supporting tiriti-based curriculum delivery in mainstream early ...

sensitivity. At each stage of the research there has to be consideration of ethics,
including ethical issues pertaining to research design, especially insofar as design
impacts upon data collection; ethical considerations must also inform practices so
that data management and information dissemination are conducted in ways that
are transparent and ethically sound. In short, ethical considerations must inform
and permeate all research practices. The following section discusses the ethical
issues specific to this study.
3.4.5 Ethical Issues of Power
Action research processes rely on building trust and power sharing
between researcher and participants. Once a centre accepted the invitation to
participate, building strong relationships became essential. This meant that as the
researcher, I needed to take care not to decide the specifics of how the research
would be undertaken, as this would be cutting across the potentially collaborative
nature of action research. But at the same time I also needed to acknowledge my
own power as a person with some skill in facilitating the research process.
I needed to address whether my desire for collaboration might be nothing
more than a sham to make me feel less guilty about exploiting teachers to achieve
materially, that is, through a higher qualification, which “could be a step toward
promotion and salary increases” (Patai, 1991, p. 146). However, I also needed to
keep in mind the purpose for which I embarked on this research journey. That was
and remains a desire to investigate what helped and what hindered teachers in
implementation of Tiriti-based programmes; simply because teachers and student
teachers have repeatedly reported that this was a concern for them. Ultimately, I
was interested in making a difference to centre practice, notwithstanding any
potential bonus that may or may not accrue as a result of gaining a higher
qualification.
Whilst I had as an ideal that the research would be carried out
collaboratively, it was important to heed Goldstein‟s (2000) note of caution
regarding power relations and collaboration when the researcher is gaining a
qualification. I knew that at the completion of the research I stood to gain a PhD.
Goldstein (2000) believes that it is important to define what collaborative
research involves, especially if the research is for a doctoral thesis. At that level,
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