The Institute for Effective Education at the University of York, and the Center for Research and Reform in Education at Johns Hopkins University publish Best Evidence in Brief, a fortnightly e-newsletter of education research news. Note the About page offering further sources of information.
The following links I think help teachers find a way in to research. Clear summaries like those below are ideal for busy teachers.
Research in 100 Words from Chris Moyse who descibes this series as “Simple summaries for busy teachers”. Also from Chris, his favourite research articles in one collection.
George Stone (@DrStoneMaths) is producing one slide summaries of interesting educational research papers.
Teaching and Learning Toolkit from the Education Endowment Foundation; they describe the toolkit as “An accessible summary of educational research on teaching 5-16 year olds.
Note too the EEF Guidance Reports, described as ‘Clear and actionable guidance for teachers n a range of high-priority issues’.
What is Worth Reading for Teachers Interested in Research?
Professor Robert Coe’s list of sources of educational research for teachers. These are things that Professor Coe considers are worth reading. He states that they are all relevant to teaching and/or school leadership and present high-quality, sound research.
First on the list is the excellent and very readable What makes great teaching? Review of the underpinning research. Robert Coe, Cesare Aloisi, Steve Higgins and Lee Elliot Major. October 2014
The report lists six common components suggested by research that teachers should consider when assessing teaching quality. The authors state that “This should be seen as offering a ‘starter kit’ for thinking about effective pedagogy. Good quality teaching will likely involve a combination of these attributes manifested at different times; the very best teachers are those that demonstrate all of these features.”
Tom Sherrington has compiled summaries of educational research format into one place on his blog. See his “Teaching and Learning Research Summaries: A collection for easy access.”
Educational Research summaries – links to articles and other educational research, with brief summaries.
The Learning Scientists are on the Blogs – Learning & Teaching page but their work on Study Strategies belongs here too.
Really important – talk to your students about how to study not just what to study.
A subject I am fascinated by and feel is very important for students of all ages. I believe that Retrieval Practice for example really helps students. For some work I have done and my students’ view see Low Stakes Testing in the Mathematics Classroom.
For valuable resources to support the techniques described here see the excellent downloadable materials on study strategies. Note how each strategy is backed up by research.
Rosenshine’s ‘Principles of Instruction‘ provides a very valuable list of research strategies teachers should know about and I believe it is well worth asking ourselves if we are incorporating these strategies regularly into our lessons. This UNESCO pamphlet on the Principles offers further reading and for a very clear summary of these principles of instruction, see olicav.com, Oliver Caviglioli’s wonderful resources including poster summaries of educational ideas. Scroll through the Poster collection for Rosenshine’s Principles of Instruction – Tom Sherrington has turned the ten strategies into a more powerful poster, chunked into four stages of a lesson.
Craig Barton has an excellent selection of research papers he recommends for teachers. Craig has structured this really clearly as you can see from his Contents:
See also this post from Stephen Tierney on 5 Evidenced Based Papers All Teachers Should Read