Week 4 Education Evaluation paradigms

When I read the article on paradigms by Professor Tom Reeves. I thought that some one was having a joke, they had put together a lot a big words, mostly jargon, into paragraphs to try and baffle me, which they did successfully and then made conclusions about a group of people, as if they existed, about their view on humankind. After I read the other article Compare two different models put together by Bronwyn - I couldn't help thinking why Professor tom Reeves could not achieve the same degree of clarity.

What I understand is that teaching and learning has a vast number of variables, many of which can not be kept constant while studying a particular one. So quantitative methods alone may give misleading solutions. The use of qualitative and objective methods alongside of quantitative methods may help to alleviate that concern. So the use of 'multiple methods evaluation model' as developed by Mark and Shortland in1987 seems to me to make the most sense. Why would you limit yourself to only one form of evaluation. As an engineer we learn that even in engineering things are not absolute, as much as we like to quantify things we also understand that in the end not 'all the variables' can be accounted for and the solution is just a 'best guess'. So many time you end up looking at a problem from different angles and seeing what the common threads are, so as to give you a picture of best fit. I can see evaluation being like this also. So look at a teaching resource with as many evaluation tools as possible, to get as best a picture as possible makes sense to me.

3 comments:

  1. Hi Pradeep
    Yes, I agree - multiple method evaluation method much more flexible and like you, I feel that would provide a better picture / fuller evaluation.

    Good post!

    Michelle

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  2. Good choice Pradeep. It is certainly recommended by Reeves and Hedberg for the evaluation of interactive multimedia learning systems. Thanks for your observations regarding clarity of the resources.

    You have certainly expressed the importance of triangulation - looking at things from several different angles and extracting the important threads. A mixed methods approach will give you the logic of quantitative methods and the depth of qualitative description.

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  3. Dear Pradeep, you put this so eloquently. I don't know if we are Reeves' intended audience, but if we are he may need to think about his writing style!

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