Research on the development of research capacity for teacher educators is limited and mixed. Kelchtermans et al. (2018) argue based on their study of teacher educators from Belgium, Ireland, Israel, the Netherlands, Norway, United Kingdom, and the USA that professional development (PD) for teacher educators should emphasize real research activities. However, a recent study in Israel (Guberman & Zuzovsky, 2022) found that in research capacity development among teacher educators, “the unintended result was the separation of teaching from research” (p. 369). In Kazakhstan, scholars have documented efforts and challenges at transforming research and publication capacity over the past thirty years in national policy and institutional practice among university science professors and students (Kuzhabekova, 2022) and schoolteachers (Ayubayeva & McLaughlin, 2023), but not teacher educators to date. 

Along with research reform in higher education, the Kazakhstani government has actively supported reform in STEM education. Moreover, as part of trilingual education reforms, the English language is viewed as a science language that facilitates integration into the global economy, and STEM subjects are to be taught through the English language. However, recent research shows that STEM teachers neither display high-quality or innovative skills in lesson planning and implementation of STEM (Goodman et al., 2023), nor are fully ready to teach STEM subjects in English (Manan et al., 2023). Whether teacher educators are prepared to support future STEM teachers in English in Kazakhstan remains an empirical question.  

To address the twin issues of research capacity and pedagogical capacity building of teacher educators in Kazakhstani pedagogical universities, the authors present a study designed to answer the following main research question: How can action research contribute to development of new STEM and multilingual education practices in Kazakhstani teacher education institutions? 

The data collection and analysis are framed through the combined lenses of action research and self-efficacy theory. Action research (Pine, 2009) consists of four phases of professional inquiry: 1) planning a change in practice and a means of documenting the change; 2) implementing the change; 3) observe the changes and consequences of the change; 4) reflecting on the process and consequences in order to consider new changes and action research designs. Self-efficacy (Bandura, 1997, as cited in Usher et al., 2023) refers to one’s beliefs about their capacity to perform tasks or skills, beliefs which are shaped by internal and external factors. Previous research has found the utility of using action research to promote self-efficacy of pre-service teachers (e.g., Cabaroglu, 2014) and in-service teachers (e.g., Kinskey, 2018) as part of their professional development. However, it has not been documented whether action research may facilitate self-efficacy in Kazakhstani teacher educators for whom both research methods and pedagogical practices may be relatively new. 

This study employed a multiple case study design (Yazan, 2015). Case selection (n=60) proceeded in two stages. First, the authors invited administrators from 4 pedagogical universities and 1 college which prepares primary school teachers from three regions of Kazakhstan to participate in a collaborative professional development project. These administrators were keen after an initial professional development course on research methods to further develop their understanding, and their faculty members’ understanding, of both research methods and either STEM or multilingual education practice. In the second stage, these administrators or delegated coordinators selected up to 20 teacher educators who were interested and available for professional development in STEM or multilingual education. Data collection with the teacher educators proceeded in three phases: pre-action research, action research, and post-action research. For Phase One (November-December 2022), the authors conducted workshops on action research synchronously online or in person, and developed a pre-action research questionnaire which included open-ended questions on understanding, interest, and readiness for both action research and specific pedagogies for STEM and multilingual education. For Phase Two, based on content analysis (Prasad, 2019) of the pre-action research responses, the authors prepared videos in three languages (English, Russian, Kazakh) on STEM pedagogies and multilingual education pedagogies of interest and relevance to the teacher educators. After watching the videos, the teacher educators had opportunities to discuss the methods and theory with both authors and their peers during synchronous online meetings. Next, the teacher educators prepared--collaboratively with other teachers or individually--syllabi with at least one of the new pedagogies, and action research plans to assess the effectiveness of applying the pedagogies in their classrooms. The authors provided feedback to the teacher educators for both the developed syllabi and action research plans. In Phase Three, teacher educators implemented the revised lesson plan and action research plans, and completed a post-action research survey in summer 2023. The responses from both open-ended surveys, alongside teachers’ syllabi and action research plans, were coded in NVivo software following the stages of thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2006). Results are presented based on individual responses and documents.

The analysis showed all the participants recognized the value of action research and reported the intention to use action research in their classrooms in the future. Some teachers already had the idea of the kind of action research they would want to conduct, either by implementing the action research plan they had prepared during the professional development or developing a new one. Some participants also expressed interest or intentions for collaborations on action research with other teachers, often from their educational institutions. This pattern was observed more among multilingual education professors than among STEM faculty. STEM teachers commented more on the utility of action research as a tool for developing their students’ research skills. However, some participants seemed to display limited understanding of the complexity of action research. The analysis of feedback on action research plans that the workshop leaders gave to the teachers revealed that in developing action research plans the teachers struggled with defining the methods to use in their research and aligning research questions with the methodology and problem. Preliminary analysis of post-action research survey responses showed that although all the participants reported interest in implementing action research in their classrooms, several participants thought that there might be challenges. The most frequently mentioned challenge to implementing action research were time constraints, complexity of the process of action research and lack of experience and skills for conducting it. Only a few participants felt highly confident in their capacity to conduct action research in the future. The results suggest a need for ongoing professional development support for action research, as well as need for administrators to carve out time for faculty members to collaborate on action research.

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