“In My Opinion” Is Not a Teaching Model

SoL in the Wild Published December 24, 2025
Original URL: https://scienceoflearning.substack.com/p/in-my-opinion-is-not-a-tea...

Summary

In “In My Opinion” Is Not a Teaching Model, the author confronts a deeply ingrained habit in education: treating personal preference and anecdotal experience as equal to—or even more important than—evidence when making instructional decisions. While classrooms are rich with ideas, strategies, and philosophies, the article argues that the profession’s greatest obstacle is not a shortage of innovation, but the persistent belief that “what I like” or “what works for me” carries the same weight as research on how students actually learn.

The piece opens with a familiar scenario. In professional conversations, teachers often justify practices with phrases like “In my opinion,” “This fits my teaching style,” or “What works for my kids is different.” While these statements may reflect sincerity and care, they are frequently used as conversation-enders rather than starting points for deeper analysis. In most professions—medicine, engineering, aviation—personal opinion does not override established evidence. In education, however, it often does.

The author illustrates this tension through a discussion with a colleague about checking for understanding. Drawing on research from scholars such as Barak Rosenshine and Dylan Wiliam, the author advocates for frequent, planned checks and whole-class responses to inform instruction. The colleague’s repeated response—“In my opinion…”—was not a research-based counterargument, but a return to preference. The issue was not disagreement, but the standard being used to justify practice. Evidence was treated as just one perspective among many, rather than the foundation for professional judgment.

A central insight of the article is that when opinion becomes the primary lens, evidence is never truly considered. Research is tolerated, not interrogated. This is not framed as a moral failing of teachers, but as a consequence of preparation and training that often fail to ground educators in the science of learning. Without an evidence-based framework, personal experience naturally becomes the default authority.

The author reflects candidly on having once operated this way themselves—making decisions based on intuition and comfort rather than alignment with how learning works. Exposure to cognitive science and learning research shifted their thinking. Instructional questions changed from “Do I like this?” to “What problem does this solve?” and “Compared to what?” That shift, the author argues, is essential if teaching is to function as a true profession.

Importantly, the article emphasizes that the solution is structural, not personal. Shaming teachers for relying on opinion is neither fair nor effective. Instead, systems must be redesigned so that evidence-based practice becomes the norm.

The first lever for change is teacher preparation. Evidence-based practices and learning science should be foundational, not optional or dependent on individual professors. Teachers should enter the profession fluent in concepts such as cognitive load theory, explicit instruction, retrieval practice, spacing, and the work of researchers like Sweller, Rosenshine, and Lemov—rather than encountering these ideas a decade into their careers.

Second, professional learning must align with research rather than trends, vendor offerings, or philosophical preferences. Districts should create coherence by anchoring initiatives in a shared, research-backed instructional framework. Evidence-based practice should not be one initiative among many; it should be the throughline.

The author also calls for districts to rethink how curriculum and professional learning departments are structured. Dedicated teams focused on cognitive science and learning research could curate evidence, translate it into classroom-ready guidance, and ensure alignment across initiatives.

Finally, the article stresses that training alone is insufficient. Teachers need supported practice, observation, and feedback aligned to the same evidence base. Without follow-up, training fades back into preference. Without observation, opinion goes unchallenged. Without coaching, ineffective practices persist.

The article concludes with a powerful reframing: shifting from opinion to evidence is not a loss of autonomy. It is a mark of professionalism—and a responsibility owed to students. When evidence becomes the default lens, instructional conversations deepen, coherence increases, and teaching moves closer to the professional standard students deserve.

Original Article-

“In My Opinion” Is Not a Teaching Model

SoL in the Wild Published December 24, 2025
Original URL: https://scienceoflearning.substack.com/p/in-my-opinion-is-not-a-tea...

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Prepared with the assistance of AI software

OpenAI. (2025). ChatGPT (4) [Large language model]. https://chat.openai.com