England provides an important example of how the espousal of ‘evidence’ in policy, and to an extent among teachers, is grafted onto a pervasive high-stakes accountability. It will show how calls for evidence-based teaching are being promoted through policy measures, including substantial funding for approved research (the Education Endowment Foundation), but also by populist traditionalists around ResearchED who appeal to teachers’ desire for professional status to be restored (Bennett 2013). This presentation responds to the claims of RCT advocates that they are a reliable and ‘scientific’ form of research (Black 2018; Simpson 2017; Wrigley 2018). It shows how misleading conclusions are reached and disseminated which lean towards traditionalist pedagogical practices, but also reframe teaching as ‘interventions’ for the transmission of knowledge . The dangers of a simplistic understanding of scientific experiments will be outlined, along with the need to hold onto the complexity of the real world. It will introduce the format of the EEF Toolkit (a meta-meta-analysis designed to compared ‘interventions’ to remedy poverty-related underachievement) to demonstrate its flawed assumptions and methodology, including some detailed examples of how it provides teachers with distorted and damaging guidance. Manifestations of the ‘apples and oranges’ problem will be presented. Building on these illustrations, a case will be argued that the roots of these errors lie in a Humean empiricism which is content with surface regularities and fails to look for underlying causal mechanisms (Gorard et al 2016). It will use Critical Realism (Bhaskar 1978; 1979) to argue the importance of theory, and the inadequacy of additive or linear models of knowledge acquisition. The nature of education as involving open, semiotic and recursive situations (Biesta 2010) will be explored, along with thoughts about emergence as intrinsic to education.

Bennett, T (2013) Teacher proof: why research in education doesn’t always mean what it claims, and what you can do about it. London: Routledge Bhaskar, R (1978) A realist theory of science. Hassocks: Harvester Press Bhaskar, R (1979) The possibility of naturalism: A philosophical critique of the contemporary human sciences. London: Routledge Biesta, G (2010) Why 'what works' still won't work: From evidence-based education to value-based education. Studies in the Philosophy of Education 29, pp 491-503 Black, C (2018) Science / Fiction: 'Evidence-based' education, scientific racism, and how learning styles became a myth. http://carolblack.org/science-fiction/ (accessed 24 August 2018) Gorard, S, Siddiqui, N and See, B H (2016) An evaluation of Fresh Start as a catch-up intervention: A trial conducted by teachers. Educational Studies 42(1), 98-113. Simpson, A. (2017). The misdirection of public policy: Comparing and combining standardised effect sizes. Journal of Education Policy, 32(4), 450-466 Wrigley, T (2018) The power of 'evidence': reliable science or a set of blunt tools? British Educational Research Journal 44(3) pp359-376