Objectives and competences
The objectives of this course are:
• to enable the students for autonomous finding of pedagogical research problems and defining their content and methodology (research hypotheses, methods, samples, approaches to collecting and analysing the data),
• to enable the students for correct usage and autonomous construction of structured and semi-structured instruments for the data collection,
• to enable the students for selecting and using appropriate approaches of qualitative and quantitative data analysing and interpretation (descriptive, explicative) of what the results imply in theory and practice,
• to enable the students for carrying out, in a team or individually, complex empirical qualitative and quantitative research in respect to its content and methodology,
• to enable the students for high quality and ethical responsible research and publishing,
• študente usposobiti za kakovostno in etično raziskovanje in objavljanje,
• to enable the students for autonomous writing research reports, professional, and scientific papers.
The student will be qualified for
• independently carrying out of complex empirical pedagogical research in respect to its content and methodology,
• participation in a research team, and carrying out of complex empirical pedagogical research,
• use of SPSS and NVivo data analysis software programs,
writing research reports, professional and scientific articles.
Content (Syllabus outline)
• Characteristics of qualitative versus quantitative and mixed methods research in pedagogical science and profession.
• Types of mostly qualitative pedagogical research (study case, action research, narrative, interpretative, phenomenological, and ethnographic studies, grounded theory).
• Phases of qualitative and quantitative research (I-introduction, M-methods, R-results, D-discussion).
• Population and sample of participants, sampling methods.
• Mostly qualitative approaches of collecting the data (participant or non-participant observation, informal or semi-structured interview, focus group, social networks).
• Methods of qualitative data analysi (content - document analysis, qualitative content analysis/ thematic analysis, grounded theory).
• Mostly quantitative approaches of collecting the data (survey, knowledge testing, scaling, attitude measurement, structured observation with check list, pedagogical experiment).
• Statistical methods for the analysis of nominal and ordinal variables (frequency distributions, chi-square test hypothesis about independence and hypothesis of equal probability, measures of contingency).
• Statistical methods for the analysis of differences with parametric tests (t-test, one – way and two - way analysis of variance, analysis of covariance). Statistical methods for the analysis of differences with non-parametric tests (Mann-Whitney, Wilcoxon, Kruskal-Wallis, Friedman, and Binominal test).
• Statistical methods for the analysis of relationships between variables (bivariate – Spearman's and Pearson's correlations, multiple correlation, linear regression analysis).
• Computer analysis of the quantitative data by means of SPSS statistical programme.
• Computer analysis of the qualitative data by means of NVivo software programme.
• Assessing research quality (validity, reliability, objectivity), and ethical aspects of research.
Writing research reports, technical and scientific papers. Use of scientific framework.
Learning and teaching methods
• higher education lectures,
• tutorial,
• lab work,
• research work,
didactical use of informational and communication technology.
Intended learning outcomes - knowledge and understanding
On completion of this course, the student will be able to
• differentiate between general characteristics of qualitative and quantitative research,
• select appropriate research design in respect of the research aims,
• interpret qualitative (qualitative content analysis/ thematic analysis, grounded theory) and quantitative approaches (descriptive, inferential statistics) of data analysing ,
• assessing validity and reliability in pedagogical research,
• use SPSS statistical programme for data analysis,
use NVivo qualitative data analysis software.
Readings
• Nind, M., Curtin, A., & Hall, K. (2016). Research Methods for Pedagogy. Bloomsbury: Bloomsbury Academic.
• Čagran, B. (2004). Univariatna in multivariatna analiza podatkov: zbirka primerov uporabe statističnih metod s SPSS. Maribor: Pedagoška fakulteta.
• Sagadin, J. (2003). Statistične metode za pedagoge. Maribor: Obzorja.
• Vogrinc, J. (2008). Kvalitativno raziskovanje na pedagoškem področju. Ljubljana: Pedagoška fakulteta.
• Adam, F., Hlebec, V., Kavčič, M., Lamut, U., Mrzel, M., Podmenik, D., Poplas Susič, T., Rotar Pavlič, D., & Švab, I. (2012). Kvalitativno raziskovanje v interdisciplinarni perspektivi. Ljubljana: Inštitut za razvojne in strateške analize.
Additional information on implementation and assessment • written examination, 60%
• practical work within lab class (LV), 10%
• seminar research work. 30%
