Historical Research in Education

Engaging in historical research involves examining source material that in most cases already exists in order to generate understandings about a topic of interest within a historical context. Usually, questions posed relate to such matters as how people, their actions, events, meanings and ideas in the past influenced and shaped phenomena of interest. Nevertheless, in education and the social sciences, the value of historical research has not always been fully appreciated. In this chapter we open by detailing why that situation is ill-advised. We follow with an overview of strategies for engaging in historical research, of issues regarding engagement in oral history, of the manner in which historians of education can draw up models from the social sciences to enrich their work, and of a range of questions illustrating significant areas that have still not been investigated to any great extent on the history of education in Ireland.