Methodology of Educational Research

Offerings:
Course GEDU 603 | Fall, spring and summer semesters of each academic year.

Catalog Description:

General Education course descriptions in the USF General Catalog online.

Objectives or Outcomes:

  1. Students will know the uses of, and the differences between, the scientific and interpretive methods of educational research
  2. Students will be able to apply the terms, concepts, methods, and processes in evaluating and critiquing research reports and journal articles
  3. Students will produce a plan or proposal for a research investigation in the field of education
  4. Students will know and evaluate research ethics for scientific and interpretive studies
  5. Students will be able to apply for IRB approval of their research

Course Topics:

  1. Qualitative and quantitative research traditions
  2. Structure of a research article
  3. Research problem
  4. Literature review and the role of theory
  5. Research questions
  6. Ethics
  7. Quantitative research: Variables, causal argument, and generalizability
  8. Quantitative research: Designs and descriptive and inferential statistics
  9. Quantitative research: Criteria for evaluation
  10. Qualitative research: Process of qualitative research, ethics, and the role of theory
  11. Qualitative research: Truth value, neutrality, confirmability, transferability, and rigor
  12. Qualitative research: Approaches and methods
  13. Qualitative research: Criteria for evaluation
  14. Components of a research plan and process of research design
  15. IRBPHS application process

Criteria of Evaluation:

  • Develop a research plan
  • Evaluation of a quantitative research study reported in a scholarly journal
  • Evaluation of a qualitative research study reported in a scholarly journal
  • Multiple-choice tests

Possible Course Textbooks:

Bodgen and Bicklen. Qualitative research in education.

Crowl, T.K. (1996). Fundamentals of educational research (2nd ed.). Madison, WI: Brown & Benchmark Publishers.

Mertes, D.M. (1998). Research methods in education and psychology: Integrating diversity with quantitative & qualitative approaches. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Mertes, D.M., and McLaughlin, J. (1995). Research methods in special education. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Vierra, A., Pollock, J., and Golez, F. (1998). Reading educational research (3rd ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill.

Stylistic Manuals:

American Psychological Association. (1994). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (4th ed.). Washington, DC: Author.