A survey research on Finnish teacher educators’ research-teaching integration and its relationship with their approaches to teaching

Abstract

The study aims to clarify how Finnish teacher educators integrate research and teaching to support their approaches to teaching. Research questions cover teacher educators’ forms of research-teaching integration, approaches to teaching, and the relationship between them. With a survey methodology, the study obtained 101 responses with a questionnaire. Six forms of research-teaching integration were identified with a qualitative content analysis. Integrating research with teaching content was mentioned most often, whereas integrating research with teaching methods and applying inquiry-oriented methods in teaching were reported less. Three kinds of approaches to teaching were found by cluster analysis. The participants with different approaches differed in their ways of research-teaching integration. However, the differences were not statistically significant in Chi-square tests. The study contributes to the international research on teacher educators and the variety in research-teaching integration in teacher education. Future research could further explore the individual and contextual factors influencing their research-teaching integration.