Conversation 7 - Impact

    Impact!

 Impact can be on (adapted from Gusskey adapted from Kirkpatrick)

• Knowledge gained by the researcher

• • Application of knowledge to practice.
  • Learning experiences of pupils
  • Learning outcomes of pupils.

This is the nub of the MA!

You said you were doing research!

So what can you generalise from your research to other researchers and practitioners?

 
Common faults are to claim learning of what is obvious. As this is Masters level work saying you learned that "lesson planning is good" is hardly revealing! Saying it "confirmed the rersearch that"...... well that another matter. The tone of a research account is important.

Return to your conceptual model
Some people spend too much time on impact on their learning, and impact on pupils learning. Too little time is spent on gathering insights that may be useful to other researchers in the field. This is the point of postgraduate research, yet not enough time is spent on drawin g out these conclusions.

Be self critical

There should be a good section on self-evaluation of the research. the findings should be tentative. A big mistake is not to have a clear connection with the data- claiming more than you have revealed. Show the bias.

You will note a lot of this relates to the aims, methodology, and other earlier sections.

 Exercise

Please contribute some alternative words and phrases describing the following:

Summarising the issues and what you are trying to do

Sharing your findings

Debating the issues

Affirming what's known.

Contradicting and arguing

Changing (your ideas)

Suggesting alternative explanations

e.g "verifying"

 These words and actions should be in your analysis