Science of the Obvious

Dr. R. Barker Bausell was the first educational researcher to demonstrate the learning superiority of both tutoring and small group instruction when the curriculum, teacher differences, instructional time, and student differences were rigorously controlled. He served as a biostatistician, research methodologist, and the Director of Research in two departments within the University of Maryland over a 35+ year career and was the founding editor/editor-in-chief of the peer reviewed, Evaluation and the Health Profession for 33 of those years. He has authored 12 other books including: Conducting Meaningful Experiments: 40 Steps to Becoming a Scientist, Too Simple to Fail: A Case for Educational Change, and Snake Oil Science: The Truth about Complementary and Alternative Medicine.

In this exciting new, two-volume trek, Bausell introduces us—with insight and levity—to diverse genres of unproductive research. Happily, he also tosses us several solution strategies to make our schools sparkle.

• IntroductionChapter One: Some Examples of Educational Research that Aren’tChapter Two: Contributors to this Sad State of AffairsChapter Three: Four Once Useful Influential Genres That We Probably No Longer Need Genre #1: Classic Learning ResearchGenre #2: Secondary Analyses of Test ScoresGenre #3: Preschool or Extra-School Descriptive/Correlational Educational Studies. Genre #4: School-Based, Descriptive/Observational Studies. Chapter Four: Three Research Genres That Were Never Useful and Should Be Abandoned Research Genre #5: Psychometric research:Research Genre #6: Meta-Analysis: Genre #7: Scale-up experiments.Chapter Five: Three Genres that Could Have Some Potential for Creating a Meaningful ScienceGenre #8: Experiments Conducted under Veridical Schooling Conditions.Genre #9: Natural Experiments (Evaluations) Conducted within Schools.Genre #10: Experiments Conducted in Schools under Laboratory ConditionsChapter Six: Genre #11 – Programmatic Educational Research Conducted by a Single Investigator Chapter Seven: Genre #12 – Recent, Well-Designed Genre-Crossing Research ConsideredImportant Enough to Garner Media Attention Final ThoughtsReferences