The Navigation and Sailing Report #4

Port name: ETEC 500

Port Section: 65E

Port Website: http://met.ubc.ca/etec-500 

Port Time Frame: (Jan-Apr 2013)

Port specialty: Research Methodologies in Education (core course)

Port Director: Dr. Janet McCracken

Port Administrator: David Roy

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Description

This course introduces students to issues and practices in a range of educational research methodologies. Through interactive modules, students learn about and engage with research strategies to promote an understanding of how research impacts our lives and educational pursuits.
This course examines the methodological possibilities available to those reading, reviewing or conducting educational research. Research is viewed as a way of thinking critically about education issues and practice and is seen as central to the conduct of all education. We assume that education is advanced through the critical application of research and believe it is enhanced when educators practice with a disposition of inquiry and wonder.

We recommend that students complete the four required core courses as early in your program as possible. Students will find it beneficial to take this course (ETEC 500) earlier rather than later in their program, and many previous students have stated that taking this course first in their program is extremely beneficial.

 

Objectives

Specifically the course will:

• introduce students to the variety of ways people frame and conduct research in education;

• familiarize students with resources available to them for the conduct of research (for example, libraries, online resources);

• enhance skills in critical reading and scholarly writing pertaining to educational research, and

• enable students to use the information and skills obtained through the above objectives in the development of assignments that reflect their personal education and research interests.

 

Artifact #1: Research Article Critiques: AC1 and AC2

 

The AC1 critiques the research study "Preparing preservice teachers in a diverse world" by Lenski, S.D., Crawford, K., Crumpler, T. & Stallworth, C, (2005), aimed to discover, prove and develop practical ways to avoid cultural clash in classrooms and help the U.S. preservice teachers observe and more effectively deal with the culture and cultural differences of their students. The study researched the experiences of six preservice teachers from the second year of "The Beyond Awareness Project", a five year study that examined the preservice teachers’ experience. It was concluded that using ethnography observational tools, helps the preservice teachers to avoid colour blindness, and become more aware of cultural differences.

 

The AC2 covers the Research Proposal Topic and Questions Rationale for Educational Technology Survey, to get feedback and find answers concerning the suitability, usability and effectiveness of the current instructional technologies including CALL lab environments and their technologies for ESL learning in higher education environments. The best way to achieve this is through the use of the scientific method. Therefore, in this research project I propose to do a scientific evaluation survey on the current state of usefulness and the future of CALL lab instructional technologies in my post-secondary ESL training environments.

 

Artifact #2: Final Assignment: Research Proposal for Educational Technology Survey

 

For my final research assignment in this course I chose to complete a thorough Research Proposal for conducting the Educational Technology Survey, at NorQuest College Edmonton, where I work as Educational and Information Technology Suppoprt Specialist, and was interested in getting valuable feedback on use of technologies for teaching.

The proposal has 29 pages and includes a critical literature review and the survey administering appendices.

 

Artifact #3: Educational Technology Survey (live for YOU)

 

The Educational Technology Survey was administered from mid April to mid May, 2013 as an evaluation survey on instructional technology access, use, support, planning and management in the Faculty of Foundational and Intercultural Studies  (FFIS) at the NorQuest College, Edmonton, ALBERTA.

I am very satisfied that the survey was welcomed at the NorQuest College, ESL and Foundational programming, where over 100 teachers were surveyed resulting in over 100 responses with the excellent completion rate of 92%.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Captain's Log:

 

Thanks to good spring winds and friendly waves on the MET Sea and in the ETEC 500 harbour waters and docks, the AC1 and AC2 assignments helped me theoretically and practically learn, refresh, update, test and sharpen my research and analytic research skills, needed for good critical research analysis of the AC1, "Preparing preservice teachers in a diverse world", and for researching the AC2, "Research Proposal Topic and Questions Rationale" for authoring, testing and administering of my own Educational Technology use survey, aimed at researching use of educational technologies at NorQuest College. The survey feedback was awesome and I am very proud on this survey, so to demonstrate the complete survey exemplary process, I reactivated the survey, have made it live for you, so you can enjoy the immersion in the survey.   

The  AC1 assignment "Preparing preservice teachers in a diverse world", is the quite interesting qualitative study of the experiences of six preservice teachers, where after the thorough critical analysis, I discovered and pointed out some research assumptions, lack of criteria support, and the study credibility and validity issues, as it is based, researched and well stated in the excellent course book published by Airasian et al, 2009, Educational research: competencies for analysis and application.

The  AC2 assignment "Research Proposal Topic and Questions Rationale" researched and analyzed the NorQuest College instructional technology environments, where I proposed doing a scientific evaluation survey on the current state of usefulness and the future of CALL lab instructional technologies in my post-secondary ESL training environments.

After lots of research, I presented the research proposal topic and the comprehensive rationale for administering a decent web based, scientific evaluation survey to about 200 foundational teachers of the FIS faculty of NorQuest College. 

suitability, usability and effectiveness of the current instructional technologies including CALL lab environments and their technologies for ESL learning in higher education environments.

The Research Proposal for Educational Technology Survey is an important research project for authoring, testing and administering of my own Educational Technology use survey, aimed at researching use of educational technologies at NorQuest College. The research proposal fully outlined and finalized the research questions, thesis and rationale, as well as the survey administering requirements and research elements, essential for the successful administration of the web based evaluation survey, based on the Chapelle (2001) Six criteria for CALL evaluation, and other research literature authors, such as: Hubbard (2006), and Laurillard (2008). Based on that decent research proposal I was able to successfully administer the Educational Technology Survey at NorQuest, get decent responses, analyze and share results, suggest improvements of FFIS instructional technology use, introduce and survey novelty mobile technologies etc., so I am very proud on my edtech survey achievement.

 

Artifat References:

 

Bradin, C. (1999). CALL issues: Instructional aspects of software evaluation. In J. Egbert and E. Hanson-Smith (Eds.), CALL environments: Research, practice, and critical issues (pp. 159-175). Alexandria, VA: Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages.

 

Chapelle, C. (2001). Computer applications in second language acquisition: Foundations for teaching, testing, and research. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

 

Gay, L.R., Mills, G., & Airasian, P. (2012). Educational research: Competencies for analysis and application. Columbus, Ohio: Pearson Education Inc.

 

Hegelheimer, V. & Tower, D. (2004). Using CALL in the classroom: Analyzing student interaction in an authentic classroom. System, 32(2), 185-205.

 

Hubbard, P. H. I. L. I. P. (2006). Evaluating CALL software. Calling on CALL: From Theory and Research to New Direction in Foreign Language Teaching). San Marcos, Texas: CALICO Monograph series, 5, 313-338.

 

Jamieson, J., Chapelle, C., & Preiss, S. (2005). CALL Evaluation by developers, a teacher, and students. CALICO Journal, 23(1), 93-138.

 

Laurillard, D. (2008). The teacher as action researcher: Using technology to capture pedagogic form. Studies in Higher Education, 33(2), 139-154.

 

Merriam, S. (2009). Qualitative research: A guide to design and implementation. San Francisco,

CA: Jossey-Bass.

 

Prensky, M. (2001). Digital natives, digital immigrants. On the Horizon, 9(5), 1-6.

 

Tashakkori, A. & Teddlie, C. (2003). Handbook of Mixed Methods in Social & Behavioral Research. Thousand Oaks: Sage