Enhancing Research Literacy for Educators: A Living Educational Theory Research Approach

We extend the notion of teacher’s research literacy to include skills and knowledge, which enable teachers to fulfil their professional responsibility to research their educational practice to understand, improve and explain it and to contribute to their professional knowledge-bases. Education is a values laden activity. As professional educators, teachers have a responsibility to enable their pupils/students to progress through a given curriculum and to generate and progress through the learner’s evolving educational curriculum. A given curriculum is a programme of study developed by the Education organisation the teacher is working in. A person’s ‘evolving educational curriculum’ is comprised by the lifelong programme of study they develop to improve their ability to live a satisfying, productive and worthwhile life for themselves and others. We illustrate how, as they engage in Living Educational Theory Research, teachers develop their research literacy as they realise their educational responsibilities as professional educators.