Posing Problems Well and Asking Questions That Work

SUGGESTIONS FOR PREPARATION

Posing problems well and asking questions that work:

Focusing your action research project

St. George’s Academy

October 14, 2013

Suggestion #1Create a new vocabulary

We have been brought together by ‘the Pupil Premium’. At one level, we all may have a vague sense of what this means and why. Yet in our brief discussion, it emerged that this term is used to refer to many different things…some of which go beyond a simple term fora government policy. The concept evokesmany different assumptions, and as someone in the group pointed out, may even be used as shorthand or a label.

Task: Try to explain – to yourself, and if you feel bold to someone else – what you want to investigate in your research, and why you think it is important to do so…without using the term ‘Pupil Premium’ (unless it is in direct reference to the named policy itself). As you work on this, reflect on how easy or hard it is to explain to yourself, and how easy or hard it is to explain to someone else. Why? Once you do this, try going back and substituting the term ‘Pupil Premium’ for the other words you used. Does it help or hinder your understanding of what you want to know and do? What other words can you use to explain what, or who, you are concerned with?

Suggestion #2Brainstorm the problem

You could ask a million questions about ‘Pupil Premium’. Most of them would be legitimate. Some will be better than others, depending on what you hope to accomplish by asking them. All of them will take you on different journeys of discovery, and open up different perspectives and possibilities. Which question do you want to dedicate your time and energy to for the duration of this project? Which other questions might yours be connected to? It can be helpful to open this field of possibilities up before you concentrate on a single problem, and then focus this into researchable questions.

Task: On separate pieces of paper (or mapping onto a larger piece), write down the issues that concern you. Write as few or as many as you need to, but think hard and don’t give up until you’re really out of ideas. When you’re finished, play with your problems. Arrange them in different ways (most to least important, most to least interesting, things that are related, things that are contradictory, etc.) to see what patterns and ideas emerge. NB – Sharing this with willing colleagues can also expand the imagination.

Further: Consider the problems you’ve posed. What sorts of things might you need to learn or do in order to work on the ones that you think might be most promising? How might you go about learning/doing them? What resources do you need to do so? Who with?

Suggestion #3Name your passions

Dana and Yendol-Hoppey (2008, cited in Pine 2009: 239) suggest that there are at least eight ‘passions’ that tend to motivate action research. Reading through their list, which they compiled from over 100 different teachers’ projects, consider whether your concerns and questions fall into one of these categories. Or are you, on the contrary, motivated by a different passion? Does thinking about your research in this way help or hinder your understanding of what you want to do?

Suggestion #4Consider your passions

Pine also explains what he believes makes a good teacher research question ‘good’ (Pine 2009: 239–241). Reading through this section, ask yourself whether the problems you have identified for research are likely to meet these criteria. At the same time, consider whether you agree with the criteria themselves. Do you have other definitions of what makes a research question ‘good’, either in itself or in relation to practice? If so, why do you think that might be?

Suggestion #5From problems to questions to ‘research questions’

We will do a lot of concrete work to shape passions, concerns and problems into researchable questions when we get together. If you want a challenge ahead of time, though, try formulating your ideas into the following schema by completing the following phrases (from Booth et al.’s The Craft of Research, 2003):

Topic: I am investigating…
Question: because I want to find out what / why / how / whether …
Significance: to help me / students / colleagues / others understand …
Consequence: so that I/we/they will be able to …

Suggestion #6Critical reading

If you found time to read Chapter 2 and/or Chapter 11 of Gerald Pine’s Teacher Action Research: Building Knowledge Democracies (Thousand Oaks, Sage: 2009),

look up any words you don’t understand or arguments you find confusing or unclear; write down things you agree or disagree with; and/or

organise your reading notes and prepare a few questions to share with the group, for the purpose of deepening understanding and/or facilitating discussion; and/or

prepare a short commentary on arguments from the reading that you think are important for the group to discuss at this point in time.

Suggestion #7Extended critical reading

Find something to read about any of the issues raised in our discussion, your ‘problematisation’ (posing problems for inquiry), or your reading of Chapters 2 and 11 from Pine (2009, distributed on 23 September). Explore some work related to your interests in the journals mentioned in the introductory hand-out, or search in library catalogues and online.

While reading, prepare some thoughts and/or questions to discuss. In particular, try to make connections between what you read and your work with (e.g.) your own students, colleagues and parents; with your discipline and area of educational work; interactions with policy, etc.

Following are a few suggestions for further reading, based on some of the more general themes arising in our initial discussion.

‘Aspirations, attitudes and behaviours’

Carter-Wall, C. and Whitfield, G. (2012) ‘The role of aspirations, attitudes and behaviour in closing the educational attainment gap’, a Joseph Roundtree Foundation ‘round-up’ [review of current research], York: Joseph Roundtree Foundation, available at

Tyler, S. (2011) ‘Transforming inequality in the classroom: not as easy as it sounds’, Journal of Student Engagement: Education Matters, 1(1): 21–28, available at

Inequalities in/and education

Ball, S. (2010) ‘New class inequalities in education – why education policy may be looking in the wrong place! Education policy, civil society and social class’, International Journal of Sociology, 30(3/4): 155–166 [ask Sarah for this paper].

Christensen, L. (2001) ‘Finding signs of hope: a veteran teacher finds inspiration in the everyday work of committed co-workers’, Rethinking Schools, 15(3) [abstract online at and short opinion piece available from Sarah].

Duffield, J. (1998) ‘Unequal opportunities, or don’t mention the (class) war’, Paper presented to the Scottish Educational Research Association conference, Dundee, 2–4 September, EducatiON-LINE, available at:

Kerr, K. and West, M. (eds) (2010) ‘Social inequality: can schools narrow the gap?’ Cheshire: British Educational Research Association, available at .

Perry, E. and Francis, B. (2010) ‘The social class gap for educational achievement: a review of the literature’, an RSA project, available at

Strand, S. (2013) ‘What accounts for ethnic achievement gaps in secondary schools in England?’ British Educational Research Association, Insights, 4,available at

Exploring government policy

If you haven’t read many of the state policies related to the current ‘pupil premium’ policy, it might be worth exploring papers such as the ones below, considering what assumptions and positions underlie them, considering your own positions on them, etc.

‘Raising the achievement of disadvantaged children’ (2013)

‘The importance of teaching: White Paper equalities impact assessment’ (2010)

And for anyone interested in putting these policies into some historical context, there is a site called ‘Education in England’ that has an amazing collection of virtually all significant papers and policies, and much analysis, since the 19th century: