Session Information
99 ERC SES 03 B, Sociologies of Education
Paper Session
Contribution
Research demonstrates that there has been a wide breadth of variation in both the roles and responsibilities of the teaching assistant (Adamson, 1999; Cajkler et al., 2007; Hancock et al., 2001) in England’s schools. Barber (1996) characterised the employment of the teaching assistant in the primary school sector as an incipient quiet revolution, as they began to adapt to more pedagogical roles (Butt and lance, 2009). Many teaching assistants were not specifically trained for this (Blatchford et al, 2004). Although teaching assistants were playing a major role in the teaching of children, they were not credited for this as the teacher was still viewed as being core to a lesson whilst the teaching assistant was seen as being periphery (Hancock and Eyres, 2004). This view, with regards to positioning in the workforce, created a hierarchy between the teacher and the teaching assistant and what could be deemed as a watering down of a profession by funnelling traditional aspects of a professional job to an assistant. Friedson (2001) argued that the intertwining roles of professional and paraprofessional were designed to reduce the cost and the independence of the professions. In light of this, Butt and Lance (2005) advised the need for sensitivity in the approach used by teachers towards teaching assistants. Difficulties and benefits associated with the remodelling of the workforce strategy were still emerging in 2006 (Collins and Simco, 2006) but they were seen as dependent upon the way in which teaching assistants were conceptualised, trained, and deployed by a school.
Professional learning required for successful large-scale reform depends on a commitment to experimentation and innovation at the local level (Leithwood et al, 2006). By 2006, the role of the teaching assistant had undergone a period of experimentation and innovation and as there is currently no definitive job description that sets out the job role of the teaching assistant, it can be assumed that the drawn-out period of experimentation and innovation continues to be on-going. In the current climate, and more than five decades after The Plowden report (1967), there are however several options by which they are now able to simultaneously work as a teaching assistant and upgrade or further their qualifications in order to enter the teaching profession as a graduate teacher (CooperGibson, 2019), albeit this being an expensive and time-consuming process.
In reflection of all of this, and with regard to timeliness, this research aimed to find out firstly, if there is a definitive employment role for the teaching assistant in the primary school in order to close the gap nationally in research literature on the role of the teaching assistant. This is timely because the whole picture of teaching assistant employment is and has been on a pendulum of continual change and whilst government research initiatives and updated government policies manipulate the pendulum, there remains a gap in research that identifies specifically, the current state of play in schools. Secondly, this research aimed to explore how qualifications, experience and status within the workforce, are perceived by teaching assistants.
Research Questions
- What are the perceptions of the primary school teaching assistant on hierarchical status in the workforce?
- What is the actual primary school teaching assistant job role?
- How do varying qualifications and academic status effect the role of the teaching assistant who is working in the primary school?
Method
This was a qualitative study. Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) was used as a framework for methodology and methods. In-depth, semi-structured interviews were used as a method of data collection for this study. In line with the framework of IPA, semi-structured interviews allow for the researcher’s interpretation of the participant’s interpretation of their social reality. Semi-structured interviews are engaged with the exploration of the everyday lived world of the participants and how they make sense of it all (Kvale, 1996). Individual interviews, in opposition to group interviews, were chosen and for sample size, 3 participants were used in conducting the interviews. This sample size should be large enough to be able to analyse and form accurate results. Whilst group interviews offer an advantage in cost-efficiency and time-efficiency (Cohen et al, 2018), I was looking to hear and understand the individual perceptions and aspirations of the teaching assistant. The interviews took place outside of the participant’s school so that they felt free to speak outside of their work area. As a framework for methodology, I chose IPA. Introduced by Jonathan Smith et al (2009), IPA is cognitivist in operation and is used for meaning making on the part of both the participant and the researcher. It examines people’s perceptions of experiences that happen to them, and a participant is asked to reflect on events, circumstances and situations that have been a part of their life or work experience. During the stage of data analysis, I attempted to make sense out of the meanings and interpretations of their perceptions. IPA is an approach to qualitative research that has an idiographic focus, and it aims to give insights into how a given person (the teaching assistant), in each context (the school), makes sense of a phenomenon (teaching assistants and the current state of play). Grounded in phenomenology, it is distinct because of its combination of psychological, interpretive, and idiographic components. IPA usually draws on the accounts of a small number of people who have certain experiences in common. In the field of this research, the data collection taken from 3 participants, each working in a different school related to the analysis of a small group of people. IPA was an ideal framework for the aims and intentions of this study.
Expected Outcomes
This research fits in with background literature in that there is no definitive role set out for the teaching assistant, that they are expected to undertake any duties and tasks given to them and that they are leaning towards a continually developing pedagogical role in the delivery of lessons to whole classes. Their roles are complex and fragmented (Hancock et al, 2002) and there is an overlap in teaching assistants doing work that was traditionally done by teachers (Hancock et al, 2002). Teaching assistants are reinforcing and delivering teaching points making their role predominantly pedagogical and they are not always trained for this (Blatchford et al, 2004). Changes in schools during the Covid Pandemic led to teaching assistants, in some schools, delivering whole class lessons full time. Although there is no statutory definitive role, it looks like there is an emerging definitive role for the teaching assistant which is one of a broad nature and is encompassed around the idea that the role of the teaching assistant is to undertake duties and activities to suit and fulfil the purpose of school requirements. Hierarchical status in the workforce needs to be addressed as teaching assistants do not feel valued and there are issues of intimidation through status in school role sets. This was a ‘Pilot Study’. In retrospect, for my next stage of research I will continue to use interpretative phenomenological analysis as a framework for methodology and for methods of data collection using a larger sample. At this stage, I can foresee that I will rely again on individual interviews undertaken outside of the school workplace. I have already begun to undertake interviews on an international basis, with schools in China, Thailand and The United Arab Emirates ( on Teams) to gain an international perspective on school support staff.
References
Adamson, S. (1999) Review of published literature on teaching assistants, Report for the DfEE teaching Assistants Project, DfEE, London Barber, M (1996) The Learning Game: arguments for an education revolution, Victor Gollancz, London Blatchford P, Russell A, Bassett P, Brown P & Martin C, 2004. The Role and Effects of teaching Assistants in English Primary Schools [Years 4 to 6] 2000 – 2003: Results from the Class Size and Pupil Adult Ratios [CSPAR] KS2 Project: DFES Butt G and Lance A, 2005. Modernising the roles of support staff in primary schools: changing focus, changing function, Educational Review, 57:2, 139-149, DOI: 10.1080/0013191042000308323 Butt G and Lance A, 2009. I am not the teacher!: some effects of remodelling the roles of teaching assistants in English primary schools, Education 3-13, 37:3, 219-231, DOI: 10.1080/0300427080234930 Cajkler, W., Tennant, G., Tiknaz, Y., Sage, R., Taylor, C., Tucker, S., Cooper, P (2007) A systematic literature review on the perceptions of ways in which teaching assistants work to support pupils’ social and academic engagement in secondary classrooms. London: EPPI Centre Central Advisory Council for Education, 1967. The Plowden Report, Children and their Primary Schools. London: HMSO Collins J and Simco N, 2006. Teaching assistants reflect: the way forward?, Reflective Practice, 7:2, 197-214, DOI: 10.1080/14623940600688589 CooperGibson Research (2019) Exploring Teaching Assistants’ appetite to become teachers DfE: London (Ref: RR935) Friedson E, 2001. Professionalism: The third Logic. Cambridge Polity Hancock R & Eyres I, 2004. Implementing a required curriculum reform: teachers at the core, teaching assistants on the periphery? : Westminster Studies in Education, 27:2, 223-235, DOI: 1080/0140672040270210 Hancock, R., Swann, W., Marr, A., Turner, J (2001) Classroom Assistants in the Primary School: Employment and Deployment. ESRC funded project: R000237803 Leithwood, K., Aitken, R., Jantzi, D (2006) Making Schools Smarter: Leading with Evidence Corwin Press
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