In "Will the No Child Left Behind Act Promote Direct Instruction of Science?" [Hake (2005)], I gave, as one of the seven reasons why Direct Science Instruction threatens to predominate nationally under the aegis of the No Child Left Behind Act, the following [bracketed by lines "HHHHHH. . . ."]:
HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
MOST INTERACTIVE ENGAGEMENT AND GUIDED INQUIRY METHODS HAVE NOT BEEN TESTED IN RANDOMIZED CONTROL TRIALS (RCT'S), THE "GOLD STANDARD" OF THE U.S. DEPT. OF EDUCATION (USDE)
That a single research method should be designated as the "gold standard" for
evaluating an intervention's effectiveness appears antithetical to the report of the NRC's Committee on Scientific Principles for Education Research [Shavelson & Towne (2002) - ST]. ST state that scientific research should "pose significant questions that can be investigated empirically," and "use methods that permit direct investigation of the questions."
Furthermore, the USDE's RCT gold standard is considered problematic by a wide
array of scholars. Taking issue with the RTC gold standard are philosophers Dennis Phillips [Shavelson, Phillips, Towne, & Feuer (2003)] and Michael Scrivin (2004); mathematicians Burkhardt & Schoenfeld (2003); engineer Woodie Flowers [Zaritsky, Kelly, Flowers, Rogers, Patrick (2003)]; and physicist Andre deSessa [Cobb, Confey, diSessa, Lehrer, & Schauble (2003)].
In addition, the following organizations oppose the RTC gold standard:
(a) American Evaluation Association (AEA)
<http://www.eval.org/doestatement.htm>,(b) American Education Research Association (AERA)
<http://www.eval.org/doeaera.htm>, and(c) National Education Association
<http://www.eval.org/doe.nearesponse.pdf> (88 kB).
HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHTwo recent articles [Bhattacharjee (2005), Stipek (2005)] discuss the pros and cons of RCT's and may be of interest to subscribers. I thank Larry Woolf for bringing the Bhattacharjee reference to my attention.
Richard Hake, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Indiana University 24245 Hatteras Street, Woodland Hills, CA 91367 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> <http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~hake> <http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~sdi>
REFERENCES
Bhattacharjee, Y. 2005. "Can Randomized Trials Answer The Question of What Works?: A $120 million federal initiative to improve secondary math education hopes to draw on an approach some researchers say may not be ready for the classroom," Science 307: 1861-1863, 25 March, currently online at
(a) <http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/307/5717/1861>,
(b) <http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/reprint/307/5717/1861.pdf> (208 kB), and
(c) the archives of AERA-L (Politics and Policy in Education) with academic referencing by R. Hake at <http://lists.asu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0504&L=aera-l&T=0&O=D&P=1708>.
Burkhardt, H. & A.H. Schoenfeld. 2003. "Improving Educational Research: Toward a More Useful, More Influential, and Better-Funded Enterprise," Educational Researcher 32(9): 3-14; online at
<http://www.aera.net/publications/?id=401>.
Cobb, P., J. Confey, A. diSessa, R. Lehrer, L. Schauble. 2003. "Design Experiments in Educational Research," Educational Researcher 32(1): 9-13; online at <http://www.aera.net/publications/?id=393>.
Hake, R.R. 2005. "Will the No Child Left Behind Act Promote Direct Instruction of Science?" Am. Phys. Soc. 50: 851 (2005); APS March Meeting, Los Angles, CA. 21-25 March; online as ref. 36 at <http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~hake>, or download directly by clicking on <http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~hake/WillNCLBPromoteDSI-3.pdf> (256 kB).
Scriven, M. 2004. "Causation," unpublished; see, e.g. "Scriven on randomized control groups," online at <http://interversity.org/lists/arn-l/archives/Nov2003/msg00309.html>.
Shavelson, R.J. & L. Towne, eds. 2002. "Scientific Research in Education," National Academy Press; online at <http://www.nap.edu/catalog/10236.html>.
Shavelson, R.J., D.C. Phillips, L. Towne, and M.J. Feuer. 2003. "On the Science of Education Design Studies," Educational Researcher 32(1): 25-28; online at <http://www.aera.net/publications/?id=393>.
Stipek, D. 2005. "Scientifically Based Practice," Education Week 24(28): 33-34; currently online at
(a) <http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2005/03/23/28stipek.h24.html>;
(b) as a Math-Learn post of 2 April 2005 10:56 am by Jerry Becker; online at
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/math-learn/message/7659>
(unfortunately one must subscribe to Math-Learn
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/math-learn/> in order to access its archives);
(c) as a post with a one-paragraph comment by Susan Ohanian at
<http://www.susanohanian.org/show_atrocities.html?id=3914>;
(d) the archives of AERA-L (Politics and Policy in Education) with academic referencing by R. Hake at <http://lists.asu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0504&L=aera-l&T=0&O=D&P=1840>.
Zaritsky, R., A.E. Kelly, W. Flowers, E. Rogers, & P. Patrick. 2003. "Clinical Design Sciences: A View From Sister Design Efforts," Educational Researcher 32(1), 33-34; online at
<http://www.aera.net/publications/?id=393>.
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