Two theoretical frameworks guided this investigation of the gap between reading disabilities research and teachers' practices. First, the concept of knowledge utilization significantly informed the methods, analyses, and implications of the study. Knowledge itself is a controversial subject which I discuss in this chapter. Also, several models have been proposed to dissect the term "use" and to explain impediments to knowledge use. I selected a model which merged Knott and Wildavsky's (1980) stages of knowledge use and Stone's (2002) routes to knowledge use to examine the issues concerning education research.
Secondly, the review of the literature on teachers' utilization of research revealed a paucity of teachers' participation in exploring the matter. As I discussed in Chapter II, twelve studies, published between 1995 and 2010, were found to have investigated education research use by eliciting teachers' input; however, these studies did not recruit educators' perspectives on a rationale for a research to practice gap or for means to bridge a gap. Frequently, teachers have been objects of discussions concerning research
implementation. This positioning of educators prompted me to adopt a critical perspective on the topic, which resultantly underpinned my research methods. Specifically, critical theoretical views, as informed by the work of Giroux (1988), McLaren (2007), and Kincheloe (2000) among others, were useful in informing my conceptualization of teachers and their pedagogical practices as contextually specific and enmeshed in relations of power. Critical theorists dispute traditionalist beliefs that knowledge is rational, objective, and unmediated, and they apply this knowledge to
thinking about teachers as „transformative intellectuals' rather than as technicians who merely impart knowledge to their students. Critical theory therefore informed my approach to studying the use of education research; however, it particularly provided insights into the systemic implications of this issue. In the following sections, I discuss knowledge utilization and critical theories in general and specifically with reference to their roles in the current study.
Theories of Knowledge Utilization
Before embarking on a discussion of knowledge utilization theories, the concept of "knowledge" warrants attention. From both a critical theory and cognitive perspective, knowledge has embodied various connotations. For example, from a cognitivist
viewpoint, Paisley and Butler (1983) reported that knowledge is awareness, skill, or change that can be made by individuals or by organizations and that it is produced by anyone from nursery school to graduate school. Concepts of "technical" versus
"practical" knowledge have also been forwarded, where technical knowledge "is capable of written codification" and practical knowledge is acquired through experience and is not necessarily amenable to written description (Eraut, 1985, p. 119). Knott and
Wildavsky (1980) suggested that knowledge specifies the relationship between variables and consequences in contrast to information, which relates variables to effects in a hypothetical relationship. However, “scholars differ on how much distinction should be made between 'information' and 'knowledge'; knowledge is usually inferred to be more refined and to have some pretested 'value'” (Backer, 1991, p. 227). Backer (1991) additionally stated that knowledge may be the "manifestation of the human urge to solve problems, to master the environment around us" (p. 225).
Karmon (2007) pointed out that schools inculcate the curricular subject, which is produced by others and is located in textbooks, as real knowledge. On the other hand, Hood (2002) equated "information" with "knowledge"; however, similar to Eraut (1985), Hood challenged the view that knowledge consists of "objective" facts that are easily communicated and understood, and transferred as if "filling an 'empty vessel'" (p. 3). Hood claimed that "new views of knowledge …stress its implicit and social nature" (p. 3); from the more current constructivist viewpoint, "knowledge is developmental, internally constructed and socially and culturally mediated" (p. 6). Hood also referred to "craft knowledge" (p. 5) which is "local" (p. 4) and evolves from individual learning and "communities of learners" within organizations (p. 3) and which usually prevails over scientific knowledge in its use. In considering knowledge use, Hood contended that we must reconcile that scientific and craft knowledge are melded in users' contexts.
Despite Hood's (2002) arguments, literature concerning the research to practice gap often refers to knowledge as the published output of a planned piece of research (Williams & Coles, 2007). While the meaning of “research” itself might also be
“contested” (Levin, 2004, p. 2), research in the context of evidence-based practice and the research to practice gap has customarily implied knowledge produced by researchers external to schools (Levin, 2004; Ontario Ministry of Education, 2007; Sari, 2006; Scribner, 2005; Shultz, 2007; Thompson, Estabrooks, & Degner, 2006; Williams & Coles, 2007; Wise, 2007). Teachers in my pre-pilot study, which is reported in Chapter V, appeared to share this connotation of research. Readers are reminded, however, that the definition of research for my study is: evidence of methods to identify and instruct students at risk for reading disabilities that have been shown to be effective by multiple
methods and/or studies. Reliable and useful knowledge may well be "local" or from "outside" (Louis, 2005, p. 55). I have not indicated a preference for one particular mode of knowledge production or research despite the fact that the literature may.
With respect to the utilization of knowledge, interest in this phenomenon reportedly extends back to the ancient Greeks (Landry, Amara, & Lamari, 2001). In America, the topic has been studied in “three waves (1920-1960, 1960-1980 and the present)” (Backer, 1991, p. 225) and it continues to garner extensive interest across disciplines such as business, health, human services, and education.
As early as the 1920s, a dissemination paradigm dominated the study of research use (Coulson, 1983; Craig, 2006; Herie & Martin, 2002; Hood, 2002; Thompson et al., 2006). Concern centered on the distribution of knowledge that was produced external to the intended user, sometimes physically and culturally distant (Hood, 2002). Hood (2002) illustrated the past dynamics of research dissemination as in Figure 1. Research was produced outside the realm of the intended users; it was then dispersed to users who
were to implement the findings. Hood also suggested that the steps may have been bi- directional with a "two-way exchange" (Hood, 2002, p. 3) as in Figure 2.
Attention to research dissemination was first motivated by interest in transmitting agricultural advances to farmers and innovative teaching strategies to educators (Backer, 1991). The initial attempts to develop explicit policies to make science more accessible to society in the United States began in 1929. With the information explosion after 1945, the concentration on promoting knowledge use flourished (Backer, 1991). The second wave (1960-1980) emphasized the study of both knowledge dissemination and
Figure 1. Past dynamics of research dissemination.