A socio-cognitive perspective on collaborative experience : narratives from two secondary school teachers in Hong Kong

Abstract

Teacher collaboration policy has been a recent trend in Hong Kong. While the benefits of collaboration have been well supported in the literature, there is little known about the process and the teachers’ perspectives of collaboration. Individual teachers are reacting differently to collaborative practices. Some are yearning for it; some are avoiding it. This research was to investigate the notion of collaboration with a focus on the individuality of teachers. Narrative inquiry was carried out to listen to the collaborative stories of two English teachers in Hong Kong. They self-narrated their collaborative experiences and were interviewed using a five-layer perspective. The five-layer perspective aimed at understanding their experiences from the personal,behavioural, social, environmental and cultural level. Findings showed that teachers’ collaborative lives depended largely on factors at the five levels. The two English teachers were looking forward to working with others but were influenced by external factors. The factors suggested by the two teachers were of resemblance. They revealed that school management and collegial relationships were the two main components in their collaborative stories. However, it was also observed that the two teachers reacted to the same circumstances differently due to their personal qualities such as personal beliefs and reflectivity. This study contributed to the knowledge of teachers’ collaborative experiences by developing an all-rounded framework with five levels of factors. Not only the collegial, cultural and environmental factors played roles in shaping the teachers’ collaborative experiences, personal factors such as past experiences and educational beliefs were important in their collaborative journeys. A more thoughtful implementation with considerations given to the individuality of teachers in a timely manner was recommended.