Day #5, June 21 st CEP 955 Summer Hybrid 2013 Jack Smith Michigan State University

Overview Week 1 focus: Elements of the front-end Specific focus today: Structuring the literature review section Pivot next week to the study design But… instructional sequence is semi-linear, but thinking and development process is cyclical Today will focus time on lit reviews and allot time other front end issues Does someone want critical attention to their RQs? Second theory bit to go with Amy’s? Book review of GCR: major theoretical perspectives

RQ Lab

Homework check-in What was useful, if anything, in GGB, chapter 4? Was anyone surprised/upset by the negative assessment of overall quality of published research in education? How many tried outlining their literature review section? Decisions about framing theory in your literature review section?

The work of review The cycle of engagement with sources Search and find/select (electronic & “dumb” and eyes-on and “smart”) Read (use of the scarce resource of time) Evaluate and characterize Look for patterns across sources (results, methods, framing theory, limitations) Structure your synthesis (communicating the patterns you see) Note: The work of review is never complete (despite our proposal writing needs and wishes)

Refining our source typology From your CEP 901B papers and top-ten work: Empirical vs. theoretical Empirical is pretty easy to recognize (common structure) Theoretical focuses on the statement and justification of general principles But E & T are insufficient as types of scholarly writing Other types? Review your top-ten

Writing interlude Would 20 minutes of literature review think, outline, and compose time be welcome?

Theory Bite(s) Introducing Amy’s Practicum Amy: social constructivism Q&A; discussion

The Role of Theory (generally) Seeing is a conceptual act => we see with our ideas Looking, observing, recording, interpreting are all conceptual actions (applications of our ideas to raw observable data) Frameworks direct our attention to particular features of the world that we could notice, label, and record No explicit framework does not imply no framework (implicit, intuitive, unconscious frames) Researcher’s responsibility and reflective practice: Try to be explicit about what guides your seeing

Theory Scale (or “reach”) In educational psychology (at least)—as in other fields— theories differ in the range of phenomena they address “Grand” theory: All of human learning and/or development, e.g., Skinner’s operant conditioning theory Outside of education: plate tectonics in geology Many other theories narrow the range of their target phenomena; “medium” to “small-scale”?? Examples: TPACK: phenomenon = what teachers know about educational technology Wentzel: phenomenon = how social support, motivation, and achievement relate But scale is also dynamic; small-scale theories can be adapted to account for a wider range of phenomena (e.g., “perceived loss”)

Grand Theory (of thinking, knowing & learning) Greeno, Collins, & Resnick (1996) provide a very useful top-level categorization of their families of theories Three broad perspectives (groupsof theories) Behavioral theories Cognitive theories Situative theories Situative (sometimes called “sociocultural”) theories focus on participating (as knowing) and on individual and collective knowing Rogoff, cognitive apprenticeship Brown, Collins, & Duguid (1989) “situated cognition” Jean Lave Etienne Wenger Perspectives form a temporal progression of the field (B->C->S)

Homework for Monday Focus: How do the framing part of my proposal (front end + RQs) shape my study design Texts: Review SRIE, chapter 5; Creswell, chapter 1 (worldviews & major research traditions) Writing: Update the entries in the Google doc (front end, RQs, study design If you need to, open a second row for yourself Other ways to move ahead Refine/improve your problem statement/introduction Show your ps/intro to a peer or Jack Work on your literature review as the next section (outlining or composing) Work on your RQs and “defining” your key terms