ethics, and validity‟ remaining contested (Coulter and Smith, 2009, p.577) It can be seen as an „amalgam of interdisciplinary analytic lenses, diverse disciplinary approaches, and both traditional and innovative methods‟ (Chase, 2005, p.651) What this means for the researcher Trahar (2008) contends is that methods be made explicit It also meant in my 38 experience, initially at least, a shifting participant group; student‟s lost and found; a less than clear path to be negotiated; a blurred vision Narrative inquiry is not just about collecting stories or telling them, the narrative approach is an overarching principle where data, analysis, representation are all narrative in form (Conle, 2000) As a methodological approach, it differs from traditional studies that use

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tools to measure phenomena which are then analysed statistically (Conle, 2000) Narrative inquirers look for more than what is visible and focus on the meaning that participants ascribe to the events of their lives (Trahar, 2011) Thus narrative inquirers see stories as being „formed and informed by the wider historical, social and cultural contexts‟ in which they are told (Trahar, 2011, p.47) This took a while to grasp and to be comfortable with; it was a fundamental shift in methodological terms

3 4 The Reason and Context for Using Narratives

Narrative research is usually used in such diverse domains as sociology, anthropology, nursing, and history, psychology, and communication studies However, narrative research has recently been used in educational practices, especially in finding experiences of teachers‟ and students‟ lives However, there is not that much research carried out on the factors affecting teachers' emotion

We believe that while there is an interest in developing educational quality, there is a need to discover and understand teachers‟ stories regarding integration of emotions into their way of teaching

We the author of this paper, and narrators, have had negative and positive experiences, and in some good and bad examples in practice However, the author wanted to bring a different point of view about personal experiences in different social and disciplinary settings through a longer timeframe The aim of the research is to help the readers to better understand whether teachers' emotion affected or not by telling narrators' own stories As mentions, narrating may also engage and convince the readers The research finding factors affecting teachers' emotions which are based on the teachers themselves narrative may be specific and convinced to the readers

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3.5 Researcher’s Role

The researcher plays an important role in qualitative research methodology because the researcher is the primary data gatherer (Lincoln & Guba, 1985) Creswell (2013) noted the researcher is a “key instrument” (p.45)

In his words, the qualitative researchers collect data themselves through examining documents, observing behavior, and interviewing participants They may use an instrument, but it is one designed by the researcher using open-ended questions They do not tend to use or rely on questionnaires or instruments developed by other researchers (p 45) Since a researcher is a primary data collector, developing a bond with the participant becomes an inevitable task For this study, the researcher did “establish a close bond with the participants” (Creswell, 2012, p 502) With the researcher‟s background in education and her experiences from her professional role as instructor in many educational institutions, the researcher could relate to the participants‟ stories, establish credibility with participants, and understand the context when interpreting data The researcher informed participants of her background and introduced herself as a female in the education field before the interview Collaboration between researcher and participants is also critical in collecting and analyzing narrative data (Creswell, 2012) The researcher actively collaborated with participants and carefully listened to their stories not only hoping to make them feel their stories were important and they were being heard (Creswell, 2012), but also to work with the participants to reduce the gap between the stories told and the narrative reported (Clandinin & Connelly, 2000) The researcher collaborated with the participants throughout the process

of research from “formulating the central phenomenon to deciding which types

of field texts will yield helpful information to writing the final restored story of individual experiences” (Creswell, 2012, p 512) Although bonding and collaborating with participants are essential in qualitative research, the researcher needed to be cautious about the authenticity of the data Data

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distortion may occur when the participants do not tell the real story for one or more reasons such as fear of telling the true story or simply because of memory errors (Creswell, 2012) The researcher‟s goal was to uncover stories told, but the researcher had to be careful about the possibility of data distortion To establish a relationship with participants, so they provided authentic and truthful responses, the researcher call to have a casual conversation with each participant

to find out whether they agree or disagree to write a narrative about your teaching work After that researcher send an invitation email to participants In the invitation letter, the researcher explained participants some points that the narratives should follow, the right to withdraw at any time during the study, and the anonymity of their identities; and informed participants about the usefulness

of the research findings to the educators who want to address the problems relating to teaching and learning

3.7 Sample Design

When designing sampling approaches, a researcher must remember, unlike quantitative research, qualitative research normally studies a few individuals or a few cases, because the purpose of a qualitative research is to gain an in-depth picture of each individual or site (Creswell, 2012) The

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intention is “not to generalize to a population, but to develop an in-depth exploration of a central phenomenon” (Creswell, 2012, p 206) Sampling approaches between quantitative and qualitative research are different in the sense that quantitative sampling approaches focus on random sampling, selecting representative individuals, and generalizing to population, while qualitative sampling approaches focus on understanding insights and learning from individuals (Creswell, 2012) Accordingly, purposeful sampling was used and the number of participants was small to gain insights into the phenomena under investigation

3.7 1 Participants

Once approved, a pool of potential candidates for research was created using the following criteria:

 The potential participants are high school teachers

 The potential participants are currently experienced English teachers in a public school system in Hung Yen (see Table 3.1 for the participant profile) The researcher checked the educational and professional background of the participants through an actual interview before sending invitation email and letter of consent to ensure the accuracy of the information The invitation email (Appendix A), accompanied by the informed consent form (Appendix B), which explained the participant‟s right to refuse to participate or withdraw at any time during the study, was sent to the potential participants After the potential participants responded to the invitation email and agreed to participate in the study, the researcher ask them to write a narrative about their emotion in career conducted in a one or two - page long narrative The researcher explained an overview of the study, verified participants‟ qualifications to be included in the study, clarified the narrative process, obtained the consent form, verified that the candidate did not have difficulties articulating her experiences

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Table 3.1 Participant profiles (All names are pseudonyms)

position

Country First

language

Marital status

Highest Degree Obtained

3.7 2 Sample Size

The number of participants for qualitative studies is generally much smaller than that of quantitative studies because the purpose of qualitative research is not to generalize the results (Ritchie, Lewis, & Elam, 2003) Collecting and analyzing qualitative data is a labor-intensive task Using a large sample in qualitative study is time consuming, costly, and impractical In determining sample sizes, some scholars provided guidelines for the sample size (Bertaux, 1981; Creswell, 2013; Morse, 1994; Polkinghorne, 1989) Since the potential participants of this study were thirteen, the sample size of this study was five, dependent on the number of teacher‟s superintendents who met the criteria described in the recruitment process

3.8 Data Collection

In a data collection process, a researcher started with the research questions in order to decide the types of data that was needed to provide relevant

3.9 Data Analysis

The analyzed data was primarily from the transcriptions of the narratives Additional data came from the researcher‟s notes and reflexive journal In examining the data, the researcher looked for themes from the content at both manifest and latent levels, themes that could be directly observed in the narrative and the themes lying beneath the narrative (Boyatzis, 2008)

To conduct narrative analysis, data can be analyzed through deductive or inductive thematic analysis approaches (Bruner, 1986) For this study, the researcher employed both deductive and inductive approaches Deductively, the researcher, following the guidelines inherent in theory-driven thematic analysis (Boyatzis, 1998), analyzed factors effecting teachers‟ emotion of all participants based on predetermined themes Themes were based on Super‟s (1957, 1990) career development theory and Mezirow‟s (1978) transformative learning theory Inductively, the study also allowed for new themes to emerge

The researcher, in undertaking this study, began the data analysis process

by creating a profile for each participant to present participants in context (Seidman, 2006) Demographic data of all participants were combined into a descriptive statistical format The data to be analyzed were from stories told by the participants Additional data came from the researcher‟s reflexive journals and notes

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Data analysis in the analysis of the data obtained at the end of this study, the inductive analysis approach was used to analyze the data obtained The stages of the inductive analysis approach were taken into consideration (Yıldırım & Şimşek (2006, pp 228-240) These stages include: identifying the key words, categorizing into themes

3.10 Coding of the data into themes

The following themes were developed from the narratives based on the research question, “What are the factors affecting teachers‟ emotion?” A data (teachers‟ narratives) were first read carefully to identify the key words These identified key words are categorized into themes Two pre-defined themes provided the foundation for the analysis of participants‟ narratives First was the theme of professional commitment by Armstrong (1995) This theme revealed the participants‟ commitment referring to the attachment and loyalty associated with the factors affecting participants‟ emotion in teaching Second, findings related

to Coolahan, (2003) Teacher salary scale has an intimate connection with teacher retention patterns Besides these pre-determined themes, two additional themes emerged from this study through inductive analysis: Students, Collegiality Examples of the key words and categories are illustrated in Table 3.2 below

Table 3 2 Codes, Categories, and Themes

„teaching love‟, „self-sacrifice‟, „the

desire to become a popular teacher‟,

„professional love‟,

„conscience‟, „human love‟, and

„idealism‟

Professional commitment

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„the level of students‟, „request for

learning‟

„success‟, „students‟ and „students‟

productivity‟, „students‟ admiration‟

Students

„solidarity‟, „synergy‟, „friendly‟

„unequal distribution of tasks‟, „less

collaboration‟, ,„unfriendly competition‟

„jealous colleagues‟

Collegiality

„low salary‟, „income‟, „raising salary‟

„can‟t save money „, „teacher‟s living is

not good‟, „Long working hour but low-

paid‟, „satisfied with my current salary‟

Financial

As a result of the coding of the data obtained at the end of the research, the following 4 themes were found (1) Professional commitment (2) Students, (3) Collegiality, (4) Financial

3.11 Reliability and Validity Validation

Reliability and validity validation of the study was based on validity strategies that should be used in the qualitative studies mentioned in Christensen

et al (2011) In order to ensure the theoretical validity of the study, a theory diversification method was applied and the consistency between the theory and the data was provided The prepared questions were presented to the field experts together with the research problem The necessary corrections were made based on the views of the field experts and a pilot interview was held with

a volunteer teacher to test the clarity and the internal validity of the questions In addition, during the collection of the data of the participants, follow-up probing questions were asked as much as possible and the participants were asked to

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express their opinions in greater detail Verbatim comments have been included

in the process of making sense of the findings The results obtained at the end of the research and the comments made by the participants were checked to ensure the interpretation validity The process of analysis and interpretation of the data were supported by findings obtained from the past research in the field

3.12 Summary

This chapter provided a detailed description of the methodology for the conduct

of the study The purpose of this research was to explore the factors affecting teacher‟s emotion

The main research question was: What factors affect high school teachers’

emotion in teaching?

The research site was school districts The participants of this study were five

teachers The criteria for selecting the participants were that they must be at least 8 - year experience teachers This study employed a qualitative narrative research design and used both deductive and inductive approaches to data analysis The data collection began with a 15-minute initial interview via telephone with each potential participant to ensure that the participant understood the research procedure The researcher then sends letter of invitation and letter of consent to the participants and asks them to write a narrative as required

For data analysis, the deductive approach following the guidelines inherent in theory driven thematic analysis was used (Boyatzis, 1998) Deductively, the analysis focused on teaching experiences of all participants based on predetermined themes Themes were based on Super‟s (1957, 1990) career development theory and Mezirow‟s (1978) transformative learning theory The study also allowed for new themes that emerged from an inductive analysis that was based on additional reviews of all research materials produced and that used cross-case analysis