What is Educational Research?
A cyclical process of steps that typically begins with identifying a research problem or issue of study. It then involves reviewing the literature, specifying a purpose for the study, collecting and analyzing data, and forming an interpretation of information. This process culminates in a report, disseminated to audiences, that is evaluated and used in the educational community. (Creswell, 2002)
In less comprehensive terms, educational research is an organized approach to asking, answering, and effectively reporting a question.
Why Educational Research?
Educators need to be consumers (and producers) of research. Creswell (2002) notes the following reasons, describing the various purposes of educational research:
1. Improve Practice
Research can suggest ways of improving practice that have been verified with many applications and by many different types of people, which is difficult for practitioners.
2. Add to Knowledge
Research can add to what we know about how people learn and what we can do help facilitate the learning process.
3. Address Gaps in Knowledge
Research can address areas in which little is know, like perhaps the effects of online versus traditional classroom learning.
4. Expand Knowledge
Research can allow us to extend what we know in ways we never conceived.
5. Replicate Knowledge
Research can act as a test to verify previous findings.
6. Add Voices of Individuals to Knowledge
Research can add an important perspective for different learning types. Much of the educational research prior to the Eighties is based on able, white, middle-to-upper class males. This is certainly not reflective of our increasingly heterogeneous students, and research helps revise theory and practice to reflect different student needs.
These are only a few of the many reasons research is important, particularly to educators.