Action Research and Criticality: Working Out the Stone in Your Shoe

The action research tradition in Australia has been heavily influenced by critical work of Steven Kemmis and the school of researchers he inspired, as well as by the British tradition inspired by Lawrence Stenhouse and others. These chapters illustrate the close alliance between educational research and the ordinary practice of working educators, which is a particular feature of Anglo-American traditions of inquiry inspired both by pragmatism and by critical theory, both of which demand of research an active engagement in intentional change process. Work in this section is developed out of this action research tradition and takes the form of analyses of practice with an eye to improving the way that practice is accomplished. In some cases, this means a critical interrogation of the effectiveness of the work of an educator/researcher, while in other cases, the analysis of practice from a socially critical perspective is the central focus of the work. What draws these disparate studies together is a central focus on practice.