EDS 8822 Practice of Research Analysis in Fine Arts

EDS art and music education students will experience the practice of analyzing research in the fine arts and becoming critical consumers and evaluators of current educational research. We will address the nature of quantitative and focus on qualitative research in the fine arts. Students will develop the skills necessary to identify, understand, and assess the strengths and weaknesses of educational research. The course will require a considerable investment of time, intensive reading and writing, and recurrent team discussions based on assignments.

Credits

3

Student Learning Outcomes

After successful completion of this course, you will be able to:

1. Recognize the uniqueness and distinctiveness of quantitative versus qualitative research in the fine arts in education
2. Distinguish different types of quantitative and qualitative research, especially as they relate to addressing educational problems in fine arts practice
3. Distinguish qualitative methodological approaches -from interpretive to positivist-as well as traditions of qualitative inquiry-ethnography, case study, narrative inquiry, phenomenology, grounded theory, action research, etc. -and appreciate their advantages and limitations for research in fine arts education
4. Understand the purpose and standards for excellence for each section in a research paper
5. Distinguish qualitative methodological approaches -from interpretive to positivist-as well as traditions of qualitative inquiry-ethnography, case study, narrative inquiry, phenomenology, grounded theory, action research, etc. -and appreciate their advantages and limitations for research in fine arts education
6. Demonstrate skills in managing selected design, data collection, analysis and writing strategies of qualitative research, via field experience exercise
7. Become acquainted with published research articles modeling theoretical, methodological and empirical decisions in studies of issues in education in the fine arts
8. Articulate strengths and weaknesses of research studies to understand when to use trustworthy empirical information to improve educational practice
9. Evaluate research studies on interventions that may be used or proposed for use in your school
10. Identify threats to internal and external validity in quantitative research, and credibility and trustworthiness in qualitative research
11. Gather research about a practice in your area of content certification, evaluate what the research says, and discuss whether research on this practice is in alignment with what you see in your specific educational context