thank you for the tip -- he says "For theory, it seems to me, closes

one’s eyes, or – perhaps less than this – in some way occludes one’s view

of the environment around. -- :) and "There has been a taken-for-granted

assumption in education that the pursuance of theory ultimately confers

improvements on practice" -- GREAT and "educational theory has nearly always led educational practice into wild goose chases and culs-de-sac." :)  -- reading it right now :) thanks. But all this does not mean we dont need theories, we just need to know what to do with this and this is what education does not know b/c they dont connect the  dots , to much stuck in the glory and shine of mentors whom we admire not use to move beyond -- ania 

Dear Paul I am spending my whole Sunday reading that book - blessing to you!!!!!!!!!!! OMG thank you -- any other books ?? :) 

Too many, too diverse ... what exactly are you interested in (theoretically), what exactly are you trying to improve (pragmatically)? ... Last year, I had to delve deep into the philosophy of science and research, looking for useful innovative ways to demonstrate the empirical validity of my views about educational assessment ... only to find out that there are as many philosophies of science as there are scholars writing about it ... no convergence of ideas and proposals ... the de facto standard view of doing empirical research in social science (hundreds of books and articles) is either not applicable or not fruitful in the field of education (in my opinion) ... there is a lack of substantive theory, instead, people are collecting data in the vain hope of finding new truths or insights whose significance goes well beyond the research project which produced the findings ... the idea of conducting regular empirical research to distill substantive theory out of it is plainly ill-conceived, perhaps even false ... all our observations, data, methods etc. are heavily theory-laden, alas the existing theories are still very meager, and some beautiful theories of the past have been forgotten without continued work on and in it ... Thus I stopped this literature research from last year and I am working again on my own theories ... for better or worse ;-)

Dear Ania: There is nonetheless one book from the category of philosophy of science that I like to recommend, as I am currently reading it, or rather, just finished reading. It is remarkably different from anything else I have encountered soforth. Unfortunately, it is only in german language, so you may not be able to read it. Its title is a tongue-in-cheek reference to the well-known QED (quod erat demonstrandum) at the end of mathematical proofs: "What had to be doubted" with the rather bold subtitle "The lie of objective science". 

https://www.amazon.com/Was-bezweifeln-war-objektiven-Wissenschaft/dp/342627485X

I speak German but I will be not likely to read it too closely as it is just too hard to translate when writing about it. I am fluent in German or at least was for a large part of my life -- I have all I need when it comes to my project area. I am not lost in those models and saw clearly that as good as Greg Thomas is he has not solved the problem; he keeps walking around it but blinded by his belief in "education" he still wants to teach - -hence his problem. I still have to read the last chapter so I hope he  solves it there though I doubt. But i am so GRATEFUL to you of that link -- I will check that German link nonetheless, b/c you seem to be sending me title that are mind blowing :) Thank you