EDIT 6900
Lesson: What is Research?
This lesson to be completed
during Cycle 1
Updated 8-21-08
| I have some comments to make about these
readings, and then some thought questions for you. Overall comments I hope you've heard me say that that I like the Farmer book very much and feel it to be a concise guide to doing useful research in the media center. If you can see "around" the SLM context, it's a sound guide to action research as an educational endeavor. However, because it IS so concise, we will supplement it with articles that present other points of view and fill in the gaps. As you read through Farmer, there is a point beyond which we will not work in this class. Although we'll read the whole book, I don't expect you to collect data in your big research project. There is another research book that I like almost as much as the Farmer: Leedy, P.D., & Ormrod, J.E. (2001). Practical research: Planning and design
(7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill Prentice Hall. (I own
this 7th edition, and a new one comes out regularly. Any edition is
useful, and there are several since this one.)
The Leedy & Ormrod is a textbook for research that I've used many times. I like it too because it's well explained. However, it has many parts that are not relevant to our agenda, and so I chose not to use it as a text. I held this one up in class at our first meeting. I can't use the first chapter as a reading for you this term, because it would be a copyright violation, since I've used it before. There are a couple of valuable points here, however. Comments about Leedy & Ormrod (L&O), Chapter 1 It is quite important to be able to distinguish research from non-research. However, I believe that these authors take a rather "prissy" point of view on the subject of what qualifies as research. As SLMSs, we believe that inquiry itself is a useful activity. It's based on curiosity or a life problem, it involves exploring the world of information for relevant information, and it may involve action to solve the original problem. We believe that all parts of this process are inherently useful and educational for all members of our learning communities. Leedy and Ormrod make light of some of our cherished notions about inquiry by labeling them "not research." However, L&O represent by far and away the dominant view within the Academy. For some "professional" researchers, research isn't research unless it involves data collection and all the steps after that. Dissertations and publications for professors that "count" toward tenure and promotion must be of the data collection variety. Many professors do not consider information-based research as the real thing. It is important for you to be able to distinguish which form of research is being discussed in any particular situation. Take these examples:
Which of these fictional examples meet the definition of research? See my answers below. For a few days, I'd like you to listen out for the word "research." A new study is featured in the media almost every day. Try to figure out exactly what kind of activity is meant each time you hear the word used. It is a useful skill to be able to distinguish the kinds of research apart, because it helps you to decide the level of trust to place in a statement based on "research." In addition to a lengthy discussion of the meaning of the word "research," L&O present this imporant idea: most often, a research project generates as many questions as it answers. This book has a wonderful Evaluation Checklist for critiquing research studies. Luckily, it's available as a handout online. We will use it when we discuss Critiquing in this class. Comments about Farmer Focus on p.1, paragraph 6, beginning "So what exactly is action research?" She lays out the steps in an action research project. In this class, we will end our projects at "designing." I don't have too much to say about these 2 pages - but in general, Farmer takes the research enterprise and tailors it to our professional work. It's highly relevant to K-12 education in general, although her context is strictly SLM. Scholastic's School Library Works I have two reservations about this publication. First, it is provided by a commercial interest. I admire the Scholastic company and think they provide super resources for schools. However, any commercial interest always sets up a possible bias in any inquiry. Obviously, it helps to sell books if school libraries are healthy and supported. On the other hand, little research would be accomplished if it were not for corporate investment - this is an intrinsic problem for most research endeavors. Second, it is not in APA style. This is not a fault of the document - but don't follow it as a guide! The worst aspect of this little problem is the lack of tight inline citations. That is, you can't easily match up a finding in the document with the source of that finding. With those two caveats out of the way, this is a highly useful resource. The reference list at the end should provide a nice supply of "impact" studies that show positive correlations between SLM factors and testing performance, along with other findings. Scholastic has provided a nice synthesis of these many studies for our convenience - admittedly with a highly positive bias. Todd Dr. Ross Todd is highly respected in the SLM field. His point of view is to be paid attention to. This recent essay in one of our leading practitioner journals urges building-level SLMSs to gather evidence to inform practice - or evidence-based practice. While ambitious to carry out, this general approach is one of the guiding principles underlying this course. It's important to have evidence to proove we're all doing a good job. It's more important to use evidence to guide decision-making so that SLM programs will be effective in the first place. Types of Research Articles None of these readings address a challenge that we will have in this class: distinguishing among types of published professional articles. Here is my taxonomy of what you will find in typical educational professional literature:
Don't confuse these types of articles with the Types of Research we'll be discussing later. Supplemental thinking (no action required) 1. Farmer's steps suggest a cycle of action research activity. I wish she had drawn a picture. What might this look like? (This would make a great "giveback.") 2.Listen for the use of the word "research" in your world (conversations, news media, etc.). What did the person using the word really mean? 3. Browse through the table of contents of a professional journal. Classify 5 of the articles into my list of types above. ======================== "Answers": Examples "c" and "d" meet the stringent definition of "research." Example "e" arguably meets the definition - educators would definitely think so, while other scientists might argue about it. Examples "a" and "b" are really information inquiries (although valuable, of course). Example "f" is an action research project; its qualification as "research" is highly arguable, but a prime example of applied and useful research as far as we are concerned. |
8/22/08: refreshed for 2008. Readings changed. 2007: created.
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