James Mannion

Lead Professional for Science, Varndean School, Brighton

PhD student, University of Cambridge

Director, Praxis Education CIC

@pedagog_machine

@praxisED

PRAXIS: Professional Development through Research Inquiry

1. Introduce myself

2. Introduce PRAXIS

3. Discuss / feedback / Q&A d

PRAXIS: Professional Development through Research Inquiry

#thisisme

• Science teacher of 10 y

• Teacher/researcher for the last 6 y

– MA in Person-centred Education • Self-esteem and ability grouping

• Philosophy for Children (P4C) in PSHE

– PhD • Learning to learn closing the gap @ KS3

Self-regulation / metacognition

Speaking and listening

Evidence-based pedagogy

Evidence-based curriculum design

Knowledge vs skills

Discourse analysis…

Res

earc

h Practice

McIntyre’s knowledge gap

Teachers’everyday practice

knowledge

McIntyre, D. (2005) Bridging the gap between research and practice. Cam J Ed 35(3), 357-382.

Codified research

knowledge

(Wilson, E. (2013). In School Based Research, E. Wilson (Ed), SAGE, p2-3)

…

In short:This is central to

The Problem of Professional Development

From Rivkin, Hanushek & Kain (2005)

How do the researchers measure impact?

• Ted Wragg – teachers make >1000 evaluative decisions on any given day.

• Many consequences across a range of student outcomes – overwhelming!

• Tempting to defer to ‘professional judgment’. And yet, a number of Q’s arise:

1. What are the consequences of these decisions on student outcomes? How can we even find out?

2. Is this even true? 1000+? What are all these decisions? (V. Lien)

3. How can we get better at making these decisions? (CPD in a nutshell)

4. How do we know if / when we’re getting better?

5. How can we know which aspects of our practice are most useful, and which might most usefully be jettisoned?

The Problem of Professional Development

#1: How do we bridge the gap between research and practice?

Ans: Practitioner-led research

#2: How can we get better at our jobs?

Ans: Practitioner-led research

#3: How can we work toward a system which optimizes educational outcomes for all young people, while being sensitive to context?

Ans: Practitioner-led research

This leads to a bold-sounding conclusion:

I believe that all teachers should engage in systematic research inquiry, as a fundamental tenet of their initial and continuing professional development.

To recap – 3 tricky questions:

To return to McIntyre’s Gap…

Teachers’ everyday practice

knowledge

Codified research

knowledge

To return to McIntyre’s Gap…

Teachers’ everyday practice

knowledge

Codified research

knowledge

Teacher-researchers

d“All teachers should engage in systematic research inquiry, as a fundamental

tenet of their initial and continuing professional development.”

Do you agree? If so – why? If not – why not?

Others are saying similar things…

Wiliam, D. (2014) Final slide from keynote presentation at researchED conference

• Practitioner-led research is not a new idea– Lots of good practice (variable, as might be expected – spectrum effect)

– Lots of people already on board with it

• However - many obstacles to system-wide implementation:– Current picture = patchwork, not network

– Good practice not commonly shared or widely available

– Many initiatives limited by £ or distance from HE provider fold / archives

– Access to paywalls (Vincent Lien’s petition - @fratribus)

– Accessibility of language used / format of journal articles

– Resistance among teachers – workload, endless change – latest fad?

– Research is almost always messy and complex – limitations of methods, impenetrable statistical analyses, plethora of cognitive biases, values, ideological battles between methodological purists, tendency toward abstraction…

Can we make it system-wide? If so, how?

• None of this is insurmountable!

• But first:

What do you notice about this language…?

• Practitioner-led research

• Disciplined inquiry

• Teachers as researchers

• Action research cycles

• School-based research

• Systematic inquiry

• Lesson study

• Coaching triads

Can we make it system-wide? If so, how?

d

PraxisAristotle (384 – 322 BC)

3 categories of human activity:

• Theoria (end goal is truth)

• Poiesis (end goal is production)

• Praxis (end goal is action/social change)

Hannah Arendt – The Human Condition (1958)

• Western philosophy has been too focused on the contemplative (vita contemplativa) and has neglected the active (vita activa).

• Arendt calls praxis ‘the highest and most important level of the active life’

Paulo Freire – Pedagogy of the oppressed (1970)

"One of the gravest obstacles to the achievement of liberation is that oppressive reality absorbs those within it and thereby acts to submerge men's consciousness. Functionally, oppression is domesticating. To no longer be prey to its force, one must emerge from it and turn upon it. This can be done only by means of the praxis: reflection and action upon the world in order to transform it.”

It’s not only language that’s the problem:

The 5-point cycle

“the praxis: reflection and action upon the world,

in order to transform it”

(Freire, 1970)

P Is Praxis - as a concept - a useful way of helping teachers understand / want to engage in research inquiry as CPD?

To simplify it even further…

• Professional development platform for teachers

– Current strapline: ‘Professional development through research inquiry‘

What does it do?

• Guides teachers through the process of carrying out a research inquiry (can upload existing also)

• There’s an inquiry planner

• The teacher/researcher hits publish

– Goes to their profile page (customisable)

– Published to a searchable database (choice of levels – e.g. school, alliance, public)

Ever-increasing database of tried and tested ideas – implemented, evaluated and written upby teachers, for teachers (and other school based practitioners )

Different levels – Bronze (~1K), Silver (~3K), Gold (~5K), Platinum (~10K) – Gold & Platinum can be submitted for M-level credits with localHE provider (long-term aim!)

What is the Praxis platform?

The PRAXIS inquiry planner

1. Title2. Context3. Research question(s) 4. Brief literature review

• Support – chat window *5. Avenue of inquiry

• Intervention / area of focus• Step by step method

6. Research methods7. Findings / analysis 8. Conclusions9. Evaluation

* not yet available

praxis-education.com

Example inquiry

• Had the idea around 18 months ago, gathered dust

• Was reminded of it through tweeting with Tom & Helene in Oct

• Blogged about it – huge response

– NFER, TDT/NTEN, HE providers (IoE – Chris Brown)

– A number of schools

• Primary + secondary

• UK based + international

• State schools + independent

– Lots of support on social media – Twitter, Blogs, Staffrm

• Last 6 months – set up Praxis Education CIC, developed pilot site

• Launched at researchED Camb in March

• So far 53 people have signed up - inquiries are yet to start rolling in (!)

• However these things take time, and “timing is everything” – exam season etc

• Need to ascertain whether there’s an appetite / demand for it, beyond general expressions of support

Praxis-The story so far…

Mid-term:

• Secure funding to build a proper site

• Need to demonstrate demand

Short-term:

• Seek peoples’ feedback

• Try to get people uploading inquiries

• Build a community – Staffrm style!

Few promising leads:

• researchED research leads?!

• TDT / NTEN network

• SUPER_network (Camb)

• Sussex research network

• Various academy chains, teaching alliances

• Australia(?!)

• Staffrm supertags for after May half-term: #summerinquiry, #500wordresearch

Next steps…

To recap: “Why do we need praxis-education.com?”

Problem

• How to bridge the research-practice gap?

• Professional development – how do we get better at our jobs? How do we know?

• Good practice not being shared –‘patchwork not network’ / geography

• £paywalls

• Academics overcomplicating the research process

• Workload

• Resistance to the ‘latest fad’

• Top-down accountability

Solution

The teacher/researcher

Small-scale practitioner-led research inquiry

Shared online platform

HE support – chat window

∞ - read, reflect, do, reflect

Schools do Praxis as CPD

Research = the ‘anti-fad’

Bottom-up counterpoint

dWhat do you think? Is this something that could be useful in your setting? What potential barriers, issues, pitfalls etc…?

PRAXIS: Professional Development through Research Inquiry

James Mannion

Lead Professional for Science, Varndean School, Brighton

PhD student, University of Cambridge

Director, Praxis Education CIC

@pedagog_machine

@praxisED