Developing teachers’ professional competence: Accessing research evidence and a theory of action

This article outlines a framework of teachers' professional competence and explores the relationship between teacher access to research and their own professional competence. It then goes onto explore the underpinning theory of action, which describes the relationship between teacher access to research and improved pupil outcomes. Finally the article explores the implications of the interaction between the framework of competence and theory of action for a range of different stakeholders, such as the Chartered College of Teaching, Multi-Academy Trusts, individual schools and teachers. One of the first successes of the Chartered College of Teaching has been to allow its members access to over 2,000 educational journals, which had previously sat behind publishers' expensive pay walls. As Dame Alison Peacock, the College's chief executive, says: 'Educational research can sometimes be seen as quite esoteric and separate from the realities of day-to-day teaching… We hope the knowled