BA in education,

module name : understanding education: research and researching

brief:

Critical Reading of a Quantitative Research Article

You are to write a 1200 word report (±10%, so anything

between 1080 and 1320 words) critically reviewing the

following research paper

Stipek, D. J., & Byler, P. (1997). Early childhood education

teachers: Do they practice what they preach? Early

Childhood Research Quarterly, 12(3), 305-325.

Assessment Criteria

Your report must include a brief description of the aims

of the article you are reviewing

You should critically examine the authors’ choice of

methods (you may use the questions we adapted from

Greenhalgh & Taylor in session 6 – see overleaf)

You must review some* of the statistics or graphs

which have been used in relation to the context and the

type of data which has been recorded. Have the authors

justified their approach?

You should cite at least three methods texts and/or other

studies that have been conducted in education to support

your views. (E.g. if you feel that the author used an

inappropriate test or didn’t do the right “checking tests”

– use your lecture notes and other sources to explain

why.).

You can include some reflective commentary – do you

find the results interesting, convincing, well-justified?

You might also consider what you have learned from the

authors’ report which might have implications for your

future quantitative research.

* See next page

Suggested structure

The aim of this task is for you to critically explore at least

some elements of the authors’ quantitative approach. It is

recommended that you briefly summarise how the authors’

methods might complement or support each other.

You can use these questions as sub-headings if you wish.

Explain that you are doing so when introducing the report

(cite the EDU202 Powerpoint slides or explain how these

are adapted from Greenhalgh & Taylor).

PLEASE NOTE: You are not required to address all of these questions or all of the methods used in the paper.

Question 1: Did the paper describe an important

educational issue addressed via a clearly formulated

question?

Question 2: Was a quantitative approach appropriate?

Question 3: How were the setting and the subjects

selected?

Question 4: What was the researcher’s perspective, and

has this been taken into account?

(How have the authors’ positionality or epistemological

beliefs around quantitative methods been declared or

implied?)

Question 5: What methods did the researcher use for

collecting data and are these described in enough detail?

Question 6: What methods did the researcher use to

analyse the data and what quality control measures were

implemented? (Assumption checks like Shapiro-Wilk

etc.)

Question 7: Are the results credible, and if so, are they

educationally important?

Question 8: What conclusions were drawn, and are they

justified by the results?

Question 9: Are the findings of the study transferable to

other educational settings?

Question 10: Has anything in this paper made me change

how I will approach reading or reporting quantitative

research in future?

Notes on referencing:

Include the full reference for the paper you are reviewing at

the end of the task. You don’t need to keep referencing it

within the text itself, instead just use page numbers (p. 4) to indicate where you are referring to parts of the paper.

When you use other sources like methods texts or other

research, reference them as usual with a citation in the text

(Connolly, 2001, p. 43) and an entry in the reference list at the

end of the task.

Notes on advanced methods:

Some of the papers may involve statistical techniques that you

have not yet covered.

You can still review these papers using the questions

above! You can comment on how clearly the author has

explained the purpose and appropriateness of their chosen

method. You can also consider how clearly the author has

reported their results.

i have provide the literature article that need to critical review in this essay,and also provide two example of this essay that written by previous student

 

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