What barriers do teachers face when it comes to educational research and how can they overcome these?

BY Scott Buckler, PhD, CPsych, CTeach

The mythical nature of research

“I’m only a teacher. What impact can I have on education?” is perhaps one of the greatest barriers facing the teacher researcher. Placing research on such an elevated pedestal can unnecessarily create a mythological boundary to engagement. However, consider your time as a student, the reading you negotiated, the complex nuances and debates you negotiated, the use of data within your current role, your careful questioning of students and staff to obtain necessary information. To this extent, have you not already engaged with a high degree of research?

Admittedly, not every journal is easy to understand, neither are all research terms easy to grapple with: such as understanding epistemology, or how the Mahalanobis distance is used. Additionally, some journal articles have a team of authors from a range of academic institutions, furthermore the nature and scope of the research appears all encompassing. Such aspects may appear to further the myth that research can only be conducted by a select few.

Having worked with the full range of students from undergraduate to PhD candidates, along with guiding colleagues in schools and universities, there are a common series of barriers that are frequently cited. These will be explored in turn, along with how to negate them in this post and the subsequent post.

“I don’t have the time.”

Statements such as this, or statements such as ‘I put students first, so I have no time for research’, are frequently cited. What this means is that the individual making such statements is finding excuses to avoid engaging in research and developing professionally. As similarly discussed in the first blog post of this series, engaging in prolonged continuing professional development, as characterised through engagement with research, has a greater effect on learning than any other aspect.

So where does the time come from? There will need to be a sacrifice, or should I say, a re-prioritising of tasks, yet spending fifteen minutes a day on research can develop momentum over time. In fifteen minutes, numerous tasks could be completed such as identifying search terms for a literature review, reading a journal article pertinent to your research, writing 250 words, developing an online questionnaire, and so forth. Indeed, this ’15 minute’ rule has been discussed by authors such as Bolker (1998).

The time may also come from working smarter, not harder, by grouping tasks, cutting down on procrastination, setting the alarm earlier, or not binge-watching the latest TV series. Yet with small measures, a quality piece of research can be conducted in a relatively short period of time.

“I don’t know what to research.”

How often have I heard this over the years? Frequently. This has led me to develop a planning tool to help narrow down a potential area to research known as the ‘forest analogy’.

Often a researcher will have a vague area they would like to focus on, such as inclusive education, behaviour, or something subject related. However, this can be as far as the researcher gets.

The forest analogy consists of visualising a number of forests known to the researcher. Each forest is a general area of education such as inclusion, behaviour, play, and so forth. From this, the researcher is asked what forest they would like to explore. As with any forest, there are thousands of trees, each relating to a sub-theme that could be researched.  This continues to focus on one tree, identifying the numerous branches as further sub-themes, prior to identifying the individual leaves. Often, I will crudely draw diagrams to help this process such as a map with forests, and sketches of trees, branches and leaves.

In the following example, several areas are suggested for each part of the analogy, with those in bold being the ones selected to help refine a focus:

·       Potential Forests: outdoor play, constructive play, role play, parallel play, fantasy play, etc.

·       Potential Trees: trying new activities, engaging with others, exploration, cooperation, improved motor skills, risk taking, etc.

·       Potential Branches: cooperation with friends, cooperation with others, cooperation with adults, frequency of cooperation, etc.

·       Potential Leaves: problem solving, creating a representation, etc.

The focus could therefore be written as, ‘The frequency of cooperation on problem solving in the outdoor environment’. This could be narrowed further, for example exploring the frequency of cooperation with the indoor versus the outdoor environment, or a specific year group, and so forth. No doubt you can apply a similar use of the forest analogy for your research.

 Conclusion

The main points to take from this are:

1)      Find small periods of time that you can protect to gain research momentum. Just fifteen minutes a few times a week is all that is needed.

2)      Focus on what you want to research.

3)      Refine your research focus through using the forest analogy.

The next post will extend the discussion of the barriers further.

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