A handbook for Exploratory Action Research

Teacher
Research question
Kind(s) of data
Teresa
a.1. Why is that my students do not speak in class?
■
■
A critical friend’s notes about lesson
■
■
Notes or recordings of interviews/chats with 
students
a.2. Do my students like to speak in English?
■
■
Responses to questionnaire
a.3. What opportunities do they have to speak in 
class?
■
■
A critical friend’s notes about lesson
1 = strongly agree; 2 = agree;
3 = neither agree nor disagree; 4 = disagree;
5 = strongly disagree 
1
2
3
4
5
1.
I find homework boring.
2.
I don’t have time to do homework.
3.
I find it too difficult to do homework on my own.

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104 
| Extra material
Answer Key
Chapter 6 
Task 6.1
Task 6.3
A. 53 % of students definitely enjoy speaking English in class.
B. 79 % of students think it’s important to speak English.
C. 84 % would like to speak English in future.
Summary / Interpretation of findings:
For the research question ‘Should I [the teacher] use the students’ mother tongue – Spanish – in the classroom?, the 
answer seems to be ‘Yes’ since it provides support for understanding. However, there is a caveat since students also 
perceive that the lesson becomes less challenging when Spanish is spoken. When it comes to interpreting this data,
the teacher can also consider how Spanish is used in order to avoid making the class less interesting and also thinking 
about better ways to aid understanding.
Response
Code/Label