Reflective Analysis

Hyejin Yoon

In Korea, educational success is related to socioeconomic status. For a long time,

Koreans have considered education as a main route to achieve an upwardly mobile lifestyle for

themselves and their family. OECDs annual educational index shows us about Koreans passion

for education; the percentage of university and graduate school completion ranks at the top

among members of OECD. By virtue of graduating from a top-tier university, people can reach

high status and hand down their social success to their descendants. Consequently, in the

psyche of Korean students, studying hard and competing with class mates who may be rivals

was deeply ingrained. I grew up in this competitive educational environment and my parents

hoped for me to realize a dream which they had once but did not fulfillentering a good school

so as to be successful in society. I tried my best to please my parents and teachers, believing

their perspectives to the world were trustworthy. It is because I was born and grew up in

Korean Confucianism in which respect for elders is an important value and not showing filial

piety is considered as one of the worst sins. I was trained to absorb existing perspectives and

values toward reality and truth.

The fair and unbiased measurement of students progress and knowledge is required in

Korea in order to prevent conflicts among people, so standardized testing such as multiple

choice exams, has been perceived so by people without consideration of students who

struggled to perform on standardized tests. Based on the social consultation, the objective

tests were accepted commonly in the education field, so I was trained to select the only one or
two correct answers among five multiple choices over my school years. There was always a

right/correct answer. The only thing I could do was memorize knowledge that teachers

presented and practice solving questions based on the conviction that If I failed to get a right

answer in the college entrance exam, I would have lagged behind in career competition. This is

a national exam in Korea where businesses start their work one or two hours late to relieve

traffic congestion and while the English-language listening section is being given, planes pause

their takeoffs to reduce noise. I had better know the "right" answer!

While taking part in the class, Ways of Knowing, I have had opportunities to study world

through various lensespositivism, post-positivism, constructivism, narrative inquiry, and

critical inquiry and I could identify that my way of knowing was similar to the positivists one.

My conviction regarding reality was same as the positivisms ontology: there is a single absolute

reality and truth to any phenomenon or situation regardless of people perspectives and

opinions. So, I believed that I could approach reality by using my innate common sense or

reason (Descarte, 1637, p. 5). Like Descarte (1637), I thought that human beings had innate

abilities to discover objective realities and I tried to maintain a clear distinction between reason

and feeling, and personal experience and fact. Also, I thought I could be close to the objective

truth by systematic inspections. Repeating the cognitive process of doubting, I supposed that I

might be able to accumulate knowledge.

However, when I encountered Kuhn (1962) through his book, The Structure of Scientific

Revolutions, I could realize that knowledge did not progress in a linear way, but rather it

periodically went through big changes called paradigm shifts. According to Kuhn (1962), a

scientific revolution occurs when people experience anomalies. The anomalies cannot be
explained by the existing worldview from which the existing interpretations come. It is a good

explanation for my experience. When I was a student in a teacher education program, I had

learned and contemplated a lot of knowledge with regard to the nature of human beings by

means of examining Western and Eastern educational psychology. At that time, I was

motivated to explore peoples inner world, mind, because I believed that the accumulated

knowledge would be conducive to understanding myself and my future students well.

However, ironically, the more I had studied about peoples mind, the more mysterious human

beings were to me: at times, I confronted difficult situations related to my students bad

behaviors that I could not explain with existing theories and knowledge, because it was beyond

my understanding and experience.

In a journey of exploring ways of knowing, discovering constructivism offered me a

solution to the problem that I could not explain with my former knowledge. Constructivism

refuses objective knowledge and allow different interpretations on a single phenomenon by

understanding the relationship between objects and culture. In other words, even though

people observe same phenomenon, they are prone to interpret it based on their own value

systems which were formed by cultures intervention. Bruner (1996) contended that people

generated knowledge through interaction in culture as context, saying it is obvious to say

that the child is born into a culture and formed by it (p. 6). People construct knowledge in

their own unique context--a set of values, skills, and way of life (Bruner, 1996, p.3). This is in

line with the concept of narrative inquiry.

By virtue of composing and sharing narratives, we can escape from a dogmatic point of

view, examining critically ones own self and then we reconstruct existing perspectives and
create new ones. It is unlike the conviction that humans illuminate the separately existing truth

transparently like a mirror. Since the truth is perceived in a different way based on individuals

cognitive frameworks such as life styles, concept systems, and value criterions, there is no

absolute perspective away from history, culture, and social situation. I categorize my present

way of knowing in this way. In addition, Clandinin and Rosiek (2007) said lived and told stories

and the talk about the stories are one of the ways that we fill our world with meaning and enlist

one anothers assistance in building lives and communities (p. 35). In the light of their

argument, knowledge was narratives that were unique to individuals and were generated in

relationships among people and between people and their environment. Therefore, I can say

that the exploration of narrative is a good way to understand peoples experiences, especially

my future students and myself. It may be possible to present a new direction toward reforming

teacher education by exploring teachers narratives.

In my country, Korea, there are a good number of studies regarding education. Most of

the research has made suggestions with numerical evidence. Before coming to the US, I also

thought I would do my research by employing quantitative methodology such as an

experiment, and statistics, because I believed the numerical evidence was objective and

reliable. However, at the end of the course, I begin to have doubt about the quantitative

approach to research concerning teaching and learning: how can we express peoples minds

and values in numbers? Now I know that as a researcher I need not only the quantitative

perspective in order to grasp a large general surface picture but also the qualitative point of

view as to see an in-depth picture. I would like to be a researcher who will contribute to
improve the quality of teacher education in Korea by comprehending teachers narratives and

using this approach to advance teacher education reform in Korea.

Reference

Bruner, J. (1996). The Culture of Education. United States of America: Presidents and Fellow of

Harvard College.

Clandinin, D.J. & Rosiek, J. (2007). Mapping a landscape of narrative inquiry: Borderland spaces

and tensions. In D.J. Clandinin (Ed.), Handbook of narrative inquiry: Mapping a

methodology (pp. 35-75). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage

Descartes, R. (1637). Discourse on Method and Related Writing. London: Penguin Group.

Kuhn, S. T. (1962). The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Chicago: The University of Chicago

Press.

Weber, R. (2004). Editors Comments: The Rhetoric of Positivism versus Interpretism: A

Personal View. MIS Quarterly, 28(1), 3-12.

Dear Jin, WOW! WOW! an excellent final reflection that is both comprehensive and exploratory. I can see that
your expansion of knowledge included a lot of self-connection to readings and research, which is what perspective
building is all about. Your engagement in each of our readings, your connections made with each one, and your
genuine in-class sharing all served as evidence of your learning. Remember all of this as you propel through the
program - research needs anchor points, and you have them! Bravo on a fine semester for which you have earned
a solid A. :-) Felicitations!