Invitation to tender: A practice review on 16 – 19 technical and vocational teaching

This practice review will involve detailed observations of teaching practice across a selection of technical and vocational subject areas in the 16 – 19 sector. The review will help build our understanding of current practice in technical and vocational classrooms and workshops, as well as inform future commissioning and guidance for the sector.

Research aims and questions

Aims

• Understand current teaching practice in technical and vocational education settings.
• Identify if teaching practices within the schools ITTECF are being utilised within technical and vocational teaching and whether some are more prevalent than others.
• Identify whether there are other teaching practices commonly observed that are not included in the ITTECF.

• Identify whether there are any commonalities in teaching practice between colleges performing highly in the identified subject areas.
  

Questions

Main:

• Do vocational and technical teachers use the teaching practices identified from the schools ITTECF in their day-to-day teaching?

Secondary:

• Are any of the teaching practices more prevalent than others?
• Are other teaching practices observed that are not included on the list from the ITTECF?
• Do colleges who do particularly well for learners in the identified SSAs use different combinations, or amounts of the identified teaching practices in the first research question?

This project will consist of primary research, to give a snapshot of current teaching practice in vocational and technical teaching in 16 – 19 education. We are open to proposals that answer the primary and secondary research questions using a variety of methods, and are open to suggestions of innovative approaches. We will expect college visits and observations to be a key focus of the research plan.

We expect proposals to include a short feasibility phase in a small number of colleges, to test the subject areas identified and the list of classroom practices.

Research teams with experience of conducting qualitative research in education, a strong understanding of the 16 – 19 sector and pedagogy in England.

We are interested in proposals from single research teams or from consortia with complementary expertise and where the consortium can demonstrate that they will work well together to ensure the quality and efficiency of the project. This call for proposals is open; researchers do not need to be part of EEF’s panel of evaluators to apply.

We accept applications from legally constituted organisations and not from individuals. The organisation does not have to be based in England. If you are based outside of England, you will need to demonstrate how you will ensure that research outputs are relevant to the English education system and that your proposal represents value for money.