Why can solutions often fail to solve the problems we're attempting to address, why do they end up causing new problems that we hadn't thought of and what can we do about it?
This is part 2 of a series on the "Cycle of Planned Failure". In part 1 we looked at the reasons why organisations, particulalry schools, might get caught up in the cycle; you can find that here. In this blog we're going to look at how we might go about breaking the cycle, finding solutions that are fit for purpose and don't create new problems of their own.
The authors of the Cambridge Education paper highlight that a key part of breaking the cycle is accurate searching and diagnosis of the problem - what specifically is it that we are trying to tackle? This fits in nicely with the Education Endowment Foundation's (EEF) guide to implementation, a section of which is below.
The EEF suggest that defining the problem is the starting point. This may stand in contrast to common practice, in which selecting the goal can be the normal starting point e.g. implementing "best practice" because it's something we're not doing and want to do. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, it's good to see good things happening elsewhere and wanting to emulate them. However, as the previous post highlights not identifying and clearly defining what it is we're trying to fix runs the risk of us a) not being able to assess if we've fixed it or not (if we don't know what we're fixing, how do we know if it's fixed?) and b) creating new problems because we haven't taken the time to think about and contextualise the change we're attempting to make. This notion of contextualisation can also be seen in bullet point 3 above, "Examine the fit and feasibility of possible interventions to the school context".
So what impact does being able to accurately define and diagnose our problem have? Let's go back to the cycle we looked at last time, but this time with the adaptation of accurate diagnoses included:
There is a caveat here that on its own diagnosis may not be enough - it should be combined with effective planning which can include debate and discussion, careful implementation and robust monitoring. Changing behaviours is hard. And changing our behaviour in the classrooms is really really hard. At a classroom level, each of us operates in an environment where a small mistake might be incredibly costly in terms of our rapport/respect with our students or their learning; in middle leadership there is a pressure to create and establish departments that produce excellent results year on year; and on a senior level school league tables mean that leaders tend to be mindful of the school's grade performance relative to other "competing" schools. In short, it's high stakes pretty much at every level. This means that we often seek out solutions that are easy to implement and promise fast results, only having time to look at the headlines without being able to contextualise the approach.
This was something highlighted by the EEF's recent evidence review into the use of cognitive science in the classroom. The findings from the review suggested that whilst approaches from cognitive science can have an impact on pupil learning, the evidence around how to apply it in classrooms is limited*. So does this mean we should push aside cognitive science? The EEF says,
"In our view, the implication of this is that caution, nuance, and reflection are needed rather than prescription, simplification, and the blanket imposition of the prevailing conceptions of best practice across subjects, age ranges, and contexts."^
Again we see the idea of contextualisation coming into play. It is critical to read beyond the headlines, to understand the mechanisms at work within a particular context and how they might be adapted to fit our contexts. We must ensure our focus moves beyond superficial surface features and looks at the underpinnings behind techniques. But crucially, before any of that, we must first accurately diagnose the problem we are trying to fix.
In the next and final part of this series, we'll look at how we bring together the ideas discussed in parts 1 and 2 and tie them together with the ideas discussed in upcoming the "Dunlosky In Action" book, part of the In Action series from John Catt.
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