Conducting reflexive ethnography on three novice English teachers in Japan: its impact on the researcher and the researched

I am currently in the sixth month of an eighteen month ethnographic study of three first-year English teachers at three different junior high schools in Japan. All the teachers are Japanese nationals. The research targets the dilemmas the teachers face in developing their teaching or facilitating student learning and how the teachers resolve these dilemmas. Through understanding the issues and how they resolve them, it is hoped that the nature of their professional development can be better understood. The main means of data collection has been class observation and interviews, which are both audio-recorded. Ethnography acknowledges the reflexivity between investigators and the researched: they collaborate in constructing the object of the research, the world of the insider. This paper will introduce the research design of the study and through analyzing transcripts of interviews and classroom talk document the nature and impact of my involvement on the novice teachers and myself. Up to this point, many questions remain about the reasons behind the dilemmas the teachers face and how the teachers resolved them. I will argue that in order to attain the hoped-for information, the participants will need to assume the role of co-researchers.