Education Research

I have commenced several research degrees before giving up on the idea completely. On each occasion I was quickly bored out of my head. I prefer the immediate feedback loop in teaching. The Project Zero work on visible thinking and visible learning makes use of the concept of the teacher as researcher. Instructional Rounds are designed with similar intent. I believe that high school teachers have much to learn from the concept of documentation emanating from the Reggio Emilia early childhood approach.

Yesterday I noticed this blogpost from Harry Webb: a critique of PBL and the new pedagogies. The comments following the post are really interesting. Is education a research-based profession? I know that Richard Elmore claims that teaching is a profession without a practice.

I saw a tweet a few weeks ago that stated that nothing kills innovation faster than the words, “Prove it.” So what evidence do we need that something works? Where does this leave classroom teachers in the ‘my research is better than your research’ debate? For instance, I’m drawn to Ron Ritchhart’s criticism of John Hattie’s work:

“Outcomes are all that matter. And of course there is no questioning of the “outcomes” so we see this all the time in schools. As long as your students get good test results we’ll leave you alone. But there are other outcomes. Hattie is essentially say (ing), so you spoonfeed kids, so you tell them the answers, so you don’t let them think for themselves. Good test results? Great.

Also Hattie is a statistician, not an educator. He looks at outcomes. So in his world this is all there is.”

In February we are hosting researchED Sydney, a conference for educators interested in research- how to become research literate, how to tell the good from the bad, and how to find research that actually helps students in the classroom…

“the focus is on research as a tool- not a set of handcuffs- for improving practice in education. Teachers often find themselves at the end of a chain of authority, usually the bottom. What if teachers engaged directly with research, and researchers, instead? What if researchers reached out to teaching communities and listened to their practical concerns? What if teachers were research literate enough to know the difference between the snake oil that sometimes creeps into the classroom, and research that was robust, cautious and sensible?”

Hope to see you there on Saturday 21st February.

One thought on “Education Research

  1. What if teachers where empowered to be researchers? What if teachers where given time and support buy schools to teach their practice. If ethic committees could stream line the process of gaining approval. If there was away of gaining credit for the research teaches do every day. Looking forward to Research Ed.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *