What is it to be an enquiring practitioner?

To be an enquiring practitioner is to ‘find out or investigate with a rationale approach that can be explained or defended’, as defined by Menter et al (2011). In other words, being an enquiring practitioner is performing the continual act of research and reflection in order to positively impact a pupil’s academic experience.

It’s my understanding that enquiring practice is an act performed by professionals, either individually or collaboratively, where time is set aside to analyse the systems in current use and see if there is any room for development. It’s easy to get ‘stuck in your ways’ both in a professional and a personal sense. But through performing constant critical reflection we create opportunities to identify areas of work that are in need of improving.

This- a continual attempt to progress forward- is an obvious benefit to being an enquiring practitioner. However there are, of course, challenges that come with it too. For example, there is always the potential for difficulties to arise when performing collaborative work; misunderstandings between group members, lack of motivation, differences in learning styles etc.

As a student teacher, I understand that being an enquiring practitioner is going to be an integral part of my new profession. I hope that being aware of its meaning and the benefits of integrating it into my day-to-day professional practice will allow me to fully participate and make the most of the skills that come along with it.

4 thoughts on “What is it to be an enquiring practitioner?

  1. Avatar photo

    Eilidh, this has a lot of good information that has helped with my understanding of what an enquiring practitioner is. You have gave a great benefit and challenges of this working method but maybe you could go into a little more depth of the advantages and disadvantages of collaborative working. You could maybe even say how it would be beneficial for you during placement or when you’re teaching your own class. I would love to learn your views on this.

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  2. Fab post eilidh! You really have a good sense of what it means to be an enquiring practitioner and are very reflective which is great. you’ve highlighted the benefits and challenges really well, and I totally agree with you with what you said about becoming ‘stuck in your ways’ when it comes to developing professionally and personally. You could possibly add more detail to your post in order to get your point across more. Well done though! 🙂

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  3. Eilidh, I really enjoyed reading your post. It’s clear you have an understanding of what it is to be an enquiring practitioner. I particularly agree with your point that being an enquiring practitioner will be integral to your profession as a student teacher. However maybe you could provide more examples of the benefits and disadvantages of practitioner enquiry. Great post!

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  4. Well done Eilidh, this post reads easily and makes sense the whole way through with good examples. More examples and details would be good, to give the reader a more in depth understanding of what you have meant of said in a point. Overall a really good post though. 🙂

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