Boundary crossing or boundary space traversal? Investigating the extent to which practitioner inquiry into educational practice is enduring

Abstract

Transformation into a teacher researcher signifies the apogee of an inquiry into practice professional learning program. A significant body of research outlines the benefits of teachers participating in a practitioner inquiry (PI) program as well as the nature of the boundary crossing that may occur. However, researchers less frequently revisit PI program participants to document the permanence of the boundary crossing from practitioner to researcher. Our qualitative multi-site case-study investigates whether participants in our PI professional learning program transitioned from practitioner to educational researcher and if so, the extent to which their researcher lens was maintained 18 months after completion of the program. We draw on the Theories of Spatiality and Boundary Crossing for design of the program and analysis of data. Findings demonstrated a consistent pattern of participant enjoyment of the PI program but transitory transformation into a teacher-researcher. We argue that our PI program participants ‘traversed’ rather than crossed into the researcher space and as such we propose a new conceptual framework, Boundary Space Traversal, to understand teacher’s experience of inquiry into practice.