Twenty-first-century educational practice: research, evidence and knowledge management - Teaching with Technologies: The Essential Guide - page 190

1. Findings and using knowledge 2. Sharing knowledge

Practitioners
and policy
makers
expected to use
research

Research
databases are
linked & cross-
searchable

Significant research
is published quickly
& disseminated
extensively

Publication methods
use technology
effectively -
multimedia/multi-
layered flow charts

3. Creating knowledge 4. Managing knowledge

Educators can find
and join
research/professional
networks and
projects in their areas
of interests

Mechanisms exist
to ensure
research
addresses
teachers'
questions

Teachers' questions
are the focus of
research, gaps are
highlighted and
researchers are
invited to fill the
gaps

Research covering all main
areas of professional
knowledge is available
including subject-specific
pedagogy, SEN pedagogy
and generic research

Figure 10.4 national knowledge management tools for education.

· mechanisms for quickly publishing and disseminating significant research -
to improve timeliness
· the use of publication mechanisms which include multimedia and are not
just restricted to text (see the flow chart example of map of medicine health-
guides www.mapofmedicine.com) - to allow easy access to the knowledge
needed at the time of need and easy identification of gaps in knowledge
· mechanisms for identifying the research questions that users need answering
and providing access to these of research generators - to improve relevance
· easy access to research networks - in order to support collaborative working
· access to list of ongoing projects - in order to minimize duplication
· a listing of invitations to join projects - in an attempt to limit the prolifera-
tion of small-scale research projects
· a research and evidence base which addresses fine-grained policy and prac-
tice issues as well as more generic issues
· the presence of online community-of-practice workspaces which provide
appropriate functionality and e-tools.

Knowledge management (KM) tools need to be provided nationally so that teachers
and researchers can find and use knowledge to build next practice and create , share
and manage knowledge for the benefit of the education sector.
In comparison with health and local government, for example, the Cochrane
Collaboration (www.cochrane.org) and IDeA (www.communities.idea.gov.uk) the
education sector is considerably behind in harnessing the power of technology to
support ongoing professional development, knowledge sharing and evidence build-
ing. In local government in the UK, as part of a national knowledge-management
strategy for the local government sector, a national e-infrastructure to support pro-
fessional networking has been developed to encourage sharing of both 'tacit' as well as