A handbook for Exploratory Action Research

Misconception 1. Lots of reading 
It is common to think that 
research involves lots of reading. 
This is possible but not 
necessary in all kinds of 
research. We will show you in 
this book how referring to other 
people’s ideas about a particular 
topic may be useful, but it is not 
as important as looking at your 
classroom closely and collecting information from it. Also, 
reading can come later – you don’t need to read or write a 
review of what ‘the literature’ says about a topic before 
starting teacher-research!
Misconception 2. Writing a paper 
This is another misconception we need to clarify. You do
not have to write a paper about your research. You can 
always present your research project to your colleagues
at school or to a wider audience at a conference. As we will 
show, you do not need to write for this purpose, you can use 
images and posters accompanied by talking to explain what 
you did. 
1
Holliday, A. (1994). Appropriate Methodology and Social Context. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 31.
Images by: Mat Wright.
Image by: Rick Carey/Shutterstock.

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What is teacher-research? | 
16
2.2 But what is research? 
A useful short definition of research is the following: 
‘Research’: n. ‘The organised, systematic search
for answers to the questions we ask’.
2
Another definition of research is: ‘systematic inquiry
made public’.
3
You can see that the word ‘systematic’ is used in both
of these definitions. In other words, research needs to be 
planned, following an organised procedure. A definition 
proposed by David Nunan also stresses this. Nunan defines 
research as ‘a process of inquiry consisting of three 
elements or components: (1) a question, problem, or 
hypothesis, (2) data, (3) analysis and interpretation of data’.
4
Here Nunan makes reference to the collection and analysis 
of ‘data’, in other words relevant ‘information’. Look at this 
definition for clarification: