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In the debate regarding what constitutes teachers' work, academics and bureaucrats continue to speak for teachers, with teachers' voices rarely heard and not accorded equal recognition. The Role of Research in Teachers' Work addresses this imbalance by privileging teachers' voices as they narrate their experiences of engaging in systematic inquiry. The book embeds the teacher narratives within the scholarly debates about the nature of knowledge and the nature of professional practice.
Scanlon examines the knowledge teachers create through their research and how that knowledge is perceived by others within the school community. This book can be read as a companion volume to Scanlon's 2015 Routledge publication My School, or as a standalone exploration of teachers' own narratives of engaging in action research. Together, these two books are unique in contemporary writing on schools, representing one of the only comprehensive longitudinal studies of a low socioeconomic secondary school from the perspective of those who learn and teach therein.
This book enables teachers to be part of the scholarly conversation about their work and the place of research in that work. As such, it should be essential reading for academics, teacher educators and postgraduates in the field of education. It should also be of interest to policymakers and teachers.
List of contents
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Introduction: Why this book, now?
Chapter 1 The nature of educational knowledge
Chapter 2 The nature of teachers¿ work
Chapter 3 Answering the action research `call to adventure¿
Chapter 4 Preparing for the research journey
Chapter 5 Conducting the research
Chapter 6 Sharing the research findings
Chapter 7 From action research to whole school initiative: a case study
Chapter 8 Impact and implications of the research
About the author
Lesley Scanlon is an Honorary Senior Lecturer in the School of Education and Social Work at the University of Sydney, Australia.
Summary
The Role of Research in Teachers’ Work privileges teachers’ voices and explores what teachers themselves say about systematic research, the process of becoming researchers and the establishment of collaborative relationships with their teacher research partner.
