Putting research into practice

Putting research into practice can improve your teaching, but any findings should be carefully examined before being introduced to the class

When a group of experts has spent time and money investigating something and has produced a report, they – and their funders – want to see those findings implemented because, well, that is a ‘good thing’. This is described as ‘research to practice’.

There are soft and hard versions of research to practice. The soft version places new knowledge in the hands of teachers to inform their professional judgement. This view recognises the many decisions teachers have to make about the context in which they are working and the individual children they teach.

The hard version of research to practice sees teaching as largely a technical function: there is one right way that experts discover, which teachers should be made to follow. 

What’s in it for primary teachers?

In its positive, enabling, soft form, research to practice offers teachers the means to assert their status as professionals, keeping up with new knowledge in their field. Underpinning day-to-day dialogue with serious professional reading can counterbalance the unpleasant managerialism that increasingly treats teachers as operatives. And many teachers find that modelling the love of learning they encourage in classroom improves their relationship with pupils.

These are all indirect benefits, but it is reasonable to expect that, from time to time, there will be opportunities for the direct application of research findings in ways that improve professional practice, and stimulate further lines of enquiry.

Not all research is good. Not all research points clearly to practical applications. Not all research findings can be transferred from one context to another If you or your school are looking to make more use of educational research, the following do’s and don’ts may be helpful.

Do…

• 1. Be proactive in accessing and using research. Otherwise, research to practice can feel just like another kind of top-down imposition.
• 2. Make sure the professional culture of your school, especially the views and approaches of the senior leadership team, will be conducive to your learning from research and putting that learning into practice.
• 3. Develop some arrangements for discussing research to practice with colleagues, for example by establishing an informal reading and discussion group.
• 4. Read around the topic: see what other writers and researchers have said about it.
• 5. Check out research findings and how they might apply to your own context by conducting your own small-scale investigations and trials, keeping an open mind until you can evaluate outcomes.
• 6. Recognise that a lot of research is designed and undertaken from a particular viewpoint. For example: what issues are important; what kinds of evidence can best throw light on those issues; what measuring systems are chosen to analyse findings; and what values underpin judgements about whether the findings are ‘good’ or ‘bad’. Try to identify these viewpoints so as to be aware how well they mesh with your own; even if they do not, the research may still have something useful to say.

Don’t…

• 1. Let your enthusiasm for finding out about the results of research become a distraction from the core purposes of your job. Research to practice is all about helping teachers to be more effective, not offering diversionary activity: don’t take your eye off the ball.
• 2. Take the headlines at face value. Read the detail. Most researchers are cautious about their findings and will be upfront about uncertainties and limitations.
• 3. Misuse research - whether published findings, or your own research - as a back-door method of dealing with ‘issues’ that should be addressed through normal management and collegial discussions. Never use research with the motivation of ‘proving I was right’, or proving someone else is wrong.
• 4. Assume that research findings will automatically be transferable to your own context.
• 5. Expect to experience a road to Damascus–style conversion. It may happen, but usually research reports either substantiate, reinforce and deepen the beliefs we already hold, or offer a mild and marginal challenge to some part of our current thinking.
• 6. Place reliance on research to the point of suspending your own professional judgement and responsibility. Don’t get into the mindset of ‘It isn’t my fault, I was only doing what the research said…’.