[NLA] NLA Discussion: Evidence-based education

[George E. Demetrion]

John:

Thanks for this well-thought out message.  You state  your position  well
and there are clearly things that you say with which I agree.  Mmost
emphatically,  the first sentence that "'evidence-based education' is a
complicated term."  I also appreciate the way you provide specific
description of the ways in which  "evidence-based education" is a
complicated term and cannot be easily subsumed within any single research
tradition.  I also share your view on the notion that each "method has
rules as to how data should be collected and analyzed,"  though I would
rather refer here to diverse research traditions and the various
scholarly canonical  upon which they are based.  That is, I want to
extend and further complexify your notion of pluralistic methods.

First, your point on the necessity of consensus on the purposes of adult
literacy before we can settle on any research tradition.  I don't believe
we're there, though there are tendencies  such as with EFF and An Action
Agenda for Literacy, if further probed and developed *could* lead toward
a greater consensus, but those tendencies have not been pushed.  They've
been stalled, rather by a policy agenda grounded largely in human capital
development combined with a cost-benefits utilitarian value system and
measurement format that has tended to constrict rather than open vital
discussion on the purposes and values of adult literacy education to the
public good where any public rationale needs to locate itself.

Second, I don't think it's at all clear on consensual grounds whether
adult literacy more properly belongs in the realm of cultural studies
(and I'm thinking both of the ethnographic research of Merrifield and
others as well as the Freirian influence on critical pedagogy) or to
scientific forms of investigation.  With that issue unresolved it becomes
virtually impossible to decide on a single methodological train, which
still seems the tendency in your message, notwithstanding the very real
acknowledgment of complexity.  To put it in other terms, various academic
disciplines have their own canonical framework to judge the validity of
any research.  If one assumes for the moment that adult literacy studies
more properly is a form of cultural studies, then research stemming from
these premises is going to stem from the academic fields of literary
theory, social philosophy, ethnic studies, history, sociology as well as
cognitive psychology.  To state it more sharply, cognitive psychology is
going to be contextualized by these other disciplines situated in its
various socio-cultural, historical contexts.  From these premises, any
research which does not grapple with this context is flawed on its face.

If one is going to argue more from scientific premises (and I can't speak
authoritatively to this), then the realm of cognitive psychology is going
to take on much more of an authoritative role in research paradigms from
the get go as learning will be more closely defined more by what's going
on (or appears to be going on) inside the brain.  This assumption then
might be more susceptible to the kind of rigorous scientific research
that is currently discussed, though maybe not.  I could go on here, but
will pass.

The broader point in relationship to your message is the tendency toward
a singular research tradition.

a) In defining the scientistic method as the foundation of evidence-based
education.  I don't want to argue too strongly against this and my own
reliance on pragmatic epistemology draws on Dewey's reconstruction of the
scientific method.  I posted on this recently, so will by-pass a
discussion.  Nonetheless, the issue is, how rigid one is to become
utilizing this method.  Does it close or open knowledge exploration?  Can
it be reconciled with constructivist theories of learning?  If so, how? 
If not, what is the significance of that disjuncture.

b)  More importantly--that necessarily what follows is a hypothesis.  It
might be, but also might not be depending on the nature of the research
project--what is being investigated.  Perhaps we might be attempting to
draw out connections, searching say, for coherence, which requires more
of an ongoing exploration as in much of the ethnographic literature.

c) Then going from hypothesis formation to testing through experimental
or quasi experimental methods.  Maybe, depending on the type of research
and range of methodologies drawn on.  But I wouldn't want to be saddled
with a singular assumption here on how research progresses, from a,b, to
c.  I'm concerned about the reductionism in this methodology and what it
leaves out (in a word, too much).

The final point that I question is the assumption that legitimate
knowledge is going to come fromthis type of  research (it may or may not)
and that once determined by the experts it is disseminated (to put it in
stronger terms; bestowed) to the field.  In particular this approach
would tend to de-legitimize practitioner-research, that teachers are
experts in their own work and if they do engage in their own form of
research, they will develop methodologies appropriate to this work based
on their own emergent canon rather than rules determined by others.  I'm
thinking here of Cochran-Smith and Lytle's (1993) important text Teacher
Research and Knowledge.  Teachers College Press.

There's more to be said, but I'm running late.  Will stop here.  This
merits additional discussion.

Best,

George Demetrion
sophocles5 at juno.com


________________________________________________________________
GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO!
Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less!
Join Juno today!  For your FREE software, visit:
http://dl.www.juno.com/get/web/.
_______________________________________________
NLA mailing list: NLA at lists.literacytent.org
http://lists.literacytent.org/mailman/listinfo/nla
LiteracyTent: web hosting, news, community and goodies for literacy
http://literacytent.org