• Question: Is there a generally-accepted set of guidelines for what evidence-based research in education is? I have seen papers without statistical analysis, with inadequate sample sizes, etc. Alternately, is there a blog or a twitter feed devoted to pointing out good or bad examples of education research?

    Asked by gertzerl17 to Sara, Richard, Paula, Brian, Alex on 7 Mar 2018.
    • Photo: Paula Clarke

      Paula Clarke answered on 7 Mar 2018:

      The Centre for Evaluation and Monitoring has a useful website with links to relevant resources https://www.cem.org/evidence-based-education

    • Photo: Brian Butterworth

      Brian Butterworth answered on 7 Mar 2018:

      I would say that the guidelines are the same as for any science, apart from the fact that education is not rocket science, it’s much more difficult than that. It’s difficult because education has a characteristic that make it different from natural sciences: education deals with conscious, reflective agents, not unconscious atoms or molecules. This means that what seems to work for Johnny, won’t work for Jimmy just because he sees that it works for Johnny. Also all learners come to formal education with a different set of cognitive capacities, inclinations, preferences, home and social environments, as well as distinct educational histories. This means, statistically, that there will be large variations in the sample under test. So, if you are testing method A against method B to see which is the better, you will need a large or very large sample to find a statistically significant difference between the two methods. Let’s suppose that method A leads to better learning outcomes than B, it is still very likely that there will be learners who do better with B than with A, and that neither method works for another subset.

      The other problem is with controls: if A is carried out by one set teachers and B by another, or on one set of learners and B on another, then it will be difficult to tell whether it is the method or the teachers or the learners responsible for the significant differences. This is not an insoluble problem, but it does require sophisticated experimental designs.

      However, if there are no statistics, saying A is better than B (for every learner?) lacks support.

      The Royal Society set up a working party, on which I served, to look into the implications of cognitive neuroscience for education. They wrote “Education is about enhancing learning, and neuroscience is about understanding the mental processes involved in learning. This common ground suggests a future in which educational practice can be transformed by science, just as medical practice was transformed by science about a century ago.”

      What we are now discovering that in medicine a method that works for most patients doesn’t work for a minority. This means personalising medicine: trying to match the method to characteristics of the patient to the method. Similarly, adapting education to the characteristics of the learner is the way forward. This means more sophisticated statistical and evidential methods.

    • Photo: Richard Churches

      Richard Churches answered on 15 Mar 2018:

      There is a lot of debate about the phrase ‘evidence-based practice’ in education. In medicine and healthcare this is defined as more than the than the simplistic application of treatments based on research findings; it is about ‘integrating individual clinical expertise with the best external evidence’ (Sackett et al., 1996, p. 71). Practically, EBP is seen as involving a number of steps:

      1. Diagnosis (assess the patient)
      2. Create a clinical question to help
      identify an appropriate treatment
      3. Look at the research evidence,
      critique it and select a treatment
      4. Treatment, involving the
      patient in the process
      5. Evaluation of the effects of the
      treatment (self-evaluation as a
      clinician).

      In this way, each patient engagement becomes a form of research project for the clinician. Alongside this, clinical practice consists of guidelines that form ‘systematically developed statements to assist practitioner and patient decisions about appropriate health care for specific clinical circumstances’ (Field and Lohr, 1990, p. 38).

      Field MJ and Lohr KN (eds) (1990) Clinical Practice Guidelines: Directions for a New Program. Washington:

      Sackett, D.L., Rosenberg, W.M.C., Muir Gray, J.A., Brian Haynes, R. Scott Richardson, W. (1996) ‘Evidence-based medicine: what it is and what it isn’t’. British Medical Journal, 312, 71–72.

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