We need educators to be constantly updating their skills and knowledge, and evidenced-informed practice is central to this; yet it is far from universal in our schools. Kristin Vanlommel and Chris Brown draw on their international research to show how EIP can be achieved based on three core principles. With this article, we consider the engagement by teachers and school leaders in educational practices that are ‘evidence-informed’ - across school systems and world-wide. There is a growing consensus that effective teaching and leadership is based on evidence-informed practice (or EIP), and that EIP results in improving student learning and achievement.
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Digital innovation in education – as in any other sector – is not only about developing and implementing novel ideas, but also about having these ideas effectively used as well as widely accepted and adopted, so that many students can benefit from innovations improving education. Effectiveness, transferability and scalability cannot be added afterwards; it must be integrated from the start in the design, development and implementation processes, as is proposed in the movement towards evidence-informed practice (EIP). The impact an educational innovation has on the values of various stakeholders is often overlooked. Value Sensitive Design (VSD) is an approach to integrate values in technological design. In this paper we discuss how EIP and VSD may be combined into an integrated approach to digital innovation in education, which we call value-informed innovation. This approach not only considers educational effectiveness, but also incorporates the innovation’s impact on human values, its scalability and transferability to other contexts. We illustrate the integrated approach with an example case of an educational innovation involving digital peer feedback.
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Evidence-informed change (EIC) has gained attention recently because it is seen as a lever to enhance the effectiveness and sustainability of educational change. Important questions are: how is EIC conceptualized, what counts as evidence, and what factors can support EIC in practice? Because of the complexity of EIC, we aimed to understand these factors from a systems perspective. Different parts of the educational system (e.g. policy, practice of teachers’ and school leaders, research) are interrelated and need to be aligned for effective and sustainable change. Based on our scoping review we propose a model that conceptualizes EIC, identifies and defines different sources of evidence, and discusses influencing factors describing a system's readiness and capacity for EIC. Our results are an important step forward in understanding and supporting EIC in practice and developing targeted policy. This article also defines a common ground for future research, bringing together insights in an integrated framework of evidence-informed change.
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Dit PD traject beoogt ontwikkeling en inbedding van learning communities voor duurzame ontwikkeling in ecosystemen van onderwijs, onderzoek en praktijk. Werken aan duurzame ontwikkelingsdoelen in de transitie naar een duurzame samenleving vraagt andere competenties van professionals, zoals kritisch bewustzijn, empathie, verantwoordelijkheid nemen, toekomstdenken en transdisciplinair werken. Deze competenties worden door hogescholen idealiter in een authentieke leeromgeving ontwikkeld, waarin vraagstukken en dilemma’s rondom duurzame ontwikkeling, kennisontwikkeling op gang brengen. Learning communities (LC’s) zijn zo’n authentieke leeromgeving: groepen waarin studenten, docenten en professionals over grenzen van praktijken heen, samen werken, leren en innoveren naar aanleiding van grote maatschappelijke vraagstukken. Ze worden in dit traject ontwikkeld als een key enabling methodology voor duurzame ontwikkeling. Bij opdrachtgever Saxion en andere hogescholen zijn experimenten gestart met LC’s, die nog niet structureel zijn ingebed in ecosystemen van onderwijs, onderzoek en praktijk. De nog zwakke afstemming van onderwijs op de praktijk van learning communities betekent voor de Nederlandse samenleving een rem op de ontwikkeling van human capital, noodzakelijk voor de transitie naar een duurzame samenleving. Belemmeringen voor de beweging naar ontwikkeling, opschaling en inbedding van LC’s zien we op vijf gebieden: • ondersteunende processen • samenwerking tussen onderwijs, onderzoek en beroepspraktijk • ervaring met ontwerp, begeleiding en evaluatie van LC’s • ervaring met education for sustainable development (ESD) • professionele rol van docenten Dit PD traject hanteert een systemische onderzoeks-en veranderaanpak. Vanuit vier rollen, professional, innovator, onderzoeker en veranderaar, werkt de PD-kandidaat samen met beginnende en best practice LC’s. Middels participatief onderzoek, kennisdeling, veranderkundige interventies, reflectie en bijstellingen, ondersteunt zij hen bij het ontwerp van evidence-informed instrumenten voor de ontwikkeling en inbedding van LC’s in het ecosysteem van hogeschool en praktijk. Het traject mondt na vijf jaar uit in een portfolio met innovatieve bijdragen aan praktijk en wetenschap en een reflectie op de ontwikkeling van de PD-kandidaat
Higher education offers great flexibility as students are largely free to decide where, when, and how to study. Being successful in such an environment requires well-developed self-regulated learning skills. However, every teacher in higher education knows that students experience ample difficulty to self-regulate their learning. They struggle to set and plan learning goals, and to gain sufficient depth in learning when preparing for exams. These struggles can negatively impact their learning, well-being, academic achievement, and professional life. On top of the existing flexibility in higher education, a need for more flexibility in what students learn is becoming evident. That is, students have room for flexible learningapproaches (i.e., deciding what learning goals or materials to study and how) and/or flexible learning trajectories (i.e.,choosing what combination of courses to take). This places an additional burden on students’ self-regulated learning skills. We posit that for students to thrive in flexible higher education, practice-oriented research on supporting students’self-regulated learning skills is required. Our collaborative consortium will i) unravel how students can be optimally scaffolded within flexible learning approaches and flexible learning trajectories, ii) examine how to optimize teacher and technological support, and iii) study how student autonomy and motivation can be guarded. We will set up a practice-oriented research program with both qualitative and quantitative methods, including design-based research, action research, pre-post comparative intervention studies, and large-scale correlational research. The findings will impact higher education through (technological) design guidelines and intervention programs for educational professionals, andsupport-modules for students.
