Blog post
Learning From Experience
How can we be the best professionals possible without making all the mistakes personally? It鈥檚 true that we can learn from our own mistakes. We have to recognize them, have the chance to reflect on our actions and plan for 鈥榯he next time鈥, and change our behaviour based on that insight.
Of course, as we tell our students it鈥檚 often better to learn from someone 别濒蝉别鈥檚 mistakes.
As classroom science teachers, we learn a lot from screwing up ourselves. From not labelling the beakers or letting year 7 use powerpacks with 1A bulbs, to mixing up the two Rebeccas in your class during parents鈥 evening. We learn 鈥 perhaps especially early in our careers 鈥 from watching our colleagues, deliberately or in passing. It鈥檚 sad that for many established teachers, the only reason to watch another鈥檚 lesson is as part of the performance management process.
Science teachers in particular can find it hard to reconcile their experience of replicable laboratory research with studies into educational interventions. Perhaps what is needed is to put published educational research into the context of 鈥榚xperience with students鈥 that we鈥檙e used to relying on. You could argue that research, at its least abstract, is simply the sum of many classroom experiences.
In the conversation online, my colleague used the phrase 鈥減eople are not electrons,鈥 – which is true. But isn鈥檛 the whole point of science to use models which, while simpler than reality, give us an indication of how reality works? We can model people as particles making up a fluid when we design corridors and stairwells, and that gives us useful information. Nobody seriously suggests that those people travelling on the Underground are actually faceless, indistinguishable drones. But with enough data, and enough people, we can make good predictions about what will usually happen most of the time.
Teachers must feel supported in being both critical and receptive, which means sharing the caveats
We need to leave room for professional judgement, while sharing how the patterns in data might imply how one approach on average works better than another. The argument I had 鈥 in this case and others 鈥 wasn鈥檛 about the bad research that鈥檚 out there. It was about the very idea that educational research should or could guide our practice at all. Teachers must feel supported in being both critical and receptive, which means sharing the caveats.
As teachers of exam groups know, averages using large numbers aren鈥檛 specific to a small subset, even if homeogenous. We don鈥檛, and can鈥檛, know all of the confounding variables for our students; the kids are all different and there鈥檚 a fine line between describing and defining them. We tend to find and remember the results which confirm our expectations, and personal anecdotes feel more powerful than data.
But educational research, imperfect and incomplete as it is, must still be better than nothing. Teachers need to realize that while we can be critical about individual papers it isn鈥檛 sensible to ignore it all. Yes, we need to be able to ask good questions about the sample sizes, about the methodology, about sources of potential bias. But then we need to take on board the advice and try applying it to our own classes.
A difference between two interventions might be large or small. The bigger the numbers, the more we should pay attention to that difference as noise in the data becomes less likely. Ignoring the subtleties of different statistical thresholds, why would you ignore that hint when planning your own lessons? Any two classes might be compared without spotting this pattern. Only wider research, beyond what most classroom teachers can take part in, lets us see what鈥檚 going on. The difference might be so small or the cost 鈥 financially or in time 鈥 that we decide it doesn鈥檛 matter. But if we don鈥檛 ask, then we鈥檒l never know.
Research won鈥檛 often give a recipe. It won鈥檛 turn us into robots or allow our jobs to be done by computer. What it can do is inform and guide. It can suggest good starting points, or approaches that, more often than not, will be the best way to teach a concept. Often the evidence used to design effective classroom strategies is 鈥榖elow the surface鈥; teachers who claim never to use educational research to improve their practice just don鈥檛 realise the foundations.
It鈥檚 interesting that many choose to describe teaching as an art, rather than a science; I can see why. But I鈥檇 suggest that there鈥檚 a middle-ground. Is it better to think of teaching as a craft? It might be 鈥榠n person鈥 rather than strictly 鈥榟ands-on鈥, but that word hints more at the professional judgment and individual style involved than the common perception of a science. Crafts traditionally guarded their secrets from outsiders but shared them openly within the group or guild. The second part, at least, is a model we should aspire to. Let鈥檚 think of research as just a conversation within a larger staffroom, and maybe we can avoid making all the mistakes ourselves.