A selected listing of books and other documents that directly relate to the history, theory and process of Practice-Based Inquiry®.
Thomas A. Wilson. The Fundamentals and Foundations of Practice-Based Inquiry®. Catalpa Ltd. October 2006. Special
Fundamentals presents the conceptual framework for PBI® including its assumptions, definitions, principles and theory of action.
Thomas A. Wilson. Answers to Basic Questions about Practice-Based Inquiry®. Catalpa Ltd. October 2006. Download
Using the FAQ format, Basic Questions provides the reader with a thorough introduction to PBI, based on the text of the web-site.
Thomas A. Wilson. Reaching for a Better Standard: English School Inspection and the Dilemmas of American Public School Inspection. Teachers College Press. 1996. For more information or to order, click here.
Catalpa's Principal Partner's well-regarded study of English School Inspection is a highly readable presentation of the roots of PBI.
Thomas A. Wilson. Visiting Accreditation: Strengthening the Regional Accreditation Process. LAB at Brown. March 1999. Download
This is the report from the multi-year field study of how to strengthen American secondary school accreditation in New England, carried out by Thomas A. Wilson under the auspices of the LAB at Brown. NEASC enthusiastically received the report and implemented many of its recommendations. The study was an important resource for the development of PBI and the SALT school visit. It served to show that the basic methodology underlying British inspection was also underlying American accreditation, mitigating obvious concerns that PBI might be too "English" for American institutions, values and accountability practices.
James Learmonth. Inspection: What's in it for Schools? Falmer. December 2000. Order from publisher.
The late James Learmonth was a retired HMI inspector who devoted his full energy to school improvement in Britain and the United States. His work had a powerful influence on the ideas behind Catalpa Ltd, Practice-Based Inquiry and Rhode Island's SALT accountability system.
Michael Luntley. Wittgenstein: Meaning and Judgement. Blackwell, Oxford and New York. 2003. Order from publisher.
Michael Luntley, Head of the Philosophy Department, Warwick University, England, carefully considers professional judgment as a rationale and important philosophical concept, rather than as something mysterious. This seminal book ties his work on judgment to the main stream ideas of modern philosophy. See additional references from his research project, Attention and Knowledge Bases of Expertise, under the Research and Technical heading.
Atul Gawande. Complications: A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science. Henry Holt and Company, New York. 2002. Order from publisher.
This fascinating and well written collection of essays by a practicing surgeon describes the tensions in his practice between the precise use of formal, scientific knowledge and the knowledge a surgeon gains from his experience doing surgery. This well-written, book is a preliminary exploration why it is necessary to better understand the importance of professional judgment in medical practice.
Sarah Lawrence-Lightfoot. J. H. Davis. The Art and Science of Portraiture. Wiley, John & Sons, Incorporated. 2002. Order from publisher.
The argument of this well written book is that portraiture, an unexpected approach to field research, has a strong claim for the legi timacy of its findings. While Portraiture and PBI differ in interesting ways, the background arguments about what makes inquiry legi timate reverberate between them.
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