The Mind Is Its Own Place: The Influence of Sustained Interactivity with Practitioners on Educational Researchers

Abstract

In this article, Michael Huberman explores the effect of sustained interactions with practitioners on educational researchers. He focuses his study on two specific cases: 1) an elementary-level mathematics project, known as the Cognitively Guided Instruction project at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, and 2) a set of intellectual biographies of math and science education researchers. Using a social-constructivist paradigm, he describes the conceptual and methodological shifts that some researchers undergo when they are confronted with the realities, constraints, and opportunities of practice. In addition to these shifts, Huberman also discusses how interacting with practitioners influences researchers' view of teaching and of how research should be used. He discusses how the "micro-worlds" of research and practice interact, and through their interactions determine the flow of knowledge. It is the interaction between micro-worlds, rather than the actors alone, that is the crucial unit of analysis in this study. Huberman concludes by suggesting that sustained interactivity between practitioners and researchers may be beneficial to both parties. In particular, sustained interactivity may allow researchers to refine, even recast, their conceptual frameworks, their methodologies, their teaching, and their modes of exchange with various audiences.