“The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.” - Marcel Proust

Whenever we aim to embark on any new journey, we do not rush headlong into the unknown. Sure, the thrill seekers out there may enjoy a series of unpredictable twists and turns, but as far as teaching and learning are concerned, a modicum of planning can go a long way. The question we’re often confronted with is, “Where do I start?”

The right answer through the right question 

Research is so much more than just finding information. It can be quite an intense (and sometimes overwhelming), very human activity; it requires us to engage with the learning process on more than just an intellectual level. Even with the most rudimentary of fact-finding missions, it is crucial that we aim our efforts at more than just discovery ‒ we need to determine our line 

of questioning and the reason for said questioning in order to structure our research optimally. We need to start by asking ourselves

the right questions.

 

 

When determining where to start, our questions should be aimed at qualitative answers, rather than quantitative ones. This can help educators, learners and other role-players prioritise interests, fields of focus, and goals. When determining which goals to prioritise, one should aim at breaking them up into short-term, long-term, and interim goals, all of which can branch out into subsidiary and ancillary steps. This is done in order to place emphasis on long-term success over temporary gain or quantifiable improvements in assessments or learner achievement.

When one has been in the education game for a number of years, one tends to get stuck in a rut, whether subconsciously or intentionally. Though there is comfort to be found in the familiar, the reliable, there is always much to learn through a little introspection, starting with a critical reflection on and evaluation of one’s own teaching. Which aspects of our own pedagogical approaches need to be researched and questioned?

Once available skills & resources have been identified and questions have been aligned to the teaching goal, organisation and​ structure of those elements become key. Let’s assume the aim in all teaching and learning is quality, in the educator, the content and skills being taught, as well as the learning experience on the whole. Generally speaking, the quality of the teaching and learning experience is determined by the quality of the teacher and that which he or she values. An educator who values professional growth, and is willing to undertake the voyage of discovery regarding their own pedagogical philosophy, will achieve excellence in their school setting and inspire their learners to strive for competence and personal excellence, regardless of abilities and circumstances.

When designing and structuring an approach to teaching, one must align one’s findings in an efficient, effective, and fair way, in order for all stakeholders to benefit. There needs to be a clear link between the identified shortcomings or areas that can be improved, and the points that one plans to implement in order to achieve this. One needs to determine whether one first needs to address areas that are lacking; alternatively, one can decide to focus on that which has already been mastered or comprehended, in order to use that as a solid foundation. Each of these has its merits and it is up to the educator to determine, and re-evaluate where necessary, which areas to attend to first. In this way, we alter and adjust our approach to education in order to accommodate learners and other stakeholders in a multitude of settings and contexts.

To a great extent, the long-term vision of the educator embarking on this journey of discovery determines the way in which success will be measured and to what extent it will be achieved. Not all success is necessarily quantifiable in the traditional way of being able to check a list or obtain a high score. Where research in the RIDE approach is concerned, success is often determined by the quality of the starting point that the process is being undertaken from. The approach is a series of processes that loops back on itself, determining new starting points when new obstacles or challenges are identified.

When researching any given topic or context, one needs to progress from the supposition that something new will be garnered, created or questioned, though the solutions may not necessarily yet be evident. During the research process, we query what we know, gather material, collect data, and otherwise engage with existing facts or the status quo. In essence, it is determining which questions to ask in order to find the most useful and insightful answers. Research is done in order to determine a starting point for our journeys of discovery. When speaking in The Republic, Plato said it best, “The beginning is the most important of the work.”

We need to learn to fail, in order to learn to succeed. As teachers, we are often under the impression that we need to know all, be all, and master all; we must succeed and we somehow feel threatened when we are questioned or opposed. We fear failure, instead of welcoming it as an opportunity that invites progress, rekindled passion and improved purpose in our professional lives. In order to internalise the quest for improvement, I propose the RIDE approach (Potgieter, 2021): Research; Investigate; Discuss; Evaluate. A good question an educator can ask is, “Where do I start?”

As experienced teachers, we are often under the incorrect impression that we know what’s best for our kids, for ourselves, for our colleagues. As novice teachers, we don’t yet know what we do not know. The remedy to each of these shortfalls is creating a feedback loop that enables us to identify that which can be improved, either by asking those around us, or engaging in some much-needed introspection.

Traditionally, feedback loops in education focus on learners’ work and assessments and how these very same learners can improve the quality of the work they deliver in order to progress and learn. That’s all for nought if educators are not willing to place themselves at the receiving end of the same kind of feedback in order to improve the quality of their own work. The concept of a feedback loop is neither new, nor complicated: it can be distilled down to a process in which the outputs of a system feed back into that very same system as inputs.

For feedback loops to be effective, we must first determine their purpose. Simply saying, “I want to be a better teacher,” is too vague and can be a very overwhelming starting point for the process that is based on self-evaluation at its core. Once we have determined what kind of information we are seeking, we can determine how to include self-reflection into this series of interconnected processes. If we optimally engage with this process, we should be willing and able to accept correction, as well as self-correct in order to progress through the loops. We tend to see feedback as final, instead of formative; if we are able to identify areas that can be improved, developed, diversified or otherwise enriched, we can start making changes, the smallest of which can often have a huge impact on our own learning and growth, as well as those around us. Libba Bray, the author of A Great and Terrible Beauty, wrote, “In every end, there is also a beginning.” Let us risk failure so that we may learn.

The rest of this blog series will focus on the four separate aspects of the RIDE approach: Research; Investigate; Discuss; Evaluate. Research will focus on the types of questioning that can be used to determine a starting point for the process of ascertaining where one can begin to adjust one’s view on teaching. Investigation will delve into finding and making meaning, expanding on questions and identifying new areas that can be improved. Discussion will explore the part that collaboration and other role players have in our approach to teaching, as well as what kind of feedback to expect and what to do with said feedback in order to build insights and questions into the process of the RIDE approach. Evaluation centres around drawing conclusions and identifying new starting points for future cycles of the RIDE approach and how we stand to improve our own teaching and the efficacy of the learning experience. In each of these instalments, I will unpack the elements of these aspects and elaborate on each as a whole, and how it can be incorporated into one’s own teaching strategy and philosophy.