Our discussion on how we might increase the relevance of research in the field of instructional technologies is drawing to a close and it is interesting to look back on what has emerged from the discussion. There haven't been many postings since my last summary but one notable posting was made by Ian Hart [22 Mar 95] and I'm sure he made the points he did to evoke some more responses to the topic.
Most respondents seem to have agreed that relevance is an important issue. Ian's response included some very strong comments among which he questioned the relevance of "any" IT research being of benefit to teachers and practitioners. He asked if "the purpose of a research project is not going to help me as a teacher, why should I take any notice of it?"
Defending the proposition that much research of the research is irrelevant, Ian commented that he is quite aware of factors that impinge on the success of his teaching and printed reports that confirmed this were of little value. Ian took the position of himself as a teacher as distinct from the group of people who are not teachers, but researchers. Aren't we all teachers and researchers? Perhaps some don't spread their research in such public ways as others, but I have always considered an inquiring and researching mind to be one of the main characteristics of a good teacher. I've read many of your previous postings Ian and I know you to be a good researcher. How do you keep your research relevant?
Among Ian's comments was a good suggestion on making research more relevant. Ian suggested that while research papers themselves might be less enticing to teachers, "developments" are a much better prospect. By developments, Ian referred to educational products with immediate application, for example, videos, books and software. If we as researchers look to make an outcome of our research some form of "deliverable product" might we make a bigger and better contribution to our field?
You will remember the description I gave in the initial paper about my own experiences with an "irrelevant" research project that sought to investigate improvements to teaching computer programming. One of the "other" outcomes of my research project was a programming textbook that was written and modeled on the alternative style of programming teaching that my research had identified. This textbook has proved to be quite popular and although many teachers would not confess to having changed their teaching style, the research probably has had some impact among the many classes in which it was, and is still being, used.
Perhaps one solution to relevance is take that extra step. Having solved a perceived problem or having identified some useful instructional strategy, we should look to develop and create a means by which the findings can be readily and effortlessly applied and transferred to the relevant stakeholders. Current measures of the quality of IT research come from the nature of the journal in which the findings are published and the number of citations that result. A more meaningful measure from a relevance perspective might be a measure of the level of applicability of the research in the form of products, applications, and/or developments. Perhaps??
One thing that interested me in this discussion has been the paucity of researchers willing to share examples of their own relevant research. I suspect we are yet to become adept at using e-mail in a conferencing mode and that we might have had a much better discussion had this topic been conducted in a face-to-face mode. But we will get better!!