Research should support teaching rather than prescribe it

As Australia looks to evidence-based teaching to improve student outcomes, UNSW researcher Dr Robin Nagy says research should inform teachers’ decisions, not dictate a one-size-fits-all approach.

As Australia debates how to improve student results, a familiar solution is being offered: a return to explicit teaching.

There is much to value in clear, structured instruction, particularly when students are encountering new or complex material, opens in a new window. It is nevertheless a mistake to treat any teaching approach as a universal remedy that can be prescribed across every classroom, for every teacher, and every student.

A classroom is not a laboratory, and teachers are not technicians following a script. Teaching is a complex, interpersonal craft that requires hundreds of decisions in real time: when to explain, when to pause, when to challenge, when to reassure, when to change direction and when to abandon the lesson plan altogether. These decisions are shaped by the students in front of the teacher and the classroom context.

In my commentary, Going the distance: Bridging the gap between research and practice, opens in a new window, published in Learning and Instruction, I argue that educational research needs to take greater account of the people who are expected to apply it: teachers.

Research may tell us whether a particular approach tends to work on average, and under what conditions. That is immensely valuable. But, as I argued recently in Education Review, opens in a new window, teachers, classrooms, and students cannot be reduced to averages. Students differ in their prior knowledge, aptitude, motivation, confidence and learning needs. Teachers differ in expertise, experience, interpersonal skills, pedagogical approach and capacity to implement or adapt a strategy.

These differences are not inconvenient details to be averaged away. They help to determine whether a research-informed recommendation succeeds once it enters a real-world classroom.

The problem with prescribing a single way to teach

A strategy that helps a novice teacher to establish structure may be unnecessary, or even restrictive, for an expert teacher. An approach that supports one group of students may be ineffective for another. A pedagogy that produces a positive average effect under research conditions may look very different in a busy classroom with limited time, competing demands, and students who do not resemble the average research participant.

The danger comes when a significant average effect from research morphs into a universal directive to improve learning: all teachers should do this, in all classes, all the time. The complexity and nuance of the original research can become homogenised into a one-size-fits-all directive, checklist, or compliance requirement. Teachers are then expected to implement the approach faithfully, regardless of whether it suits their students or builds intelligently on their existing practice.

Explicit teaching is not always the best option

The debate over explicit teaching is a good example. Cognitive load research describes an expertise reversal effect, opens in a new window: guidance that helps novices can become redundant or counterproductive as expertise develops. The question is therefore not whether explicit teaching or inquiry learning is inherently better, opens in a new window, but which approach best suits these students, this classroom context, and this stage of learning.

Context can also overwhelm the best-considered pedagogy. When I first started teaching in Australia, I taught a low-achieving Year 8 mathematics class, Set 8 of nine, in which many students had recognised learning challenges. Their engagement was initially poor, but by adapting questions and scaffolding lessons, I saw students become more engaged as they experienced early success.

That progress was undone when the class was required to sit the same common assessment as every other Year 8 class. The test was far beyond the level at which my students were working, and they achieved an average mark of around 20 per cent. Students who had begun to believe they could succeed were confronted with an assessment that appeared to prove the opposite. Their motivation and engagement deteriorated immediately.

Research-informed practice alone could not help me fix the problem in my class the next day. The difficulty lay in the assessment policy, the students' confidence, the classroom relationships and my having no authority to adapt the test. The experience illustrates that teaching cannot be separated from context.

The example also shows why educational success cannot be reduced to grades and test scores. Academic achievement matters, but so do motivation, engagement, confidence, effort, perseverance, and a student's willingness to learn. Research shows that students' perceptions of teaching support shape their motivation and engagement through adolescence, opens in a new window. These outcomes are not soft extras. They help to create the conditions in which achievement becomes possible, and they have value in their own right.

A script cannot replace professional judgement

A narrow focus on measurable achievement can also obscure the contribution of teachers’ professional skills. Good teaching depends on subject knowledge, but also on empathy, communication, humour, patience, creativity, adaptability, and the ability to build trusting relationships with students.

These qualities are difficult to capture in an average effect size. They are even harder to standardise.

This does not mean teachers should be left to work without evidence or support. Research has an essential role in helping teachers understand what may work, for whom, under what conditions, and why.

But research should support professional judgement rather than replace it.

Novice teachers may need explicit, structured guidance as they develop their practice. More experienced teachers may need greater autonomy to adapt research-informed recommendations in their classrooms. For some expert teachers, the value of research may lie not in telling them what to do, but in helping them understand and articulate why their existing practice works.

This suggests a teacher equivalent of the expertise reversal effect. The same guidance may substantially assist a novice or struggling teacher while adding little to, or even constraining, an accomplished practitioner. If we believe in differentiating instruction for students, it makes little sense to assume identical professional learning is effective for every teacher.

Teachers should help to shape the recommendations that emerge from research. They are not passive recipients of educational evidence; they are skilled practitioners who hold knowledge of students and classrooms that cannot be recovered from data alone. Their questioning of a recommendation is not necessarily resistance to evidence. It may be the professional scrutiny required to make that evidence useful to their contexts.

Education systems and authorities need to resist the temptation to turn every promising finding into a universal mandate. Researchers who want their work to improve learning need to go the distance. That means identifying the conditions under which an effect occurs, examining how findings play out across different teacher and student profiles, spending time in schools, and involving practitioners in helping to translate research into usable guidance. School leaders and policymakers, in turn, need to distinguish between providing teachers with sound evidence and requiring its uniform implementation.

The question should not be, 'What is the one best way to teach?' It should be, 'What is most likely to work for these students, with this teacher, in this classroom, and under these conditions?'

Australia's students do not need identical lessons. They need research that respects the complexity of teaching and strengthens teachers' capacity to make informed, thoughtful decisions. That is how research goes the distance: by supporting professional judgement in the classroom where learning actually happens.

Dr Robin Nagy BSc (Hons), MEng, PhD, is an Adjunct Lecturer in the School of Education at UNSW Sydney. He is an educational consultant and director of 'Academic Profiles' and 'Effort Tracking' advising schools on best practice in implementing data-driven growth strategies.