Practitioner Enquiry Tip of the Week: connected to practice. Practitioner enquiry is an approach targeting professional learning and therefore making connections into practice and the needs of learners is essential and a defining characteristic/1🧵
#PractitionerEnquiryTotW
And just like all good practitioner enquiry leaders should try to do, I am going to practice what I preach. I am leaving my list of things to do behind. Practitioner enquiry can wait; holidays cannot.
#PractitionerEnquiryTotW will be back on the 22nd April. Enjoy your time off./4
So this holiday avoid the temptation to do your enquiry while away from the classroom. It's really not helpful for you, the people around you, or your enquiry process. Holidays are for holidaying. If you can't give yourself permission then blame this lack of connection./4
If you are trying to do enquiry while away from the classroom, it is quite possible that you're doing more harm than good, as these connections and immediacy bring inspiration, relevance, and warrant for targeted action to your enquiry. If you're not there, this is super hard. /3
Close connections with tight feedback loops between children's learning, practice and professional understanding give practitioner enquiry its usefulness, novelty and insight. Teachers researching in their classrooms is its strength, if you're not there it doesn't work the same/2
Practitioner Enquiry Tip of the Week: connected to practice. Practitioner enquiry is an approach targeting professional learning and therefore making connections into practice and the needs of learners is essential and a defining characteristic/1🧵
#PractitionerEnquiryTotW
Practitoner Enquiry Tip of the Week: Dolly's rule. Many people who have listened to me speak have taken away the key message that practitioner enquiry needs to happen in the 9-5, but how flexible is this to teachers' busy lives and working schedules? /1🧵
#PractitionerEnquiryTotW
Dolly's rule is core. The commitment to 9-5, to practice, learners and connectedness, does not make it less of a research approach. It is just what research needs to look like when embedded in prof learning for busy professionals. Its a principle that I will continue to uphold/6
However, I will not hold it against you if you need to do activity out of the 9-5. If your week is full and this is the only way to get stuff done then away you go. We all need a bit of fexibility in our lives. However, it is not the expectation, that is not our starting point/5
Dolly's rule therefore is about reinforcing these core messages:
- it answers useful questions
- it connects to learner outcomes
- it uses evidence bound to teaching and learning
- it helps teachers understand their practice
- it helps teachers share practice
/4
Practitioner enquiry enthusiasts might do more (because its useful and well connected), but it can't be starting point. I keep in mind the teacher struggling with a class of characters in a newly promoted post, going home to 3 children under 7, how do they fit it in?/3
The main point of Dolly's rule is that any prof learning model predicated on work outside of the 9-5 is not sustainable. All teachers in Scotland are required to do practitioner enquiry to meet the standards and prof update (which is a good thing), but this can't be extra /2
Practitoner Enquiry Tip of the Week: Dolly's rule. Many people who have listened to me speak have taken away the key message that practitioner enquiry needs to happen in the 9-5, but how flexible is this to teachers' busy lives and working schedules? /1🧵
#PractitionerEnquiryTotW
Practitioner Enquiry Tip of the Week: Is practitioner enquiry research? A question from the inaugral workshop for our CfTE Research Hub on Monday. The simple answer is a resounding yes. But this week I will explore why some might suggest its not/1🧵
#PractitionerEnquiryTotW
Education is stronger for having all types of research in its repertoire. Different approaches bring own unique perspective and insight to understanding the complex and dynamic world of schools and learning. Practitioner enquiry is not less, its just another part of the jigsaw/8
One type of research is not inherently better than another. Judging another approach through a set of criteria meant for something other leads to misunderstandings. Practitioner enquiry is research, you can do a doctorate in it and I have made it my career. It is just different/7
We need the experiemental method and meta-analyses of the EEF and John Hattie, they generate insight into 'best bets', but we also need the close to practice enquiries of teachers exploring the rich detail of those best bets when used with S1 on a Monday morning in Clydebank/6
To do practitioner enquiry based research is for the individual to learn through research. It is not to generalise. It is to accept the complexities and real life of the classroom and the people within it. It is to see the teachers' insight as benefit rather than bias /5
But practitioner enquiry is regularly being judged through a research lens which was never appropriate for this type of research approach (or many others of this type). The intent of practitioner enquiry is prof learning, for teachers to understand their practice a bit more/4
The positioning of the teacher-researcher embedded in the research site leads to accusations of bias. The tight focus completed at small scale with targeted populations means that generalisation is problematic (esp. when using a statistical understanding of the term). All true/3
There are a number of issues at play in this question and I understand where it is coming from. Our education research landscape is dominated by messaging about scientific method and the real life contextually nuanced practitioner enquiry does not fit into that mold/2
Practitioner Enquiry Tip of the Week: Is practitioner enquiry research? A question from the inaugral workshop for our CfTE Research Hub on Monday. The simple answer is a resounding yes. But this week I will explore why some might suggest its not/1🧵
#PractitionerEnquiryTotW
There is still time to sign up for this FREE online workshop on Monday. Just follow the QR code in the image below.
Also watch this space for future events - a webinar with Deirdre Grogran (25th March) and a f2f workshop exploring leadership for practitioner enquiry with me (30th March).
There is still time to sign up for this FREE online workshop on Monday. Just follow the QR code in the image below.
Also watch this space for future events - a webinar with Deirdre Grogran (25th March) and a f2f workshop exploring leadership for practitioner enquiry with me (30th March).
Practitioner Enquiry Tip of the Week: Does size matter? When I'm supporting teachers doing enquiry an unseen force often seems to push them to think quality comes from large sample sizes meaning they make decisions they might otherwise have avoided/1🧵
#PractitionerEnquiryTotW
Congratulations Paul and all the authors. Already shared with @uogcfte.bsky.social Teacher Associates and @katewall.bsky.social as we launch new CfTE Hub focusing on innovative pedagogies.
Don't be pushed by your own assumptions (or someone else's) in regard what is good quality research. Sample size is a minimum requirement for quality, rather focus on developing a line of enquiry from question to population to evidence to synthesis. You're decisions matter/8
So, keep aware of balance:
Bigger samples = simplified data sets (numbers)
Smaller samples = detail and rich evidence (words and pictures)
Make your choice based on what you want to know, what kinds of evidence you like, pragmatics of your context and who is in population. /7
Going large when you're interested in detail and complexity pushes enquirers to overstretch and overcommit, both in regards workload and scope of their enquiry. It's easy to become overwhelmed by a large data set of complex, rich evidence (e.g. drawings, work samples, video)/6
Good quality case studies of 1 or a small group of individuals exist, although again the sample size is not what brings quality to the case study approach. Quality in the end comes from the match between method (and sample size) and the enquiry question, so be open to options/5