Data Sources/ Instrumentation
There were three sets of data sources for this study: a Teaching Style self-assessment instrument based on Grasha's work (Appendix D), the Grasha-Reichmann Teaching Style Inventory, a web-based assessment (Appendix B), and three separate versions of a qualitative interview instrument, one for each group, (Appendixes E, F, G). These instruments were chosen because they not only reflect the participants self-assessment of their own teaching style, but also ask for the reflection in three different ways, thereby developing construct validity (deMarrais & Lapan, 2004) and offering reliability through triangulation (Berg, 2004). Additionally, the Grasha instruments were chosen because they reflect the fluidity of teaching style and do not absolutely label a teacher with one style. Grasha's clusters seem to approach a much more realistic vision of true teaching styles and account for differences in student level, subject matter, and other variables. The Grasha-Reichmann instrument is available to the public to use and can be accessed on various web sites.
The Teaching Style self-assessment instrument was presented on paper in chart format, and listed Grasha's five categories of teaching styles with a brief description of each style below the category name. The study participant was asked to read the descriptions and to fill in the bubble next to the category that best fits the participants' self-assessment of their own teaching style. The participant was informed that the fit would not be exact, but to choose the closest match.
The Grasha-Reichmann Teaching Style Inventory is a web-based assessment, available at various web sites, that asks for a Likert-type response to a series of questions designed to objectively categorize teaching style. A teacher is asked to respond to a statement such as, "I set high standards for students in this class." He/she responds within a five-point range from strongly disagree to strongly agree. The teaching style is calculated via a numeric score and the results are presented in a table that presents whether the respondent is low, moderate or high, based on the numeric outcome, in a particular style.
The qualitative instrument was designed to elicit information from faculty in their own words toward attitudes and beliefs about technology, extent of technology use, and attitudes and beliefs about teaching. Since each group had varying degrees of technology incorporation, the instrument was slightly modified for each group to reflect these degrees. This qualitative instrument was a semi-structured interview designed to assess a broad overview of the subject's current teaching methodology, teaching beliefs, use of technology and attitudes toward technology in instruction. The questions were open-ended and intentionally vague in order to allow the subject control of the conversation. All versions of the instrument began by asking the participant to talk about likes and dislikes of their job, then of teaching. By focusing on their single favorite course, they would, later in the interview, describe their teaching methods. As the interview progresses, they were asked about their use of and beliefs about instructional technology.
Research Design
The subjects were first given the Teaching Style self-assessment instrument (see Table 3). This instrument was designed to gauge how the faculty subjectively viewed their own teaching styles. To that end, the subjects were asked to find a best fit into one category and indicate that fit by filling in the appropriate bubble. They were given the instruction that they would not fit completely and neatly into one category. Groups A and C were then immediately given Grasha's Teaching Style Inventory. Group B was given the Inventory on the second day of the workshop, which was no later than two weeks after the self-assessment (see Table 3). Groups A and B were given the Inventory via the web, with Group C given the choice to take the web version or fill out a paper version. The paper version was scored by the researcher at a later date. This inventory objectively assessed the subject's teaching style based on Grasha's defined categories. Subjects in all groups then participated in the qualitative interview, which lasted no longer than one hour.
Analysis of Data
The results of the Teaching Style Inventory were analyzed with the Kruskal-Wallis H test for independent samples. It is a nonparametric (not normally distributed) one-way analysis of variance test for the situation where the ANOVA normality assumptions may not apply. The Kruskal-Wallis test compares mean ranks to test whether independent samples are from the same population. From each group, the scores in each of the five categories were summed and compared to the scores in the other two groups in order to determine if there was a statistical difference among groups in each of the five types of teaching style.
The qualitative interviews were conducted during a five-month period, with those from Group B interviewed first. The interviews lasted between 30 minutes and one and a quarter hours, with the average interview time being approximately 45 minutes. All interviews with Group B were conducted in the researcher's office. Six of the Group A interviews were also conducted at this location. Nine of the interviews from Group C were conducted in the subject's office. The interview tapes were then transcribed verbatim. The results were coded following a method of independent analysis and analyzed for dominant themes that emerged which are related to four broad areas: (a) teaching style, (b) teaching methodology, (c) attitudes toward technology, and (d) use of technology as a teaching method. This coding was done by listing significant statements, determining the meaning of the statements and then identifying the essence of the phenomenon (Berg, 2004) .
All three data sets were then compared to determine whether there was consistency in the self-assessments of teaching style. The Teaching Style self-assessment was compared to the Teaching Style Inventory, and then compared to responses from the qualitative interview.
Summary
In order to better serve faculty in their quest to incorporate instructional technology into teaching, resource centers nationwide need to address the barriers to incorporation. In the past, time, energy and resources have been focused on addressing extrinsic barriers that faculty face. These barriers have included, but are not limited to, lack of time, lack of money, lack of technical support, and lack of knowledge. The purpose of this study was to explore how intrinsic fundamental beliefs about teaching, the notion of who a person is as a teacher, not extrinsic resource-based barriers, may cause faculty to resist or to support instructional technology incorporation.