Focusing is about establishing the priority for improvement. In this phase teachers use information about students’ strengths and needs gathered during scanning in order to determine where to concentrate their energies to change the experiences and outcomes of students, and what is going to provide the biggest impact. The broad scan will reveal many new perspectives on students’ experiences. The focusing phase narrows and hones the area of investigation. It involves breaking down larger issues into something more workable, and explores close-up questions that offer additional insights. An outcome of the focusing phase might be a working map of the elements that comprise the area that needs improving, and identifying pathways toward potential approaches to trial. Focusing should allow teachers to develop a good idea of where to focus their ongoing inquiry and what it might involve.

A guide to the focusing phase 

Start by interrogating your evidence. Review the data and question your findings, asking ‘how do I know?’ and ‘why does this matter?’ Then create a data overview, a succinct and well-organised summary of data relevant to your question, based on several data sources, in order to provoke thinking and discussion. Share your data with a critical friend or your team. No one can individually identify all of the patterns in the data. Encourage them to ask questions, to challenge your assumptions, and to check your preconceptions and blind spots.

Next you need to select an area of focus. Focus on areas of student learning that are most important and which you have the greatest ability to influence. Be careful not to choose according to your own interests. Ensure that your area of inquiry focuses on investigating teaching practice (rather than, for example, creating a unit of work). Focus on what your scan shows is happening, and don’t introduce completely new areas unrelated to the scanning process. Select key observationsand generate inferences and potential explanations and conclusions for those observations. Avoid jumping to conclusions, but speculate what might be the reasons for the patterns in the data that you identify. 

It is important to ensure the selected focus is manageable: select no more than one or two small and specific areas, and make your inquiry deep and focused but not overly constrained. Sometimes areas are related or reinforce one another and so can be tackled at the same time. Think about how to build on strengths and positives as well as gain clarity on challenges. Consider whether there are common areas that you might collaborate on with other teachers.

Once you have narrowed your area of focus, you need to define the problem. Try to drill down and identify the true root cause of the problem. Continue to collect evidence to clarify what is happening, and avoid jumping to solutions: make sure you understand the issues fully.Ensure your analysis is thoughtful and based on multiple, rich sources of information.

Tools for focusing

The following tools may be useful during the focusing phase, although it is not essential to use these or any other formal tools.

Next steps

Before rushing to set a goal and create an action plan you need to work through the next phase in the inquiry spiral – the ‘developing a hunch’ phase. It is important you work through this phase to identify the cause(s) of and how your teaching practice has had an impact on the problem. 

References

Handscomb, G., & MacBeath, J. (2006) Professional development through teacher enquiry. SET – Resources for teachers, 1, 40-45.

The Literacy and Numeracy Secretariat. (2010).Collaborative teacher inquiry: New directions in professional practice. Retrieved from http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/literacynumeracy/inspire/research/CBS_SystemLeaders.pdf

Timperley, H., Kaser, L., & Halbert, J. (2014). A framework for transforming learning in schools: Innovation and the spiral of inquiry (Seminar series 234). Melbourne: Centre for Strategic Education.