ABSTRACT
Definitions of action research vary greatly. The term in its broadest sense refers to research conducted in a field setting with those actually involved in that field, often alongside an ‘outsider’, into the study of questions influenced by practitioners rather than solely by ‘experts’. The burgeoning of interest in action research internationally over the past twenty years seems both to hold great promise and also to provide an occasion to consider why such a change in educational research is occurring and what it might involve.
