An exploratory analysis of some taken for granted aspects of the hospital teacher's role

Abstract

Initially hospital education and the life of pupil patients are seen against a background of literature and observations. With the literature reviewed a specific research problem, The Hospital Teacher's Role, is formulated. It takes account of the social characteristics of the hospital and the child educational system in this setting. The theoretical framework for the research is then built up by drawing upon the work of theorists from many vantage points. To enhance the framework's applicability a general formulation is developed, capable of being applied at fieldwork level to most acquired roles. The questionnaire developed to examine The Role Typology consists of forty-two fixed response items covering four main typology areas. These areas see the teacher as a possible child educator and therapist, member of a multi-disciplinary team, and an educator of medical and nursing personnel. The sample is composed of sixty-five doctors, thirty-eight nurses and thirty-nine teachers. The questionnaire data are analysed to test the validity of five assumptions developed from the theoretical frame~work and linked to a series of research questions. This fieldwork indicates some measure of support for all five assumptions but generalization is only of a tentative nature largely as a result of sampling limitations. The role taken-for-granted by the sample is pupil orientated consisting of a pedagogic and therapeutic element, and a service to the medical team on educational matters concerning pupil patients.Some discussion of the consequences of this for interaction takes place in the final chapter. The research, exploratory in nature, achieved its main aims chiefly to explore the possibilities of examining child education(at both a practical and a theoretical level) in an abnormal setting,and, to gather information generally about education in hospital as a basis for more specific research in that area.