Action research as a methodology for professional development in leading an educational process

The need to resolve a researcher’s discomfort, resulting from the inherent gap between values and beliefs and their practical implementation, led to using action research methodology during an academy-field partnership. Two teacher educators, 24 pre-service teachers specializing in science, and six teachers participated in the study. Throughout the two years of the partnership this study describes a reflective perspective process that focuses on actions, events, thoughts, dilemmas and feelings of the participants that emerged from the researcher's reflective journal. Cycles of reflection on thinking and doing helped monitoring the complex process of the partnership that bridges the gap between the academic and field cultures. The collected data underwent three stages of interpretative content analysis that point to the role of reflection cycles on thinking and doing, resulting in the interweaving of cognitive, affective, theoretical and practical features during the academy-field practice model.