Complete thesis - Murdoch University

The design researcher values creative manipulation and control of the environment in additionto (if not over) more traditional research values such as the pursuit of truth or understanding.A practical or functional addition to a body of knowledge, codified and transmitted to thecommunity where it can provide the basis for further exploration, may be all that is requiredof a successful project. Indeed, it is precisely in the exploration of ‘wicked problems’ forwhich conflicting or sparse theoretical bases exist that Design Research excels (March andSmith, 1995; Carroll and Kellogg, 1989).The need to address issues of usability, scalability and sustainability are characteristics ofDesign Research: a lack of adequate consideration of the larger systemic constraints in whichthe context of intervention is a part is seen to lead to both impoverished designs as well asunder-specified theories that lack generalisable power. At the same time, the design experimentitself has similarities with more established methods for combining data of differentsorts. It can, therefore, be rightly placed as a member of the mixed methods family.Design Research in EducationDesign-based educational research, as conceived by Brown (1992) and Collins (1992), andadvocated by the Learning Sciences community, was introduced with the expectation thatresearchers would systemically adjust various aspects of the designed context so that eachadjustment served as a type of experimentation. This designed context is subject to test andrevision, and the successive iterations that result play a role similar to that of systematic variationin experiment, allowing researchers to test and generate theory in naturalistic contexts.Brown’s original concept of design experimenting assumed iterations between laboratory andclassroom. The research moves beyond simply observing in ways that allow the researcherto improve and generate evidence-based claims about learning.The application of the methods and metaphors of a design science approach to education hasa fairly short history, bound up with a shift from a social science approach to experimentationin learning research to a design experimental approach to the study of learning. As notedabove, Brown assumed that work would iterate between laboratory and classroom, capturingthe advantages of both. Within a design science approach, currently accepted theory isused to develop an educational artefact or intervention that is tested, modified, retested andredesigned in both the laboratory and the classroom, until a version is developed that bothachieves the educational aims required for the classroom context, and allows reflection on theeducational processes involved in attaining those aims.187