Effective ITT / ITE
Teachers as researchers
Papers & recommended reading | Editorial reviews | Task for trainees
Focus
Student teachers should be encouraged to perceive education as a discipline
based on a bedrock of constant principles, but whose operation requires
continuous shifts in thinking and changes in strategy; the objectives and
intentions will need to mutate in order to achieve core aims based on human
values.
Part of achieving this aim will be to make explicit that school-based education has to be an evolving institution if it is to be credible, serve, and survive. It needs to be portrayed as an exciting, self-questioning area, capable of adaptation and organic reconstruction via intelligent processes enlightened by research, an important proportion of which is undertaken by serving teachers. ITT / ITE programmes might thus include opportunities to undertake action research, having been introduced to what it is, its ethics, principles and methods. By being involved in action research, student teachers' work might take initial steps to becoming effective agents of school improvement, and motivated to be retained, and progress, within the profession, particularly if involvement in action research-type activity during the PGCE accrues credits towards further post-PGCE Masters course study.
On the level of collegial interaction, the student teacher may be operating in a field of Continuing Professional Development (CPD) beyond the scope of the QTS (Q) standards.
Study of this topic has the potential to address aspects of all QTS standards, depending on the research focus:
| Professional attributes | |
| Relationships with children and young
people |
Q1, Q2 |
| Frameworks |
Q3 (a) (b) |
| Communicating
and working with others |
Q4, Q5, Q6 |
| Personal professional development | Q7, Q8, Q9 |
| Professional knowledge and understanding | |
| Teaching and learning |
Q10 |
| Assessment and monitoring | Q11, Q12, Q13 |
| Subjects and curriculum |
Q14, Q15 |
| Literacy, numeracy and ICT |
Q16, Q17 |
| Achievement
and diversity |
Q18, Q19, Q20 |
| Health and well-being | Q21 (a) (b) |
| Professional skills | |
| Planning | Q22, Q23, Q24 |
| Teaching | Q25 (a) (b) (c) (d) |
| Assessing, monitoring and giving feedback | Q26 (a) (b), Q27, Q28 |
| Reviewing teaching and learning | Q29 |
| Learning environment | Q30, Q31 |
| Team work and collaboration | Q32, Q33 |
Task for trainees
Group discussion
To what extent are you aware of the influence of significant research on
aspects of your everyday practice? You might start by discussing for example,
learning styles, target language, or assessment.
Observation focus
Identify and arrange to speak with any member(s) of staff who are involved
with action research projects within school, or via their pursuit of further
qualifications such as a Masters level degree. Ask her/him/them particularly
how the research positively impacts on their everyday life as a teacher.
Check your planning
Have you a current priority target towards which you would prefer to make
more rapid progress? It may be improving your feedback to pupils on their
homework, for example. Try to link the target to a 'bigger heading' , in
the case of the example 'Assessment for learning', and seek out and read
research articles related to the topic with a view to informing your practice.
