Joel has begun blogging. Not nearly as irreverant as I understand a blogger should be, I’m excited to begin authoring in addition to lurking.
Many thanks to my Ph.D. chair David Wiley for getting me started.
My primary interest is in completing my dissertation study titled Design Theory for Authoring Tools that Support Teacher Adaptation of Mathlets (TATSTAM).
While my wider interest is the reuse and adaptation of all kinds of interactive online resources, for the purpose of my study I have narrowed my focus to middle school math teacher reuse of mathlets.
The three areas of investigation of my dissertation study are:
- In what ways do middle school math teachers want to reuse and adapt interactive online resources?
- What barriers do middle school math teachers encounter when trying to reuse and adapt interactive online resources?
- What design guidelines support the development of authoring tools that support teacher reuse and adapt interactive online resources?
As part of the study I’m developing a web-based authoring tool called TADRIOLA. Following a slightly adultrated formative research methodology (Reigeluth & Frick, 1999) TADRIOLA is an instance of the initial version of TATSTAM that I created by synthesizing the literature and personal experience. My main deviance from “orthodox” formative research methodology was to use it to develop software design theory as opposed to instructional design theory.
A simple explanation of what I have done is:
- Review the literature to identify ways that teacher want to reuse and adapt interactive online learning resources a well as barriers that they encounter.
- Propose a design theory for authoring tools that support teacher reuse and adaptation of interactive online learning resources (TATSTAM).
- Design a web-based authoring tool (TADRIOLA) that is an instance of the design theory.
- Conduct focus groups with middle school math teachers to gain empirical evidence about teacher wants, barriers, and the “goodness” of TADRIOLA and TATSTAM.
- Analyze data and revise TADRIOLA and TATSTAM based on the analysis of the data.
- Repeat.
I’ve utilized a case study methodology (Yin, 1984) and analyzed data using qualitative coding methods (Miles & Huberman, 1984).
So far I’ve conducted focus groups with middle school math teachers at 6 different locations. At the first location I worked 1-on-1 with 7 teachers using questionnaires, structured interviews, and user tests. At the other groups I have worked with groups using surveys, questionnaires, group discussions, and user tests. In all I have worked with 59 middle school teachers and some 20 other types including technology specialists and college professors who teach students preparing to be math teachers.
Reigeluth, C.M., & Frick, T.W. (1999). Formative research: A methodology for improving design theories. In C.M. Reigeluth (Ed.), Instructional-Design Theories and Models: A New Paradigm of Instructional Theory. (Volume II). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Assoc. [PDF]
Miles, M. B., & Huberman, A. M. (1984). Analyzing qualitative data: A source book for new methods. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications.
Yin, R. K. (1984). Case study research design and methods. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications.
Posted on August 11th, 2003 by joel
Filed under: authoring tools, interactive online math, research
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