No reliable answer yet. So even good research does not point inexorably to good instructional practice. Nevertheless, some excellent research has been done in the last two decades or so on how students understand topics in science and mathematics. It is this aspect of science-education research that can be most profitably copied in technology education. Newton's laws of motion.
Students believe constant speed needs some cause to sustain it.
Nevertheless, some research indicates that middle-school students can start understanding the effect of constant forces to speed up, slow down, or change the direction of motion of an object. So tough decisions have to be made, if there is to be any substantial progress. Just the opposite. Cover the widest possible range of research questions that can be imagined. All of these examples assume that student learning is by far the highest priority to study.