These notes began life as a ramble about what I was trying to do in my putative enquiry about homework. In the writing it has changed into a wider-ranging piece (still a ramble) that tries to discover in what theoretical field I might camp. This territory is very unfamiliar...

What is action research?

It looks very much as if I will need to adopt an 'action research' methodology for my inquiry. So what does one of those look like?

Jean McNiff describes it with candour and clarity. Her freely available short booklet offering advice to would-be action researchers is concise and clear. Read it and you can't fail to understand what 'action research' is. Whether you'll like it or not is another matter...

Not a science...

Action researchers place their activity firmly outside the positivist tradition. There are some alarming statements contained within the article for anyone with a normative understanding of inquiry, e.g.

• 'Action research is an enquiry... into the self.'
• '...it could be that there are no answers to your particular issue...'
• 'The word 'prove' does not exist in action research.'

This approach is not recognisably research in the traditional, academic sense of the word. To be fair, action researchers don't pretend to be doing science, though it's proselytes do claim to share certain scientific concepts such as empiricism and the need for critical appraisal by a scholarly community. Nevertheless, it's easy to see why proponents might be tempted to write self-indulgent accounts of limited general interest.

...more a mission

Action research, as described by McNiff, is no less than a way of life. 'We are not aiming for 'end products,'' she zealously proclaims, '...(but) right ways of living.' It is not a call to understand things but to improve them. To undertake action research is a commitment, an engagement, a liberation. To join the ranks of the elect - or not - is an individual's choice. A portentous choice, it seems. (Does the TTA know it's funding people to change the world?)

Action research in action

The corpus of work generated by action researchers can stand as a knowledge base for the teaching profession, McNiff claims in a recent address. Does it look like it could do that?

I'm not well acquainted with the research literature but, for what it's worth, I'll record my reactions to the undertaking as I understand it, and the few examples that I have read so far. My (accidental) choices may be shockingly unrepresentative and, until better informed, I cannot possibly judge the quality of what I have read in comparison with other instances of the same genre. In addition I am reacting to a field that is new to me. As already indicated this territory is very strange, especially to someone trained as a physical scientist, even one with a passing interest in ontology. As a result, what follows cannot claim to be more than ill-informed first impressions. Probably no more than a rehearsal of prejudice in fact.

Clarity

I have found myself unsure of the point of the pieces I have read. In contrast to McNiff's admirably clear description of the activity of action researchers the fruits of their labour seem impenetrable. Listening this morning to the lyrics of a Travis song I couldn't prevent a wry smile crossing my lips when I heard again the opening words: 'I read it all, every word, and I still don't understand a thing.' Which superfluous remembrance leads seamlessly to my next point...

Brevity

To my taste action research writing is sometimes desperately long-winded. Raising the status of anecdotal observation and personal narrative to that of research evidence is manifestly a licence to admit material of dubious relevance. It takes me most of my life to have my own life. When I read someone else's research I want to know what they've found, not their life history.

Expert knowledge

This lack of brevity stems from a laudable desire to concede that everybody possesses expertise (we are all incontestably the world expert at being ourself, after all). But the notion that all people have a legitimate a priori claim to embodied knowledge is a truism (it means they're alive). That all people can engage equally in a process that occurs at least partly within the Academy is not an obvious corollary. Once embodied knowledge becomes the stuff of discourse it is transformed. Not everyone is equally fitted to handle this transformed stuff: specific skills and knowledge are surely necessary.

Applicability

The specificity of much action research limits its interest. Where researchers focus inexorably on their personal situation, almost without thought of broader issues, there seems little chance that anyone outside that setting can gain from the findings. This might well be self-contemplation, idle to everyone but the researcher. That's not to declare the process fruitless, but it might render it unworthy of the appellation 'research'. The distinction between average everyday problem solving plus reflection (which everyone does) and research (done only by researchers) may be very hard to draw.

Empiricism

The shortcomings of a very narrow research focus are sometimes fudged by talk of case studies, the implication being that somehow the situation that is described is representative of many more similar situations that are not. Of course, without empirical evidence this extrapolation is entirely unfounded. 'Case study' might be a euphemism for 'inadequate evidence'.

Validity

I am unnerved by the claim that researchers negotiate the criteria by which their work is judged. I struggle with the question of how a piece of research might be agreed to be successful. I accept that the success criteria employed in many settings are likely to be assumed or hidden and it is as well to make these things explicit; even in the physical sciences this is probably the case if you think about it for long enough. However, where causality is claimed it is usually possible to judge when evidence is strong or weak. Yet if researchers are free to make up their own criteria it would seem to make every inquiry successful by definition.('It could be that there are no answers to your particular issue, but the process of asking questions is as important as finding answers.' Aaagh! Sometimes you just want answers.)

The fact that action research findings are public is essential to its adherents' claim to be generating new knowledge. Justly or not I harbour a nagging fear that practitioners might be so willing to legitimise others' claims to knowledge that the rigour of this critical community is diminished to the point where it can hardly be said to be critical at all. Fluffy perhaps? How insights generated by this process are subject to criticism is unclear to me and how they can be ruled inadmissible is a mystery. If there is no way to declare them invalid then conversely how can they be held to be valid? Or does this smack of a prehistoric throwback to a normative true/false dichotomy?

Any alternative?

So... I am not entirely uncritical of the action research approach.

There exist numerous other options for a theoretical field in which to locate an educational inquiry. However, not feeling convinced by an action research approach doesn't automatically make an experimental alternative the obvious choice.

Scientific approaches

My training allows me to claim an understanding of the methods employed by natural scientists. These are stupendously powerful tools, yielding surprising insights of unparalleled validity but they simply cannot be applied to people's learning. They cannot.

My training does not allow me to claim an understanding of the social scientists' methods. It has, however, thrust examples of their work to my attention. The contrast between their science and that of the natural scientists is profound: its lineage is clear but its pedigree is spoilt. It is science more by analogy than fact. Bastardised science is applicable to people's learning but its products do not possess the validity that the label of science popularly assumes.

Interpretive ethnomethodological liberationist phenomenology

I could adopt any one of the numerous species of exotic sociological perspectives from which to make sense of my inquiry. Or I could invent one of my own... But I haven't got the time.

The TTA pragmatically believe that I, and others like me, can engage in meaningful inquiry within a short time scale or they wouldn't fund us. Perhaps they are indifferent to the foundations on which these improvements are built. Perhaps I should be too. They share my impatience for results that will improve the lot of children in my school (they do know they are funding people to change the world after all) and don't expect me to get to grips with a whole new theoretical outlook to make this possible.

No alternative

So what's a new researcher to do? I know there are a few things to avoid:

• I cannot conduct a large scale inquiry with a sample size that might temper my embarrassment at calling it science
• I will not call my school a case study and pretend that it is somehow representative
• I have not the time to adopt a brand new philosophical perspective from which the world will make perfect sense (much as I'd like to...)
• I should not gaze fixedly at my navel and flatter myself that anyone else will find it remotely interesting.

So I just plough on regardless, solving problems and thinking a bit about what's happening? It may be my only viable option but it doesn't seem worth the name 'research', even if it is preceded by 'action'...

Success criteria

If, then, my inquiry is to proceed on a vaguely-action-research-type-footing it would appear to be incumbent on me to create an account that is:

• Crystal clear so as to be immediately understood
• Captivatingly written, to engage every reader
• A model of brevity
• Firmly based on a foundation of solid evidence
• Of general applicability, and
• Universally acknowledged to be of value.

All this after having been torn to shreds by a rabidly critical group of so-called friends.
No pressure then.

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