Educational research is the process through which educators evaluate various aspects of education such as student learning, instructional methods, teachers’ training programs and classroom challenges. The main purpose of educational research is to improve the quality of education by solving the problems that are associated with the education system. This paper highlights the usefulness of educational research.
Teachers can benefit from educational research in the following ways. To begin with, educational research informs the teaching practice. It enables educators to improve the quality of the content that they teach in various subject areas. Additionally, action research often includes inferences which facilitate implementation of various educational projects and policies.
Educational research is one of the best ways of solving existing problems in the education system. Best practice in educational research calls for reliance on observable experience, as well as, empirical evidence. This involves using accurate data and carefully developed procedures to analyze existing problems. The results of these analyses often provide effective solutions to existing and emerging problems.
Finally, educational research facilitates specialized and in-depth study among educators. Teachers who are interested in acquiring advanced knowledge through higher education such as PhD degrees must undertake rigorous research in their subject areas. In this regard, research enables the teachers to create new knowledge or to refine existing educational theories.
Educational research has a great impact on educator’s daily teaching roles. Effective research findings often influence educators’ decisions, as well as, the methodology for delivering course content. Concisely, research provides evidence based solutions to the instructional challenges that teachers face in classrooms.
Consequently, teachers are able to choose instructional methods that meet the learning needs of all students. Research also facilitates improvement in learning outcomes. It enables teachers to incorporate new ideas and approaches in the teaching practice. Furthermore, research provides teachers with the opportunity to reflect on their experiences with educational theories and to construct new understandings.
Hence, the teacher’s competency in teaching improves. Finally, educational research promotes organizational culture change at the school level. Empirical studies reveal that barriers to adoption of evidence based instructional methods exist at the school level. By inculcating a culture of research, teachers will be likely to embark on evidence based approaches to deliver course contents.
Teachers have varying encounters with educational research. Lack of high quality evidence is one of the factors that discourage the use of educational research findings. Most findings are inconclusive since the researchers hardly use effective research designs such as randomized controlled trials.
Moreover, teachers tend to prefer research findings that are relevant and easy to implement in their specific situations. Generally, teachers should have close encounters with educational research in order to improve their competencies.
The main similarity between contemporary and action research is that both of them produce findings and conclusions. However, they differ in the following ways. Whereas, action research includes recommendations for action, contemporary research does not. Contemporary research tends to extend a particular scholarly discipline. Action research, on the other hand, often adopts an interdisciplinary approach.
Whereas contemporary educational research focuses on testing a single set of hypotheses, action research focuses on analyzing the impacts of the available policy options. In conclusion, educators should adopt action educational research in order to develop solutions that are effective and relevant to their professional teaching needs.