Research School Network: “Research is the starting point of the conversation, it doesn’t tell you what to do”

The last thing Sir Kevan Collins, chief executive of the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF), wants teachers to do is to log on to the organisations Teaching and Learning Toolkit and read it like a prescription: do this, then this, this number of times a day. ​“We are absolutely not looking to nail what works – there are no absolutes in this,” he explains. ​“It is always about trying to reduce your uncertainty, to get a bit more confidence about what you do.” For Sir Kevan, research is only useful when it is viewed in the context of a teacher’s own classroom and is part of a much broader body of knowledge. He expands upon this theme in this episode of Tes Podagogy, discussing whether research is useful to teachers and how it should be used. He also tackles criticisms of the EEF’s work, including the use of ​“months progress” as a measure of potential impact of an intervention, the reliance on RCTs and the lack of analysis of specific SEND interventions. Across all these themes, though, is an insistence that research is something that should empower teachers, not dictate to them. ​“It should be the starting point of a conversation,” he says, ​“not telling you what to do”

Tes – The education podcast