Carrie Ann’s Reading Log (2/15)- The Many Directions of Research Design
Which is the research path best traveled? This will mainly depend on your research question and time frame in which you choose to do your study. As a researcher, you must make a decision of which way to “travel” (primarily quantitative or qualitative) once you have formulated your research topic question. Chapter six in the McKinney book presents an abridged version of the specific research methodologies and some thoughts on how you can find the right method for your SoTL research. Just last semester I took the Educational Research and Research in Special Education classes, so I am very familiar with the methodologies presented in the chapter. One thing that I made note of while reading her description of the questionnaire methodology was that a vital point was left out. In order to insure validity in findings and to make your findings generalizable to the population you need at least a 50% response rate with the questionnaire. This can be hard to achieve in some cases because some people will just look at a questionnaire and toss it or delete it, and it might take multiple administrations/mailings to achieve the response rate that you need for this method. Also, I do wish that the author took more time to explain in depth the types of analysis that are required for the specific research methodologies, this also needs to be taken into consideration by the researcher.
For myself and in the topics I would like to study, a multi-method approach would suit my research area. But, this can change if you slightly change your research question. You need to take a long look at your research question, the subjects/individuals involved and materials at your disposal and match your research methodology to give you the best “path” to take in order to study your topic to the fullest.
Teddy’s 9 “How to get started?” Research Questions
Teddy’s 9 “How do I get started?” Research Questions
Posted for class session 02.09.2010
Question 1. Think about a teaching and /or learning issue, problem, or question that you have about your students, a course, an assignment, a pedagogical strategy, your program, etc. Briefly state that issue, problem, or question as a question(s). Problem: Why are college undergraduate programs still training skilled music students to seek traditional modes of employment rather than modes relative to entrepreneurial/indie commercial music?
Question 2. What do you know about this topic and about ways to study this question from the extant literature in your discipline and in higher education more broadly? Answer: I can only state what I have basically observed/witnessed about the programs and various colleagues as an adjunct faculty member.
Question 3. Given your question, what type of information or artifacts do you already have that will help you answer this question? Answer: Presently, I possess a host of other music scholars who have passionately discussed this topic in various forums. Their perspectives and resolutions are many, as are the pros and cons of the issue!
Question 4. Given your question, what type of information or artifacts will you need (and from what sources) to answer this question? Answer: To properly answer this question, I feel directed to acquire personal background data about administrators, professors and students of current music programs that are for the most part traditionally engaged in their pedagogical approach to prepare undergraduate music students for the workforce. This would equate to knowing their goals or mission statements, program history, structure and/or configuration of their department, funding, graduation rates and their global vision for their school of music.
Question 5. Given your question and the information you need, what research strategies might you use to obtain this information and answer this question? Answer: I would use interviews, employment-success rates of students to non-traditional/commercial employers, internet research data, human resources department data from school systems, employment data of public music stores and a single university data bank of music school graduates employed the prior year.
Question 6. What time frame will be most appropriate to answer your question? Answer: One year!
Question 7. What are some practical problems you might face in doing this study? What resources would you need and how might you obtain these? Answer: Privacy issues, intimidation and rejection towards discussing the topic are some of the practical problems that could arise in researching this issue. I would need department files, personal information of graduates and their employers from universities and this could prove to be the tough cookie to crumble.
Question 8. What ethical issues should you consider in doing this study? Answer: Privacy and non-biased accurate reporting!
Question 9. In what ways and in what outlets will you be able to obtain peer feedback on this work and make this work public? Answer: Blogs, conferences, seminars, online surveys, books, email & via-media.
Jason’s Response to Teddy’s reading log from 2/7
Reading Teddy’s posting outlining his experience in a less than ideal graduate course, I thought to myself “this is why all of this teaching and learning stuff is so important”. Most people would agree that education is important for any society. They may outline economic benefits or democratic advantages to having an educated public, but are our college courses really achieving the goal of education? Having a degree is nice on a resume, but are we truly educating. If we are to rely on the kind of course that Teddy outlined, in which a professor blindly assuming that meaningful learning is occurring and consciously chooses to ignore a structural inequality in the course design, I think the answer is “no”.
Jason’s NINE research questions
1) Think about a teaching and/or learning issue, problem, or question that you have about your students, a course, an assignment, a pedagogical strategy, your program, etc. Briefly state that issue, problem, or question as a question(s)
“How can an introductory sociology course best teach the sociological perspective to students, for their long term use?” would be my ideal research questions, although practically I will probably have to reduce that down to a specific content area. For example, “Which activities are most effective at introducing institutional inequality?”
2) What do you know about this topic and about ways to study this question from the extant literature in your discipline and in higher education more broadly?
I think that this issue has a lot to do with many of the articles and books that I have read in my CTCH classes. The sociological perspective is an ability and therefore requires teaching that rewards application over memorization (deep learning vs. surface learning, active vs. passive learning, etc). Most sociological studies relevant to this issue (mostly in the journal teaching sociology) use pre/post tests, which vary in quality. I hope to learn in this course the most effective ways to measure learning outcomes and apply those methodologies to my proposal for this course.
3) Given your question, what types of information or artifacts do you already have that will help you answer this question?
I think that I kind of answered this question in my above question 2 answer. However, I would think that I would heavily rely on teaching sociology and SToL literature. I also have access to both in class and online course each semester.
4) Given your question, what other types of information or artifacts will you need (and from what sources) to answer this question?
I think that the biggest piece of information I would need is the outcomes assessment. I need to figure out if I want to go qualitative or quantitative in the research design.
5) Given your question and the information your need, what research strategies might you use to obtain this information and answer this question?
I think I would go about this in a pretty standard way, like approaching any research. However, my teaching technique would be the independent variable and the outcomes the dependent variable. Again, I need to decide on qualitative or quantitative methods of gathering my data.
6) What time frame will be most appropriate to answer your question?
This research can be done over the course of a semester (16 weeks) o a shorter time frame for summer courses.
7) What are some practical problems you might face in doing this study? What resources would you need and how might you obtain these?
Well, I have access/informed consent, etc. However, learning outcomes are a difficult variable to measure. Hopefully in this course I can learn some of the better techniques and apply them in my research.
8 What ethical issues should you consider in doing this study?
I don’t see any ethical conflict, but as I get more specific, one may become apparent. I would need to go through the IRB.
9) In what ways and in what outlets will you be able to obtain peer feedback on this work and make this work public?
Well, I will probably attempt to publish my dissertation in teaching sociology. So that would offer peer review.
FYI – Responses in Comments Section
Hi, everyone,
Just in case you don’t see them, I posted responses as comments to previous entries. On the “Add New Post” page, there is a link on the left-hand side that you can click. I think this should get you there. Otherwise you can view the original entries and scroll down. I believe they were in response to “Carrie Ann’s 1/26 Class Reflection” and “What We Should Study and How?” Thanks.
Aracelie