INNOVACIÓN DOCENTE E INICIACIÓN A LA INVESTIGACIÓN

UNIT 1. WHAT IS INNOVATION?

Innovation is a tricky word. The job description of a teacher includes managing several different
realities. Ordinarily, people think that being a teacher means standing in front of a group of pupils,
explaining some lessons and checking some exercises from time to time. The attitude expected in a
teacher varies from the strict and disciplined old fashion way to a more open and friendly one. The
cliché does not recognise all the other relevant questions thatan average teacher needs to manage
every year and almost every day. Teachers' management skills concern:
• Curriculum:
– Design of the long term and short term programmes.
– Adapt the legislation to the day-to-day reality of the school: contentsand evaluation.
• Materials:
– Review and select the material used in class: books, exercises, ICT.
– Adapt the contents to the necessities of the various courses the teachersteach.
• Class dynamics:
– Seek the most efficient class management bearing in mind the pro-files of the class.
– Review and update the classroom dynamics.
– Analyse class and assessment results.
• School organisation:
– Collaborate in school's activities and management.
• Themselves:
– Train themselves to be updated.
– Self-evaluate their work and improve.
– Plan their own career goals.
In brief, most teachers face new groups every year, and their need to be adapted to the demanding
necessities of their pupils goes with their job. Didactics is mostly about making decisions that affect
all the elements, as the oneslisted above, which make teaching possible. Nowadays, the debate lies
between standardised and personalised models. Both try to make schools better, one
(standardisation) by introducing level exams and selecting students for upper cycles, and the other
(personalised education) by customising the way the students face the constructionof their own
education. Teaching in these two models requires different approaches and objectives but,
whatever it is the model in which the teachers do their jobs, they still have the need to adapt the
educational objectives to their own classrooms to the demands of society. Education has two main
goals: help pupils in the construction of their own being as persons in a society; help them to get prepared
for an autonomous life by having their own professional career. There is no need to insist on the idea
that both things are equally important. An educational system that only prepared peoplefor their own
intellectual reflection but with no practical and real vision about their implication in society would be
completely useless. In its turn, a system that prioritised or onlyvalued the professional outcomes would
be a mechanism of producing learning machines. For all this, we can conclude that our society is
different from the one inherited by the contemporary ruling generation and this is forcing the
educational systems to change.

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2. THE PARALYSING SEARCH FOR CULPRITS

As was said above, change and adaptation to a new reality is the reason to remain alert and open to
innovation. Nevertheless, teachers and schools tendto feel that the problem with education is so big
that they can do nothing at their level ifnothing is previously done from the top. This temptation of
looking for culprits is quite a commonplace these days but it is unequivocally false. Schools in Spain
have enough autonomy so as to put into practicesome measures that might help lessen the effects
of this concern about the need of constant innovation. Schools can design their own set of projects
and through them they can start new ways of facing the challenges of these days' education. For
example, concerning FL, schools can design their own Languages Project, witha long-term view about
how they want to deal with (foreign and national) languages teaching in the school.
3. MODERNISATION AND INNOVATION

Some teachers confuse modernise with innovate. A few years ago, many schools started to purchase
digital or interactive white- boards. Many of them considered this to be disrupting, the sign of
becoming this century's schools. However, after their implementation nothing basic changed.

The whiteboard occupied the same space as the blackboard, and shared all its functions, whereas the
pupils sat with the same distribution, had to do the same type of exercises and applied the same
strategies that they did before the invention. Schools that lay aside CD players anduse iPads, PCs or
digital whiteboards instead are not innovating but modernising. Innovation has to do with those
things that introduce a relevant, disrupting change in the principles of education.
Disrupting innovation: the introduction of asingle element that causes changes at different levels and
brings about unexpected advantages and the modification of roles.

Unfortunately, many schools do not have the internal mechanisms to detect improvements that can be
institutionalised, and changes at teachers' levels are viewed with scepticism or even with open
mistrust. Schools should realise that innovation in education can only irradiate from them, that it will
not come from above and there will be no magic spell to invoke it.

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This process requires a climate, and climate depends on both the managers and the teachers.
Basically, what teachers need is to have a long-term project, a vision of how the future of the school
can be. If they have the skills and are motivated, it is important the there is a constant flow of
resources. Finally, it is necessary a realistic action plan, something that really matters, that offers a
clear solution to the demands and challenges of the teachers, the students and the whole school. If
any ofthese elements is missing or fails during the process the consequences can be different from
expected.

4. REFORM AND INNOVATION

When social changes were necessary, there were several attempts to improve theconditions of the
educational system. These improvements were introduced through laws and regulations and they
were the systemic response to the need for a better social integration of minorities, reduce the age
of schooling, or some other questions such as give more autonomy to schools or redefine the way they
can finance themselves.
The problem with reforms is that in order to be effective they require the convergence of the
Administration (both, national and autonomous in the case of Spain), unions, professionals, pupils, and
parents. As they commonly do not have the global picture, reforms get stuck.

The State Administration by itself is not able to produce change and innovation, but it is important
that it supports those institutions that are or want to be innovative, and that it creates the accurate
context for innovation. As was seen above, innovation isproduced in schools when the context is
receptive. However, there can be some factorsthat block any new initiative (freely based on Carbonell
2012):

- Reluctance of teachers. A way to resist to any reform is by being stuckto one's routines. Some
teachers, for various reasons, are quite reluctant toany change, because it can affect to their feeling
of security.
- Individualism and corporatism. Individualism is the tendency to believethat "my class is my castle",
where nobody has the right to get in, and of course my inventions are mine, and only mine.
Corporatism, linked in a certain way to it, means that groups within the institutions fight for their own
interests and comfort, commonly to obtain power or influence.
- Pessimism and professional discomfort. The discourse of defeatism is widely spread in education.
The ideas that teachers are all burnt out, that their conditions are poor, that they do not have
adequate means, that they are not valued, etc., create a bubble of discomfort that raises a wall
againstany new approach. It is true that the conditions of many teachers should bebetter, and it is true
that the Administration often fails to manage personneland resources in accordance to the interests
of teachers and schools, but it is also true that teachers that have never tried to innovate, and who
do notdevote an extra minute to their job and their careers are quite prompt to pro-test about the bad
conditions in which they have to work.
- The effects of reforms. Educational reforms, as has been said above, technocratic and bureaucratic
reforms do not always create the best impulse forinnovation and real reforms. In Spain, there is a long
tradition of an excessive intervention in education, and teachers are very much obliged to followevery
kind of norm and they cannot do anything that had not been previously regulated.

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- The paradox of the "double curriculum". Teachers innovate in many aspects of education, but the
standardised evaluations at some levelsthat have been imposed by the Administration (alleging
some reasons of "quality control") cause that some teachers follow their own innovative criteria and
procedures, but momentarily suspend them to train the students for the evaluations (which are just
ordinary tests that are prepared by re- petition and memorisation). In English teaching this is what
happens with the external examinations or certifications.
- The ideology of effort. In the past few decades, as a reaction to the establishment of the
comprehensive school model, more focused on competences than the old contents-only approach,
much criticism has arisen about the need to go "back to basis".
- Lack of collaboration between universities and schools. The academic world is not united and there
is not much communication between the two main poles of it: universities and schools. Universities
should be the centres inwhich every kind of reflection about education should be possible, the place in
which all the information about schools should be, and the places where teachers might have their
own space for reflection too. However, the lack of transparency of administrations about educational
outcomes, bureaucracy and lack of culture of cooperation make that both realities have scarce and
some-times only theoretical approaches, quite far from the reality of the classrooms.

5. INNOVATION: FACTORS FOR SUCCESS

The focus of education has to be on creating the conditions in which students will want and be able to
learn.
- The role of the teacher is to facilitate students' learning.
- The role of principals (headmasters) is to create the conditions in their schools in which teachers can
fulfil these roles.
- The role of policy-makers is to create conditions in which principals andschools can fulfil these
responsibilities.
The objective, then, of all innovation is to improve the relationship between teacherand student. In
this very line of thought, Carbonell (2012) identifies some factors that compound innovation within
the scope of comprehensive education:
1. Change and innovation are personal experiences that address the needs of individuals and groups.
2. Innovation tends to gradually establish meaningful relationships between subjects in such a way that
students have a more global picture of reality.
3. Schools become more democratic and attractive through innovative practices.
4. Innovation causes reflection on the experiences and dynamics lived in the classroom.
5. Since innovation comes from the teachers, it breaks up the classic idea about the teachers being
"obedient" to what the Administration (the experts in education) tell them to do in class.
6. Innovation widens the pedagogical autonomy of schools.
7. Innovation is the expected and natural response to the goals of education asa way to being adapted
to the needs of each era.
8. The way to become innovative lays on the capacity to work in teams.
9. Innovation is both a theory and a practice, at the same time, none of themcan be put aside.

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10. Innovation makes possible that unknown wishes and passions that the students had come up to
surface.
11. Innovation facilitates apprehending new knowledge, but at the same timeit helps understanding the
nature of knowledge too.
12. Innovation produces some kind of permanent intellectual restlessness.
13. It is easy to override the fact that training and education go together, butthere is no possible training
without a global educational approach.
Fernando Trujillo (2012), quoting Waters, states some features that help predicting the success or
failure of educational innovation:

• The innovative solution offers more or extra advantages than the previouspractice.
• Degree of compatibility with the persistent values, previous experiences and the needs of the agents
of change involved.
• The innovation can be monitored for some time to check its success.
• Visibility of the results of the innovation for external observers.
• Degree of originality. The greater the originality the lesser the degree of compatibility and the
greater the possibility of failure.
• Innovation must be concrete in theoretical and practical terms.
• Perception of the status that innovation generates in the educational community.
As Robinson said, the core of the process of innovation is the relationship between learner and
teacher, and this relationship must be looked after. Carbonell (2012) remarks some factors that not
only support this idea and but also create the favourable atmosphere for constant innovation:

1. Stable and receptive teamwork. When teachers are organised as teams, sharing and willing to share
information, innovation is much easier. Schools with a departmental organisation which commonly
design activities or programmes together are more inclined to introduce innovative practices.
2. Exchange networks for cooperation. Communication technologies facilitate the exchange of
experiences. Blogs or other instruments favour contactwith other teachers with similar interests.
3. Innovative regions. It is good to have innovative schools but if the schoolsof a whole area go together,
innovation is much likely to endure for longer.In those areas in which a region or a city supported
their schools, these became a continuous source of new initiatives. When a region shares their
findings and all schools within it put them into practice, the effort previously devoted to compete is
diverted to collaboration, improving all the schoolsat the same time.
4. Improving personal communication. Innovation is better and more prompt in an atmosphere of
solidarity and cooperation, and for that purpose, communication is vital but also physically sharing
spaces and routines, acts that celebrate the common purposes and show that that union of interests
is real.

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5. Correct institutionalisation. It has been repeatedly said that innovation must be institutionalised, but
there is an real risk of turning it in a stagnatedpractice if it is too routinised or transformed in a mere
slogan for the promotion of the school. In those cases, the "atmosphere" for change can be easily lost.
6. Constant movement ahead. The previous point implies that innovation must be something constant.
7. Reflection and evaluation. An internal evaluation procedure is absolutelynecessary, as well as the
debate and the publicity of the experience in scientific or professional journals in a way that may give
cause for constructive criticism that initiates a new cycle of innovation.
It has been said that innovation must beinstitutionalised in order to be stable and have impact on the
educational community. InSpain, there are gradually more and more schools that design their own
PLCs (ProyectoLingüístico de Centro) to make all the languages spoken (studied) in the school converge
into one single project. This is clearly the way FL teachers have to make their proposalsof change
evolve into institutionalised innovation. Taking the PLC as a reference, teachers can make change
possible at least in these areas:
• Timetables, time devoted to each language and most adequate exploitationof time distribution.
• The sequence in which the contents of each language are presented.
• Disciplines that are taught in each language.
• Criteria for the selection of contents in case of cross-curricular subjects.
• Literacy initiation, handwriting skills initiation.
• Attention to diversity applied to FL.
• Actions of educational intervention, i.e., with non-nationals.
• Evaluation of the skills for each language. The role of external certifications.
• Materials and resources.
• Accountability and communication of skill achievements to families.
At present, FL teachers need to face a twofold challenge: the integration of contentsand the "double
curriculum". CLIL and communicative approaches in schools are in process of implementation but
they still have a long way to go before achieving a wide- spread acceptance. Although the
Administrations do not oppose and even support theseapproaches they simultaneously raise the
ratio pupil/teacher to reduce costs or imposea summative and numeric evaluation, which at the end
of the day make communicative
approaches fail. On the other hand, the use of external examinations is applauded by parents and
politicians who think that these certifications are either a "guarantee" of the"level" of the school or a
merit with a view to the professional development.

BASIC CONCEPTS
➢ Corporatism. The defence of the interests of a group by the members of that group over the
interests of others.
➢ Double curriculum. It is the duality of objectives and procedures that a teacher has to teach and
follow as a result of introducing exams, tests or external evaluations in the ordinary course of the
academic year.
➢ PLC –Proyecto Lingüístico de Centro–. The school project that describes all the actions and
strategies to be taken to teach languages in every cycle.