Challenges related to my own context: Identifying and addressing challenges in my own teaching

Teachers face a range of challenges each day. These may relate to the activities or to the students being taught or to the wider contexts in which they work. How these challenges are identified and acted upon is an important process.Over recent years, there has been a rise in the use of evidence-based/informed practice to support teachers in identifying where change might be needed in order to improve pupil learning outcomes and the strategies that might be adopted to make this change. In particular, in England, the evolution of research schools and organisations, such as the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) and Evidence Based Education (EBE), coupled with the emergence of ‘Walkthru’, provide further sources of evidence to support teachers.This chapter starts by introducing the case study school. It then considers how models of change and implementation can be used to support teachers to explore and use evidence to inform changes to their own practice in order to improve pupil learning outcomes. Drawing heavily on the EEF Implementation Guidance, it then looks at key considerations, processes and actions to be put in place to support change, including effective professional development. Throughout, the chapter returns to the case study school to reflect on the actions the school undertook and how they sought to implement change to support pupils’ engagement in, and the resulting impact on, their learning.