 Good evening. Very good to be with you. I dare say that this is not your normal activity at five past six on a Tuesday evening. The idea is to give you time to do some foundation thinking around your research and your dissertation. You'll spend quite a bit of time talking to each other because I'm not going to lecture you for an hour and a quarter. erwalk, lle ddatbienan o'r opwys iddyn nhw, oes o'r idea i'r cyf hertzio'r sgwlio roedd o'r選ffau ac yn oed yn ei ei wneud symud yma cael wybodaeth ei ddefnyddio, oherwydd mae'r dweud i gael y bydd y ddelch myndig yn cael fawr, mae'r ddweud i'r dyfynidau ar y ddelfyniad cyfranc. So'r ddewch bod pobl wedi'i gwneud bod oedd wedi'i gweinog ni'r ddefnyddio wedi'i cefnod, Right, let's begin to talk about this whole issue in very broad terms. On the handout that some of you have, and hopefully shortly you have a shortie, it starts off with a rather negative comment from Mick Waters, who I'm sure many of you have come across or heard is probably one of the most civilized writers on curriculum matters in children's learning that there is. And he makes the point there that by and large in this country we do not have a research culture in schools. It's unusual for English teachers to engage in research. Many of you, I daresay, are not engaging in your dissertations for the love of research. You're writing them because of the need to actually get your degrees. Is that correct ladies and gentlemen? No one's going to own up to that at this stage. But, for example, in Japan, about 70% of all the publications about research into effective pedagogy, research into young people's learning, by and large, 70% of that research in Japan is done by teachers. So there's a huge difference in culture between this country, culture like Finland obviously, the Netherlands and Japan. So, therefore, in many ways you are working in an area for which there's not always a great deal of understanding and support in school. And that, I think, really needs to be acknowledged and crucially, it makes working collaboratively supporting each other absolutely fundamental. And therefore, although this is a solitary activity in many senses, the more you network, the more you share, the more you actually use each other in order to support yourselves through the research, the better. I'm sure there are colleagues in school who do have experience, who can advise and support you. Although, as I say, the outcome is personal, the process should be social. And really do not hesitate to use my colleagues here to use each other as support in doing what for some of you may well be the biggest single piece of writing in your professional lives. You may never write as many words as this again. In fact, for some of you, you're determined never to write as many words as this again. But in fact, of course, this is a major element in your professional qualification, and therefore hopefully you can enjoy it as well as benefit from it in all sorts of ways. So the first issue is this can be a bit of a strange experience. The second issue is that actually looking at the notion of teachers' researching practice, whatever the topic it is that you're looking at, whether it's classroom practice, whether it's your workers' middle leaders, the whole issue of the strategy adopted by your school on certain issues, but actually this is very important stuff. And the more we have a research base which is done by yourselves in education as a country, the better off we're going to be. And therefore there really is a very powerful argument for saying that some of the most effective professional development you'll ever engage in is actually researching your own practice or that of your team or that of a group of colleagues. There are very few examples of professional development which really has the same level of impact as the research that you're about to embark on. So it can be enormously powerful. So let me then just begin to map out some of the key themes. If you like, here are some of the key words that I think are really worth thinking about at the start of your study, and this is not on the handout. I keep changing it just to keep myself interested, you know how it is. So the first issue I'll put to you is that your research is very much a matter of the relationship between theory and practice. And that a good piece of research, especially in the context of research which is school-based, has got a very strong awareness of an engagement with theory. You can't do this without some theory. That's the academic element which I'll go back to in a moment. It's really important that the theory, the underpinning, conceptual ideas really do influence and inform your analysis of what's going on in classrooms or across the school. But that's the practice. And in many ways a really strong piece of research, either or and where theory informs practice or practice informs theory. And I can't stress to you strongly enough that right the way through your study what you're looking at is essentially this interactive process between the ideas and the practice, between what we aspire to in school and what actually happens, between what we believe to be the entitlement of a young person to an education experience and the actual concrete experience that they have. So the interaction of theory and practice, I can't stress strongly enough, is a major element in your approach to your research. And we need to find it right the way through. It's not just now's my theory moment. It's about understanding and being aware of a significant level of conceptual structures that professionals need to engage with. The second major point by way of introduction I would make to you is that there are three key elements which are sort of in interaction here. The first is the professional, that your degree and the work that you do is very much rooted in your professional practice. And therefore it needs to grow out of your practice and experience. It needs to illuminate that practice. It needs to help you think critically about that practice. And the professional dimension is absolutely fundamental. And that is linked directly into the academic. That's the theory, that's the research that already exists. And you need to engage with that as well. You can't get a good master's dissertation if you simply focus on my practice, nor if you simply say, here is a list of all the books I've ever read. You need the interaction, the theory and practice out there. But the third element is this notion of scholarship. And if you are a diagram minded person and think of a simple Venn diagram, three circles overlapping on one side is the professional, on the other side is the academic, and linking those two is scholarship. And scholarship is about the care that you take with your research. Scholarship is about the clarity of your writing, the presentation of your ideas. Scholarship is about the rigor with which you explore other people's ideas. Scholarship is very much underpinning the basic notion of this is how we do high quality research. And that really is one of the most powerful factors in you enjoying your research, but also in making a difference, in making a contribution. Is that okay by way of start-up everybody? You've all been busy writing, hope the postcards are coming along nicely. And any thoughts or questions or is this too early in our relationship? Too early yet? Okay, fine. Right, so let's start a conversation between yourselves, even if you're not prepared to talk to me. And that is the bottom of page one of the handout. Okay, if I may move us on. So you will discuss with your supervisor and with your tutors the criteria by which your dissertation would eventually be assessed. But can I just raise with you at the bottom of page one there some of the significant factors that in varying degrees they won't all apply to all dissertations all the time. But I do think, for example, that your dissertation really does need to focus in on real issues. You know, it's got to be rooted in what your life as a professional. And therefore real significant aspects of your work in school. I would argue that if we're looking at, you know, you spending a significant amount of time and energy, then one of the key themes that ought to appear somehow somewhere is one of our key challenges as an education system, which is the notion of closing the gap. You know, that how do we get to the point where every young person is receiving a quality of education? That's really a challenge, isn't it? Yes, ma'am. I'm not quite sure where the gaps are. I would say there's a huge amount of literature with great respect in that area. Of course you've read Dion Hattie's work, yes. Hattie's work is all about to what extent do pedagogic strategies make an impact upon student achievement, yes. And his detailed analysis, the meta-analysis, points out that there is very strong statistical correlations between certain types of teaching strategy and certain levels of student achievement. Am I missing your point? Sorry if I haven't. All I would say is that Dion Hattie's work probably is that link for most purposes because, as you know, his study called Visible Learning, if you haven't come across it, is the most definitive and defining study of pedagogic practice there is. And please don't try this at home, everybody. What he did was to look at 500,000 pieces of research. You don't have to look at that many. Don't worry. And he did this synthesising process, or his team did. And eventually what they did was to produce a range of statistically very sophisticated models which point to levels of correlation between teaching strategy and learning outcome. So I do take your point. It's often very difficult to actually get a grip on where these things are. In that particular area, I think you'll find there's a huge amount. For example, there's also the work done by the University of Durham for the Sutton Trust on the pupil premium, which I'm sure many of you have come across. And what they do there is to actually apply a different criterion which is what about the, effectively, what's the cost-benefit analysis of certain types of teaching strategy and certain kinds of resource and so on. So I think, thank you for raising the point because I think it's a really helpful way of saying what we really need to be testing out what's available out there. We really need to be looking hard because chances are, with great respect, ladies and gentlemen, you're not going to produce a unique piece of work. People have been there before you. And one of the things that you need to do is to discover who's been there, what they've said, and how it illuminates and informs your own personal research. Is that okay? Can I move on? Thank you for raising that now. So issues around closing the gap. I mean, there are real issues, real challenges in terms of how do we ensure that every young person is learning effectively. And then improving educational outcomes for all pupils. And this ties in exactly with the point that we've just been making. There is a lot of research which points out that certain factors are more significant than others. And this is part of the scholarship. This is part of your confidence in really developing a real understanding of who's been in your area before you. It's got to be ethical. In other words, that you can't treat your students, your pupils, your colleagues, although you may be tempted with your colleagues, as guinea pigs. It's got to be a public process this. You cannot, by definition, carry out research on people with their informed consent. Otherwise it's just not morally acceptable. So there's a big issue for you in designing your research so it's appropriate, especially if you're going to involve children. There are real fundamental principles to be adhered to. Reliability and trustworthiness I'll come back to this, but basically we need to know that your research is valid and not just you sitting down at home and making it up. We need to have the confidence to think of a court of law, apart from the one going on in South Africa at the moment which is pretty scary, isn't it? But if you think of a court of law, the guilt or innocence of the accused person is largely determined by the integrity of the evidence. And it's really not a bad idea to explore the notion of to what extent is my evidence really going to be held up. Is it reliable? Is it trustworthy? It may be because of the professional dimension that one of the things you need to look at is will your research actually make a difference? And we hope it does. We hope it informs practice. We hope it raises questions and debates and issues and such, and such. It needs to be relevant to the work of you and your colleagues. And that's a significant factor. This is a contribution towards our understanding of how things can be improved in schools. And finally, as I've said, demonstrate scholarship and academic value. So those half dozen or so points there, I think, are the starting point for saying, however my research goes, I need to keep coming back to those areas. Have a look at those six, please, and with your neighbours for a couple of minutes. Which of those is more as taken for granted? Which of them might be challenging? Which of them is an issue? It might be concerned about as your research continues. So just have a few months, please, just reflecting on those six. I'm sorry, there is a seven on page two. Age 4. Age 5. Age 6. Age 7. Age 12. Age 13. Age 15. Age 16. Age 17. Age 18. Age 19. Age 20. Age 22. Age 23. Yn y gallwch i gyda'r gwaith yn y bydd y gallwn, rydyn ni wedi'i'n cael ei ddadu'r gwaith. Rydyn ni'n cael ei ddweud gan hynny, rydyn ni'n cael ei ddweud. Ac yn dweud, mae'n ddweud hynny'n gwneud i'r ddaeth yn iawn. Ond ydych chi'n dweud y ddweud. Yn y ddweud, mae'n ddweud y ceisio i ddim yn ei ddweud. ychydig? Mae'r ddiddordeb, mae'n gwybod, ychydig yw'r strategiaeth oherwydd y wneud y gallu'r bwysig o'ch gweithio'r gweithio? Mae hynny'n gofio. Mae'r ddiddorol, mae'r ddiddorol yn y cyd-rhyw o'r ysgrifennu yn gweithio. Mae'n gallu ei wneud chi'n siarad i'r ffwrdd a'i'r ddiddorol, mae'n gallu'n gallu ei wneud. That's very powerful. It may be that it is about a project that's ongoing in school and you're adding further ideas and information to the study. It may be that you're simply doing it as a way of extending your personal understanding. One of the worrying things, ladies and gentlemen, is that when you've completed your studies and your research and you've completed your dissertation, you will be an expert. That's really worrying, isn't it? Because nobody wants to be an expert these days. But you will have a significant and substantial body of knowledge which ought not to be lost simply because you've finished your dissertation. And so therefore how it's applied, how it's used, how it's understood and so are very important. So clarification, the function of this piece of research is to, and to be very clear about that, and then be very clear indeed about what the context of your study is. In other words, it needs to be very clearly indicated about the nature of the issues in your school, about the geographical context of your school. The study needs to be set in a framework which makes it understandable to somebody who does not know you or your school. And therefore you need to demonstrate very robustly that these are the significant variables that influence this particular piece of work. And according to what your study is, so for example the nature of the school's intake, so for example its off-stead status, so for example the turnover of staff, et cetera, et cetera, all of those are contextual variables, aren't they? Which can make a difference and you need to be robust and explicit about them in order to be sure that your research is absolutely clear as to how things work. Well most schools will have that nature available, won't they? Oh fine, I mean the same rules apply essentially which is that any kind of referencing needs about what is it, four or five bits of information. Number one, who wrote it, name? Number two, when was it written, date? Number three, what's it called, title? Number four, where was it published? And number five, who published it? So if it's an in-house document you just manipulate those in the same way that if you get the data online then you simply acknowledge where you've downloaded the data from. Is that okay? I mean basically school documentation is really important and all you need to be able to show is that you don't need to know who wrote this document but you need to say this is the X, Y, Z schools policy on. And then you're making it clear that you haven't made it up, it is a document that exists and that's the important thing in terms of credibility. Is that okay for everybody? Thank you for raising that. So the context needs to be very clear in order to inform how the reader will approach your study. And secondly you need to say why given the context of your school this study is worth doing. In other words what are, why have you chosen this particular topic given the context that you've described? And that is really important because then that allows you then to say I am engaging in this study because this is a significant factor that we have agreed as a team that this is something we need to investigate, et cetera, et cetera. So you need to tell the reader why you are doing this and where you are coming from and what the issues are as you perceive them. Yep. And then thirdly what's your focus? What's the topic? And a former colleague of mine said there are three things which are really fundamental in terms of a successful dissertation. And would you like the three? Great. Number one is focus. Number two is focus. It's got you there didn't I? Can anybody guess the third by any chance? Yeah absolutely. In other words it is not, you do not have the capacity to change the world. Let's make that quite clear. You've got to be fairly modest and you've got to recognise that in most cases your study benefits from depth rather than breadth. Far better to go into analysing specific classroom strategies than just have a study which is generic about the history of pedagogy. And so depth rather than breadth that's the focus, the focus, the focus, drill it down until it really gives you something substantial to work on. Because as I say this is for many a once in a lifetime opportunity to really understand something in great depth. And the integrity of your research is the depth that you actually achieve. And then as I say in the handout it's things like for example it may be closing the gap what really works with certain types of students. For example yesterday I was working with the staff and some of the students from a pupil referral unit. And one of the issues as you all know that really does impact upon student engagement, pupil engagement is this issue of intrinsic motivation. That the intrinsically motivated student is your dream. You love them more than anything else on the planet because they smile at you, they ask you for extra work and they really love you as well. And those intrinsically motivated students really are, they're the ones who achieve. If you have a student who isn't intrinsically motivated then securing their engagement is a major challenge, isn't it? To whilst my background is of secondary school teaching and I hadn't come across this sort of, I don't know what it is but it's basically the slob factor in young men. This sort of presence in the room that they are, it gets really irritated by it and saying how on earth do we get that young man really engaged in his learning? That's a fundamental challenge. That's something to do with this notion of intervention strategies. And certainly with one group of year 9s I was working with on the south coast recently, the school had asked me to go in and simply get from the year 9s exactly what it was they wanted in their life. And they just wouldn't engage with me. They just thought I was some kind of alien life form which is probably true. But the issue is that when I started saying to them, why is it that you find it difficult to spend five minutes on a piece of academic work and yet you'll spend two and a half hours on your computers playing games? That's when they came to life. And they really became very articulate about how the computer game really is engaging and interesting and challenging. And I suddenly realised that they just live in a different world to us. Now then that sort of research is really powerful because these are the students who are the most fragile in your schools aren't they? That might be a focus. It might be a focus on classroom practice. For example one of the things as again you know that comes through the work of John Hattie, the work of Carol Dweck, the work of the University of Durham team is that feedback in the classroom is just about the most powerful strategy available to us. If you get the quality of feedback right then you have got a magical proposition. But for some of our colleagues out there changing practice in order to use the models of feedback that research indicates would be really very very challenging. So maybe it's a study of teacher perceptions of changing their classroom practice focusing in on feedback, something like that. And then thirdly what about change? That in the next two or three years believe me the change is going to go on. And so what about leading change? What about your role in school? Are you somebody who is leading change? What are the strategies that really help in order to get this process of change going in school? How do you help somebody who's been in the classroom for 35 years really recognise that perhaps their practice is not appropriate anymore and help them change? How do you begin to face up to some of the issues that are coming through at the moment in terms of government policy? So focusing on issues like change, the leadership strategies, engagement with your colleagues, all of those are relevant too. And therefore, and again it's at the bottom of page three but I'll say it now and repeat it, whatever focus you adopt it's got to have legs. It's got to be sustainable and crucially A it's hopefully it's got to be interesting and B hopefully it's going to be useful. But one of the challenges is you're going to spend a lot of time on this so it needs to be something that ideally is both interesting and useful but at least it's one of those two. So where are you thinking at the moment? Perhaps you are going to choose another neighbour now and just outline where your thinking is in terms of the sorts of topic, the issues that you're already approaching with regard to your choice of area and the implications please of the sorts of things that may or may not be appropriate and possible in school. Because sometimes you might want to research something which is not going to go down to well with some of your colleagues. I'd like to come in and see your classroom practice please. Actually I'd rather you didn't go away. So there are real, there are micro-political issues about what you research and how you research it. So what are your first thoughts, where are you currently thinking about the sort of focus that you're going to adopt in your study please? That's more than that. Maybe I should go. So then I want to see and have a look at what's going on. I know many of you are going to be there, so we are actually making that the main thing that's going on. I know some of you are going to be there. So then is that the between your time? I think so. I think that's the main thing. You are not going to walk around the way you think when you are there. OK, if I may, sorry to break in again. So to be a bit simplistic and I apologise. Basically you don't do your dissertation on feedback. You don't even do your dissertation on feedback and teaching. You do your dissertation on one, two, three levels down. In terms of, for example, the issues in terms of teacher attitudes towards the current Dweck approach to feedback. Many teachers find her approach really worrying because they are saying we are working with fragile children and the notion of a high level of challenge of their work could be really profoundly negative. That's actually a misreading of what she is saying but their teacher perceptions may not be accurate and that's what you are investigating, that's what you are researching. So whatever topic you choose, really invest some time into saying is there another layer down? Is there another layer down? Because that really does give you the different perspective and really makes it useful and practical. OK, on that any comments, any thoughts? And one day you will have to make a commitment on this. You cannot actually write your dissertation on the problems of writing your dissertation. I don't know if we could have a piece like that, couldn't we? The ultra-reflective piece. My dissertation is an indication of the problems that are making my mind up. But you will need to make commitment because of the pressures of time and crucially not wasting time. So those are the main issues I think in terms of the broad themes. Now let's begin to look in more detail at how the dissertation might work. Point number five, opinion varies on this. I personally like it because I think it's worth saying that now I've chosen my specific focus, the broad theme and the particular issues, that I think it's a very good idea to say what are the key questions I need to answer in order to do a successful dissertation. And I think there's a generic question which eventually becomes your title. As you all know, you've all heard this. But the last thing you'll write with any piece of research is the title to make sure it's an accurate reflection of what you've actually done. But I think that your hypothetical, the notion of what is I'm going to investigate starts out with a number of questions. And therefore your broad area of investigation, that's the key, that's the driving research question. The main to that are potentially other research questions, for example, given what it is you want to investigate. What's the most appropriate methodological approach? What are the methods that you need to employ? How much literature do you need to engage with? What's the outcome? How should your dissertation be presented? All sorts of things like that whereby you use those questions and the chances are, as you go through your study, they will change. That's brilliant. But the issue is you are saying here are the starting key questions and how do they develop and evolve over time. But again, talk about that with your supervisor. Talk about it with your tutor because they will have their own take on that. The issue of point number six I think is one of the key ones in success. And as I said in the beginning, this is all about theory practice, theory practice. And therefore you need to have the rich body of conceptual understanding in order to inform your study. As I say with great respect, you will not be unique in your field. There will be a significant body of research and literature which really does inform your particular context. And one of the issues is that you need to demonstrate that you are familiar, not with it all. And here comes part of the challenge, but with those bits of the existing research and literature which are most relevant to your own study. And that means you're going to spend some time doing some searching. That means you've got to start, for example, one of the best ways is to take the obvious key text in an area and just look at that bibliography. And then go down and find more and more, do the online search in terms of the journals. But basically map out the key components in terms of theory of your chosen area of study. And the reason for doing that is for you to demonstrate that you are aware of the context in which your research is taking place. You've talked about the school context as a way of setting the theme. Now you're talking about, if you like, the intellectual, the scholarly context. And you need to be able to demonstrate that you are aware of and able to deploy as appropriate key messages from that research base. And again, it's very difficult. This is where you do some significant amount of online work. This is where you talk with your tutor and say, given my theme, then what are the issues that I really need to change? For example, if you decide to look at the whole issue of change, then anybody will tell you that the most significant writer on change in education is the Canadian Michael Fullen. He's the dominant thinker. And it's very difficult. He writes about a book a year and has done so for about 20 years. And therefore you can't just say, I'm going to look at Fullen. It's just too much. And therefore you begin to tease out which of his books are the most relevant. If you get stuck, then, for example, something to do, is to go on to the National College for Teacher and Learning website and just have a look what's been published on there, because there's a huge amount on there. And use it or lose it at the moment, ladies and gentlemen. It's very much a potential victim of government cuts. Have a look at the NFER website. What research have they done? Have a look at the Sutton Trust and the Educational Endowment Foundation websites. Huge amounts of research are going on all the time. And the notion is not to get frustrated or worried, but simply to begin to map out what looked to be interesting, significant, relevant themes and topics. That I cannot give you any sort of guidance on how much you should read. It depends upon your topic. So to use the recurring theme of the evening on the issue of feedback, there's an enormous amount of literature. On the issue of helping teachers change their classroom practice, there's a huge amount of literature, et cetera, et cetera. But there are some topics that you may identify, which are particularly esoteric, where there may be very limited literature. What you've got to do, and this is a key point right the way through your study, is to say, I'm choosing this area of literature because this is the area that's most relevant and most significant. And I know there's other titles out there, but I've chosen not to use them because. As long as you explain, as long as you justify, as long as you argue, then you are absolutely within your rights to say, whilst I accept that there's a major body of theory over there, I'm really not going to use it because it's too much in terms of it's not all relevant to my particular study. Is that okay? But you've really got to work on this one. And the point about the literature is not just to say, these are the books that I have engaged with, but rather, at the end of that particular section or chapter, however you organise it, I would say, for the rest of the study, I'm going to be using these key frameworks as the basis of my investigation. And I would say it comes down to something very simple, which is at the end of the section on the theory, on the literature, you develop your own criteria. For example, working with the second year's last night, we got into a fairly extended conversation about one of the strategies that really can make a difference in the classroom is co-coaching. Where you get pupils working collaboratively, coaching each other. Now, there was an immediate question last night about what's the difference between coaching and mentoring. And the answer, ladies and gentlemen, is wrapped up in great mystery and theology and there's no definitive answer to it. What you need to do is to say, for the purposes of this study, I am saying that mentoring means this and coaching means that. And here's the backup. Here's what so-and-so says, here's what so-and-so says. I disagree with so-and-so becox. And so, for example, there's a lot of the literature around sports coaching, which is really powerful and transferable in terms of engaging with motivation issues, engaging with personal resilience and so on. So if you're looking at co-coaching as a classroom strategy, you need to tell us, please, what you mean by coaching and what the difference is from mentoring and how that differs, again, perhaps from counselling. And really use your literature chapter to define your key concepts. That's the issue. So when I use the word, as Humpty Dumpty said, it means this. So you are very clear and very rigorous in your definitions. And when you worry about starting writing this chapter, what are the key words of my study and what do I understand them to mean? And crucially, not just me saying what they mean, but who else agrees with me and putting them in to support your case. That's the corroborative evidence that every court of law depends on. Is that fairly coherent, everybody? Yeah? A few nods around the room, that's good. And an occasional smile as well, which is even better. So, as I say, it's intimidating. Many of you have done this kind of thing before. You know how it works. It's hard work and the crucial thing, the absolute paramount thing. I will hold my hand up and say, I have done this on more occasions than I care to remember, is you find that brilliant quote absolutely captures the issue. And you put it down and you just are so excited by it, you forget to put down the page it was on. Yeah? No page, no reference. You can't say it's somewhere around page 100, I think. Not acceptable. So, therefore, really, really detailed and very careful management of your resources is absolutely fundamental. Set up a system from the outset and there are all sorts of software available which help you to manage your data. So, it means engaging with the text. So, it means following clues and traces to find the really significant pieces in your subject area. It means helping each other with ideas, sources. It means going to your tutors in order to get help. But, crucially, a substantial proportion, and I won't say how much in terms of actual percent, but a significant proportion of your study. And what will make it, in many of the senses, is the integrity of your literature review and the conclusions that you draw in terms of the criteria to inform your study. Have a look around, see if there's anybody who's still looking interesting. Have they got experience of this? What do you see as the major challenges given the topic that you're exploring? What does the literature look like? What's your current take, please, on this notion that this is going to be a substantial part of your study? How comfortable, confident are you? What are the challenges and worries about it, please? Have a few minutes to review. I was thinking about this one. He did a big thing on it. No, no, no, no. In a nice way. No, no, no. In a nice way. But the notion is you need to make a start, usually it's from a, perhaps a colleague in school, certainly from your tutor, but begin to set up your references early on because they are elusive and sometimes they'll take time to track down. And don't be intimidated by the journals. You need to engage with the journals, they are the major, the most significant and reliable source. But again there's a huge amount out there, so have your focus very clear when you start searching the journals. Okay? Right. The next step is the one that I suppose causes the greatest challenges of all. And that's essentially the methodological issues that your study needs to address. Now I want to be very clear that there are very, very real differences between methodological and methods. Basically the methodological approach, if you like, is the philosophy of the knowledge that you're creating. What sort of knowledge is it? So for example back to the Court of Law, although it's a myth, by and large DNA is taken as being almost completely reliable and authoritative. And in most countries now DNA is the determining factor. Was this person present at the scene? Yes, we've got a speck of blood and sometimes it's a minute speck of blood which confirms that that person's unique DNA can only have been there because he was there. And then you go right the way across to circumstantial evidence and by and large courts are very cautious about circumstantial evidence, aren't they? But nevertheless, with corroboration they can be powerful reinforcing factors. Now the methodological issue, the epistemology is what you're getting into here, is basically to say I recognize there are different types of knowledge. The learning that you get for example from reading a novel is different to the learning you get from reading a maths text. The different types of knowledge and you need to be very clear, ladies and gentlemen, exactly what type of knowledge you are generating in the context of your study. And I've just listed a few that you're all familiar with. But for example, this issue of randomized trials, the chances are that the medicines that you are currently taking or have taken or will be taking, virtually every medicine that's prescribed in this country and most of the countries now is the result of rigorous randomized trials. Where the statistics, where the sampling is absolutely rigorous and precise. Now in education we've never really used randomized trials because there's a moral issue. But actually the work of one leading medical researcher called Ben Goldaker, which you may have come across him because he became a pinup on some of the quiz shows on television. But he's a bit like, he's the mathematical Brian Cox if you like. And basically Goldaker did a paper for the department which was published last year arguing for greater use of randomized trials. In other words, how do we know this is true? Well the answer is because we've tested it. And so one piece where we do have an example of a randomized trial was looking at the whole issue of what really makes a difference with children's literacy in the early years. And one of the arguments, and many of you will remember this, is that absolute consistency of a certain type of approach called the literacy hour was probably the best way to secure children's literacy. Yes, and the whole country went into paroxysms over it and everybody was saying, oh it's 10 past two, better change. And when the notion of introducing free school meals for every five to seven year old was introduced, they did a randomized trial looking at the impact of a free school meal with the impact of the literacy hour on children's literacy. And guess what? The free school meal has a greater impact upon children's achievement than the literacy hour ever did. You could have told them that, couldn't you? But you see, we now have fairly robust evidence. And if you're interested in this, if you go on to the Deputy Prime Minister's website, there is a report around this notion of free meals for all children aged five to seven. But the thing is, the technique that was adopted was to be rigorously comparative based on hard data rather than, as happened with literacy hour, these seem to be good ideas. It's a different approach. It's a different mindset. It's a different type of science. Now I doubt personally whether many of you will have the facilities, the resources, the time and the energy to carry out this type of research. But nevertheless, the high level, the experimental, if you like, aspect of research has a place perhaps. Most of you will be familiar with the quantitative approaches using statistics and focusing in on empirical evidence. That's the area of high confidence. But can I please make the point because I've done a lot of examining of PhDs and I've only ever failed one completely. And that was devastating for everybody involved. And that was because this huge amount of work, which was allegedly statistically based, was in fact not statistics at all, it was simple arithmetic. And therefore it was totally untrustworthy because all of the strategies that are used in statistical analysis, this person simply didn't know anything about. And therefore they were finding averages and saying, if I divide the total number of people in the pilot by the average number, I'll get a score. It's rubbish and the person wouldn't accept it and so we eventually failed it. But the quantitative, the use of the numerical has a place. Can you manage it? Are you comfortable and confident in your statistical methodology? Have you got a friend who can do it for you, even better? But the notion is that that is appropriate to certain types of research. The quantitative, the more subjective approaches are also very, very significant and valid. And I guess of all the master's dissertations that have been done over the past 30 years or so, a huge proportion are using interviews and questionnaires and so on. Quite rigorous, very disciplined, but nevertheless not in the same way as the quantitative approaches. And just in passing, just a word about the use of interviews and questionnaires and so on. At the moment I'm talking at 80 words, sorry, I'm talking at 80 words a minute. That's the average speed for somebody working like this. So if you sit me down and ask me a series of questions and I talk like this, which is probably my comfortable talking being, in half an hour, how many words are you going to get? Statisticians, that's one for you. The answer is a lot. Can you manage that number of words? In half an hour I will speak as many words as are in a third of many novels. Have you got the ability to handle it? The qualitative data is magical, but you've really got to be clear about it. One of the most powerful areas of all is action research. And there's a very long and very distinguished history of action research in education. And it's a major, major area. It does often usually involve collaborative working. That's no problem. You can work out how your particular contribution can be recorded. But action research or, as I'm sure some of you are familiar, increasingly talking about the notion of joint practice development. Whereby teachers are working collaboratively to improve. That can feed into your dissertation and have a significant impact on practice. The ethnographic studies, really the work done by social anthropologists and so on, really getting under the skin of how does this team work? What do they think? What do they believe? And crucially asking them to explain and getting their stories. And then the personal narrative and feminist research has done a huge amount here. To say, actually the personal voice has integrity. Just because it's not quantitative, just because it's not on the basis of a questionnaire. It doesn't mean that somebody saying, this is how I feel about my life as a teacher, hasn't got significant integrity and we can use it. But you need to recognize it has issues. So you have those broad method of the logical structures and you really need to get your head round what sort of approach does my type of research really involve. In other words, that you should not just be picking them at random off the shelf, that what you've identified as the key focus of your study will probably point in the direction of a particular methodological stance. And then you can go in and pick up on the methods. Begafodd. In my view, life is too short. If you think that you... I can't remember the sum for 30 times 80, but it's... Is it two and a half thousand? It's a huge number of words. No, it's 24,000, isn't it? 24,000. Sorry, it's tired. But if you have, say, 10 half hour interviews, you've got a quarter of a million words. You don't want them. The paperwork can be like that. What you do is you have them, you keep them, but you actually identify what bits you're going to take from them. But you must be very punctilious indeed that an external examiner might well ask to see how you've actually analyzed the data that you have. Whenever you generate data, my view is that you don't need to put it in, particularly in the master's dissertation, but you do need to make it available and say, this is how I've managed my data. But you see, 10 interviews, half an hour each, quarter of a million words, it's just overwhelming. Yeah? And don't even think about transcribing them. Yeah? Because it's huge. But sometimes, shorter interviews, you can. And that's brilliant. Yes, ma'am. I was just thinking that in my view. Yes, in my view. I think so. I mean, it's a different type of evidence, isn't it? In the same place, you're saying it's what you keep there. Yeah. Oh, yeah. It's actually a very, very powerful body of research methodologies around the use of images like video clips and so on. And the analysis of those clips and so on. Again, there's a strong literature on that because again, it's so difficult to say, is that person looking bored? No, he's relaxed. But when people see me when my face is not animated by talking, you say he looks really miserable. Well, that's actually true. But nevertheless, I mean, subjectivity really is an issue with that, isn't it? So what's actually going on in this classroom? It looks like a riot. No, the class are re-enacting the battle face things. It's actually very purposeful learning. Except for poor Harold, of course. Yeah, bad deal. So you need to recognise that the issues around the methodological stance you take and the methods that you choose are very much in harmony. And crucially, that the issues that you've generated through your literature review appear right the way through your argument saying, I'm using this methodological stance because of this. And OK on that, everybody? I'm just conscious of your time. The ethical issues, first and foremost, to summarise it, it's about informed consent. You do not research people as you would laboratory animals. One university I worked in, the ethics form, started with the question, does this research involve experimentation on animals? And somebody wrote underneath, no, just children. It's a real issue for us. And you need to observe all the protocols which this university has very clear guidelines. And you need to refer to those in your study and saying, I am aware of and I have adopted and implied. Certainly informed consent, where appropriate confidentiality, and that again is something that really needs to be embedded in the way in which you are saying, this piece of research is safe, it has integrity. Number 10 is really going back to where I started. Valid, reliable, trustworthy. In other words, if I read your research, am I safe in making judgments about the topics that you've been discussing and describing? Because it really is fundamental. And therefore, just as the defence and prosecution barristers are saying eventually to the jury, believe my evidence because, and the judge is summing up a court case, you know the judge will say, the defence's argument that is not reliable. Whereas the prosecution's case here, that evidence has got validity. That's the sort of issue that needs to be faced. Is your work safe? Is it reliable? Crucially, could it be used by another researcher with confidence? And that I think is really, really important. And probably one of the key factors that determines how successful your study is, is the extent to which it really does deliver. Okay, and then finally, presentation. And again, I think that's all fairly clear cut. It is important that it looks good. It really is. There's at least one typographical error on these three pages, but I'm sure you all spotted and corrected. And thank you for doing that. It's one of the most depressing things in life that you publish a piece of work in a journal, you have a book come out, and you open it to a page X, and there is you immediately spot a typo, and it's been through so many iterations that manuscript. Before it gets printed and still, there's usually one. Now, I reassure myself that in the book of 75,000 words, if there's one spelling mistake in percentage terms, that's not bad. But nevertheless, it shouldn't be there. So, scrupulousness in the way that you present, in the clarity that you present, and crucially gets somebody to proofread it for you. It's amazing how blind we become. Even with modern computers and all the help that they offer and so on, your mistakes still get through. And it's about courtesy to the reader, but it's also about scholarship. This looks good. It sends out a positive message. And finally, and I think really importantly, that you need, in my view, to actually have a commentary going on about how you have learnt through this process. For example, if you decided to use questionnaires with a group of colleagues, and shall we say that replies you got back were less than helpful? Then, I would expect to say, I realised that some of the questions were ambiguous, some of the questions actually touched on sensitive issues. Therefore, I scrapped the first round of questionnaires and reworked them and trialled them properly and used the revised version. That's brilliant. That shows you're actively involved in critiquing your own work. And you're actually being very clear about that this is all a matter of judgement. But also, this research has changed my practice. This research has challenged the orthodoxies. Working with my colleagues in the team, we have, on the basis of this research, agreed to explore something that's wonderful to know. And that really does go right the way back where I started, theory practice all the way through. So, there are hopefully, it's just a very fast, very rudimentary overview. Just to take a couple of minutes, please. Are there any issues which I've not covered, which you want a response to, which I'm sure there are many. Are there any challenges, comments, questions and so on? So that you can start the process now with a fair degree of confidence. So just a couple of minutes with your neighbour, please. And then we'll draw to a close. OK, if I may. Last time. Any thoughts? Any observations? Any comments? Any questions? Maybe like a paper that we might have read about, let's say, change management by full-on or something. But kind of more of the whole process of all. And I don't think I had really anticipated that before. That's helpful. Thank you. I mean, there are many, many different modes that this comes out as. And that's one of the issues that, as you get engaged with your studies, so you find that some of you will be writing very narrative-based work. It'll be far more focused and detailed and more rigorous in the sense of the evidence base and so on. And it's all valid because there's this huge spectrum. And we're not prescribing where you should be on that spectrum, but the notion is that essentially the logic, the internal logic of your study is clear that because I'm studying this, I'm reading that, I'm using this research methodology, and therefore I'm producing these conclusions. And this is how it reads now. It's a good idea to have a look at dissertations just to get a sense of how they are, although you need to be careful that you don't frighten yourself. And you also need to say, I mean, chances are if they're in the library, they've passed. And therefore you need to be able to read them and say, now I've got this model, what's my own model look like? Yeah, thank you for that. It's one other thing if I may, and I know you say this to your own pupils and students all the time, manage the process. It will not write itself. You need to say that in all, for example, some of you are fluent and confident writers, for some of you writing is not your first natural engagement and activity, and you may need to take time over it, plan it and crucially remember it's later than you think. And therefore you need to get this process under control. OK, and I wish you well, and I'll see you next year when we talk about how to wrap all this up. Thank you all.