Inquiry and the

Growth of Knowledge

What is educational research and why do it?

Framing Questions

Is educational inquiry a science?

Should it be?
Should we look to science for

criteria of good educational

inquiry?

The Growth of Knowledge:

Conventional Narrative

Foundational Metaphor
The growth of knowledge is achieved by adding one
brick at a time.
Research is cumulative, i.e., it adds up to produce
knowledge.

Purposes of Educational
Inquiry

Predict & prescribe

Identify causes, find the best way, produce
enduring knowledge, measure current
practices/outcomes and improve them, improve
schools, solve problems at school
Understand
Understand how social experience is created and
given meaning, emic (insider), not etic
(outsider), perspective

Purposes (contd)

Emancipate
Challenge status quo, give voice to non-dominant groups,
work toward social change (how things might be
otherwise)
Deconstruct
Question authority, product different knowledge & produce
knowledge differently, trouble or queer knowledge
(i.e., denaturalize what is taken as normal, make visible
power/knowledge nexus)

Values & Uses of Educational

Inquiry
Values
uniformity, consensus, progress
difference, plurality, contestation
Uses
status & hierarchy
(researchers/practitioners)
control & social engineering
silencing, reproduction of inequalities
professionalization (common language &
standards)

Single Case Research

Study

Single case research (SCR) methods are a

category of experimental behavioral research

techniques for investigating and demonstrating
causal or functional relationships between
independent and dependent variables (ONeill et
al., 2011).

Deductive v. Inductive
approach
Deductive: hypothesis is formulated based on a

theoretical framework.

EX. All people love pizza. If I offer my students pizza

they will work hard in my class.

Inductive: theory bound hypothesis is not

necessarily needed to conduct research

EX. What happens when I provide pizza for my

students?

Sidmans four approaches

Four primary reasons to conduct experiments:

To evaluate a hypothesis

To indulge the investigators curiosity about nature

To try out new experimental methods

To establish the existence of a behavioral phenomenon

Applied Behavior Analysis

(ABA)
Focused on how behavorial principles and

procedures could be used to increase desired

behavior and decrease undesired behavior
(ONeill, et al., p. 7)

Refer to Table 1.1 on same pg in text.

Directly related to the work of B.F. Skinner.

Stimulus response

Pavlovs experiments with dogs and conditioning

ABA and SCR

SCR supports a broader application. Many SCR

designs follow an intervention design and are

related to behavior. But SCR does not have to
focus on behavior.

Academics

Daily living skills

Learning and growth

Evidence-Based Practices

Viewed as a justification for the science of educational

inquiry/research (refer back to initial slides).

As a result of No Child Left Behind legislation. What Works

Clearinghouse. http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc/

How do we know a student is benefitting from special

education services?

By providing evidence this takes a variety of shapes and

forms (refer to Table 1.2 in ONeill text, pg. 9)

Also refer to Gersten et al. (2005) article (pp. 175-176)

Small Group work

With your group of four review Research Memo

#1. Come to a consensus for the specific article

that you have been assigned. Be prepared to
share out with the whole group.