Dr. Z's Reflections on Research

2007-01-25T07:16:00.000-06:00

This blog is a journal of Dr. Z preparing to research and actually doing the research that ultimately resulted in an article. He recorded his thoughts so that students would be able to see the process. It is a bit disjointed at times, but that is the process of writing. I hope that this can provide you insight into what you might experience.

Please begin reading at the bottom of the journal and progress until you come to the most recent. This will provide you with a chronological sequence of thoughts.

Add your own comments as you progress. It will be good to hear from you.

Z

2004-02-15T20:29:00.000-06:00

Wow. This R. M Felder seems to be the master of learning styles and engineering. He has a website that has all of his articles on it. Each article has a wealth of references below it. Other names in the field include Harvey Silver and Richard Strong. I just found an article from Silver and Strong entitled "Integrating Learning Styles and Multiple Intelligences." THIS is the article I have been looking for all my life!!!! It integrate the two theories by using the Multiple Intelligences as the major categories and then describing a set of four learning processes or abilities, one for each of the four learning styles, for each intelligence.

After I did a Google search on Harvey Silver, I found at Amazon that he had actually written a complete book on this integration theory. What a find!!!!!!!!

2004-02-04T14:29:00.000-06:00

Geez, It's time to go over to the library. I need to get back to my research.

2004-02-02T15:07:00.000-06:00

Perhaps I should emphasize the tool for measuring the learning styles like Myers-Briggs. There aren't many instruments for measuring multiple intelligences.

Myers-Briggs involves:
Extroversion-Introversion
Sensing-Intuition
Thinking-Feeling
Judging-Perceiving

I could use the results of Gerry's surveys of the engineering students in Malaysia at ITTHO.
Here's a good site for M-B
http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/jungtype.htm

Aha!!! After searching on Schmeck (his inventory was the one I used for my dissertation to measure Learning Styles) and Learning Styles, I found a wonderful website
http://www.indstate.edu/ctl/styles/learning.html#STYLES
He lists Gardner's Multiple Intelligences as Information Processing Models. I KNEW THAT!!! Sheesh, it's been a while since I read about these things. It's funny what you can forget over time.
So I should use IPM as a descriptor.
That didn't work. It was primarily computer-based information processing.
What about active learning? That didn't work. Checked it out in the thesaurus and ERIC doesn't use it. Might still find that phrase in a title or abstract, however.

Used Engineering Education AND Myers-Briggs and found 7 good articles. Problem is that i don't have a printer to print the abstracts. Found a printer in the Youth collection that prints on both sides. That's COOL!!!

Just did a search on Education Full Text and found a few articles using Myers-Briggs and Engineering students as descriptors.

2004-02-02T10:24:00.000-06:00

This Blogging is kind of cool. I open a textedit file (simplistic word processor like Wordpad) on my screen and take notes as I work. The last posting explained my research questions and descriptors so I didn't have to search through my pages or files for that information as I sat down to work today. It's a great way to keep on track. It was also useful to print out my search history from my last session. It shows me my successful searches and the descriptors used.

After reviewing the printouts of the 7 sources I found from my search, I found that learning styles may not be the descriptor that I should use. It appears in most of the abstracts from my search that they are defining learning styles as how a student interacts with others while learning. Does the student interact in class? Does the student like to work alone or with other students? These are interesting but not what I am pursuing. I want to know about how their intelligences (spatial, verbal/linguistic, etc) relates to how they are learning about engineering in class.

2004-01-31T14:30:00.000-06:00

I will be writing an article on the learning styles of engineering students and the best ways to address their needs.
My research questions will be:
1) Is there a predominant learning style for engineering students?
2) If so, is there any difference between the various fields including chemical, mechanical, and civil?
3) What are the best ways to address these students' needs?
4) Do present engineering courses present information in ways that best support their students' needs?

I believe the descriptors I will need are:
learning styles and engineering students.
I used these two descriptors and found 7 articles.
I used the ERIC thesaurus to see if ERIC uses learning style and turns out it uses Cognitive style. It also listed Learning Strategies, Learning theories (probably not useful). I also saw Experiential Learning and Active Learning which will be useful when trying to pinpoint specific types of strategies. I decided to address Gardner's work and checked the term, Multiple Intelligences. Turns out it is an actual term used by ERIC.

I began my ERIC search by searching on each of these topics. This way, I be able to use the Search History process to combine these searches as needed.

Having a tough time downloading these ERIC ED documents from home so I will have to wait until I get to the library and see if it works any better.

2004-01-31T08:40:00.000-06:00

Well, I forgot about the paper I need to submit for the ARCEE conference. It is due on Feb 15. This means that I must change my emphasis for a few weeks. This paper will be one dealing with learning styles of engineering students and how to best address them.

2004-01-30T18:44:00.000-06:00

It's amazing how much I am learning about portfolios and alternative assessment. I have read and spoken on professional portfolios but student portfolios are a different animal. The books I have read are not saying much about students writing reflections but it seems to me that reflections are the parts that make a portfolio important.

The biggest problem with researching is that you realize how much you don't know. Maybe ignorance IS bliss.

2004-01-28T16:42:00.000-06:00

Well, here it is. I have opened a blog for reflecting on my research process. I am in the middle, no at the beginning, of writing a chapter about using e-portfolios as alternative forms of assessment. I was asked by Dr. Roberto Muffoletto about 1.5 years ago to begin work on this project for his Breaking the Walls. In this book, he is inviting experts to write about alternative forms of assessment that could/should be used instead of standardized testing.

Should be fun.

2004-01-28T14:43:00.000-06:00

i am sitting in my cubicle in the library surrounded with books about assessment. It is obvious that I need to do a great deal of reading about assessment for this chapter. Assessment needs to be the premise for these writings. After laying the foundation about assessment, alternative assessment and ?? I will be able to discuss e-folios, their application and integration into the student assessment process.

It is quite obvious that my plan for writing on Wednesdays between Ed Media classes will be insufficient. I will have to add Thursday mornings and probably Monday mornings. I hope that is enough.