Steps in the Research Process

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Steps in the Research Process

• EDSE 510 Fall 2005
• David Geelan

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Three questions in research

• What claims do you want to make?
• What audience do you need to convince of the
  strength of those claims?
• What kind(s) of evidence do you need to collect
  and analyze to convince that audience?

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What claims do you want to make?

• Do you want to claim that
• You have a new teaching strategy that will
  increase standardised test scores?
• You can richly portray the reality of classroom
  teaching for education students?
• You can identify a particular factor that is
  leading to student difficulties?
• Lots more possibilities!

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What audience do you need to convince of the
strength of those claims?

• Who are the results of your research directed
  toward?
• Teachers? Administrators? Teacher Educators? The
  broader community? Politicians? Academics?
• Part of this question what would change if your
  research served the purpose you have for it?

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What kind(s) of evidence do you need to collect
and analyze to convince that audience?

• Different audiences require different kinds of
  evidence some read teacher narratives, some
  require statistical analysis, some like quotes
  from students and teachers
• What will be intelligible, plausible and fruitful
  for the audience(s) you have in mind?

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Avoiding Scientism

• We tend to default to assuming that models from
  the physical sciences are the gold standard in
  research experimental group, control group,
  dependent variable, independent variable,
  controlled variables, quantitative data
• It can be argued that humans (teachers and
  students) arent simple enough for all variables
  but the ones of interest to be controlled

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• Experimental studies are only one possible model
  out of a wide range of ways in which educational
  research can be conducted
• We will look at experimental studies (Chapter 11
  in Creswell), but also describe plenty of
  alternative approaches

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Different paradigms

• positivist vs post-positivist
• qualitative vs quantitative

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Steps in the Research Process

• From Creswell (2005), who claims that these are
  generic enough to fit both quantitative and
  qualitative studies
• identify a research problem
• review the literature
• specify a purpose for the research
• collect data
• analyze and interpret the data
• evaluate the results and report the research

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• Please note that in some qualitative and action
  research studies there may be a number of
  iterative cycles moving back and forth between
  steps 4 and 5, and even step 3 may be revisited
  in the course of the project

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identify a research problem

• What are you passionate about? Why?
• What issues are in pressing need of attention in
  (your field of) education?
• What issues have teachers (a) excited or (b)
  frustrated, and what kind of information would
  share the former and alleviate the latter?

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review the literature

• What have other people written and said about the
  problem?
• What relevant research has already been
  conducted?
• What methods were used in the existing studies?
  How well did those methods work?

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specify a purpose for the research

• Operationalise the research problem as one or
  more research questions, and think in detail
  about what specific kind(s) of evidence will
  allow you to make plausible claims as answers to
  those questions
• What will change if your research serves its
  purpose? (i.e. your purpose)

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collect data

• Collect all of the relevant kinds of evidence
• numbers
• words
• impressions
• media
• etc

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analyze and interpret the data

• Use the appropriate tools to analyze (comes from
  the Greek verb to loose(n) i.e. pull it
  apart) the data you have gathered and to make
  meaning from them

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evaluate the results and report the research

• Determine whether and how well the research
  serves its purpose, and how plausible the claims
  you make are
• Find appropriate means to communicate the results
  to the relevant audience this may include
  published papers but may also include multimedia,
  web sites, seminars, workshops, etc

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The Steps and EDSE 510

• Steps 1-3 will be similar for quantitative and
  qualitative studies, Steps 4-6 will be quite
  different for different types of studies
• This course is intended to help you to develop a
  wider repertoire of paradigms, perspectives,
  methods, skills and approaches in order to serve
  your research problems and purposes