Jude’s perception on research informed teaching
Using research to inform my practice is something that I am passionate about and it just makes sense to me; why wouldn’t I want to engage with research to improve as a classroom teacher? However, there is so much out there, so many ideas and so many possible new strategies to engage with that it can be a bit overwhelming. I gave a lecture to some PGCE students recently about using research in practice and it really made me stop and reflect – what am I doing, how am I doing it and why am I doing it?
I read. I read a lot. I am forever surrounded by books and journals or I am reading blogs online. That fuels my thinking and inspires my practice. But engaging with research isn’t just about reading. It is about thinking and about criticality. Not every idea will work in my context. Not every idea will suit my teaching style or my subject. Not every idea will be a sound idea. Not every idea will be based on research (think about some of the trends in education over the last few years, we have all delivered some ideas that later turned out to be just that, ideas but with no basis). So once I’ve read, I think critically to make sure I have found the golden nuggets that will make a valuable impact on my practice. I make sure that what I take from my reading and then act upon will be for the benefit of the students I teach. I try to avoid the silver bullets, the quick wins that seem to be too good to be true (and tend to end up with me getting out my trusted laminator!) because long term, they often don’t have an impact on the students. The silver bullets are tempting but the danger is that by trying to do something from everything I read, I will dilute the impact and just create chaos in my classroom. The golden nuggets are the gems that you embed in your practice, that grow your thinking, that help you learn and make you a better teacher.
Golden Nuggets nor silver bullets!! – Jenny’s perception of problems with encouraging research informed teaching
So firstly I feel I need to clarify myself… I too have a strong belief that using research to help inform teaching practice in a classroom and across the school is of enormous value. My statement ‘nuggets nor bullets’ refers to the number of practitioners that don’t appear to value or engage with the research that is out there. Whilst this has always been a bit of a phenomenon for me, as a senior leader I have now had to think more about how I can help steer the boat a little and try to help staff see the value in this more. So in understanding the issue I find myself asking a few questions:
Is it that staff don’t know about how to find research? I find this hard to believe, simply typing in successful teaching strategies found me about 284,000,000 results in just 0.61 seconds. I feel we are in an exciting place for educationalists at the moment there are a number of books being written, blogs being shared all sharing successes and ideas based on research, no longer do we need to head to the library and search out journals, if we don’t want to. Jude is in heaven, two things she loves; reading and teaching found everywhere. Jude currently runs a professional reading group where she finds the books, scans segments, provides a group to discuss this and even shares her summary of the main findings. Our school has a professional reading Twitter account where a variety of things are posted enabling staff to read about research and select strategies as appropriate. The school runs a number of 15 minute forums which can help staff engage with some teaching and learning nuggets that can be shared. Plus we have professional reading that forms part of the directed faculty meetings. I know a number of schools do the same in in many cases more so I am not sure this is the problem in schools.
Is it that staff don’t have the time? I am not going to sit and type this from my ‘ivory tower’ and suggest that this is not a problem for staff. I appreciate teaching a full day with duties can often be a barrier for staff attending additional CPD sessions. But could they read a book for 20mins? Could they go onto twitter and see what other people are sharing? Could they try and find time to have a discussion with other members of the school who are interested? This is a barrier and leaders in the school need to look at how this can be broken down, we are currently looking at how we can use some directed time to add a Teaching and Learning slot in for all staff to attend.
Do staff not see the value in the research? I think this is the case for a number of teachers in education and is a more of a Wicked Problem for school. There are no quick fixes, it is about changing a culture, about changing the mind-set of staff, about encouraging and empowering staff to embrace new ideas and not be scared of taking a risk! This needs a golden nugget of its own!
Creating Cognitive Classrooms 