ABSTRACT
The last few years have seen a sea change in the opportunities available for teachers to engage both in doing teacher research projects and in using existing findings from the wider research and evidence base. A number of recent initiatives have signposted the Government’s intention to support a form of evidence-based practice (EBP) which incorporates both of these elements. Performance Threshold Assessments, for example, require the evidencing of systematic engagement in professional development which could include research and evidence-based activities with a principal focus on teaching in the classroom (DfEE, 2000). In addition, the DfEE announced a new Professional Development Programme for 2000/01, now extended for a further three years, to improve classroom practice by funding Best Practice Research Scholarships which will support teachers in undertaking research and development work and becoming more informed by existing research (DfEE, 2001). The TTA itself, of course, has a relatively long history of supporting teachers’ engagement in and with research. The TTA’s Teacher Research Grants scheme has, since 1996, supported about thirty teachers a year, and in 1997 our own School-based Research Consortia initiative was launched. Finally, the DfEE has established the Evidence for Policy and Practice Information and Coordinating Centre (EPPI Centre) to commission and maintain systematic reviews of, in the first instance, school-based education research, in order to build resource databases and help practitioners and policy makers to locate and access relevant research.
