Aportes de la investigación-acción educativa a la hipótesis del maestro investigador: evidencias y obstáculos

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to present generalizations taken from six educational research cohorts or groups of researchers/teachers which were carried out between 1998 and 2003. Specifically, this paper refers to one of the objectives of this research work, namely verifying the hypothesis of teacher/researcher, proposed by Lawrence Stenhouse in the 70´s, according to which it is possible to carry out research work simultaneously with teaching. If this hypothesis is valid, then the model of teacher education acquires new dimensions.

The paper, following Popper´s theory of hypothesis falsification claims that these six years of research done with different groups of teachers allow for generalizations, in spite of the fact that the research work was done using a qualitative research approach. In fact, case studies are numerous and have had similar operation purposes and techniques. In case studies, certain irregularities have been observed that can be taken as evidence in pro of the teacher/researcher hypothesis, that is to say, a teacher who performs the functions of teacher and researcher of his teaching practice. These positive generalizations are presented and commented. However, as stated in Popper's theory, there are degrees of uncertainty when the nil hypothesis is rejected; in other words, the hypothesis is surrounded by negative facts which yield doubt on its probability. The paper also presents these observations as generalizations acting as obstacles to the hypothesis of the teacher/researcher.