SAGE Journal Articles

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Journal Article 1: Van Velzen, J. H. (2013). Educational researchers and practicalityAmerican Educational Research Journal50, 789–811.

Abstract: In this article, an attempt to identify further directions in research designs that researchers can use to contribute to the relevance of educational research findings, by including teachers’ practicality issues, is presented. Sixty experienced teachers in secondary education read the reporting of modified experimental research findings about an unfamiliar teaching method for promoting students’ conceptual understanding via historical information and filled in open-ended questions that included general opinion, professional judgment, and research interpretation to capture their practicality issues. The teachers’ answers were analyzed to deduce a hierarchy of themes. The results suggest that the teachers’ practicality issues, which included mainly (a) students’ long-term achievement results, (b) the utility of the teaching method, (c) student experiences, and (d) comparison with other teaching methods, can point to a research program that includes teachers’ practicality issues.

Journal Article 2: Dolby, N., & Rahman, A. (2008). Research in international educationReview of Educational Research78, 676–726.

Abstract: Until recently, international education has existed at the margins of educational research. However, in the current context of globalization, international education has moved closer to the center of educational research throughout the world. In this article, the authors identify, describe, and analyze six distinct research approaches to international education: comparative and international education, internationalization of higher education, international schools, international research on teaching and teacher education, internationalization of K-12 education, and globalization of education. Within each approach, the authors discuss the historical context and the global political, economic, social, and cultural shifts that have shaped the research approach; map the major research trajectories that have developed; discuss the audience and research community; and analyze strengths and weaknesses. The authors conclude with a discussion of emergent trends within research in international education.

Journal Article 3: Hardy, I., Heimans, S., & Lingard, B. (2011). Journal rankings: Positioning the field of educational research and educational academicsPower and Education3, 4–17.

Abstract: This article explores the way in which journal ranking processes in education impact upon the field of education and educational researchers. The article draws upon the recent moves to rank order journals in academic disciplines/domains of research in Australia through the introduction of the ERA – Excellence in Research for Australia – as a means of evaluating academic work. Drawing upon an analysis of the specific ordering of ‘leading’ journals in education according to the ERA and the national locations of journal editors, the article focuses on how these processes of ‘academic accountancy’ have implications for the field of educational research, as well as for individual academics measured and monitored through this process. The research demonstrates how already privileged Anglo-US research and research outlets continue to be consecrated and legitimated at the expense of more local and alternative programs and outlets. The article suggests that the push to manage and measure research productivity, taken up in policy within and across specific nation states (in this case, Australia), ignores the breadth of existing research within the field of educational research and potentially narrows the nature of the research undertaken by individual academics and reduces the potential publication outlets, thereby contributing to the recalibration and repositioning of academic work.