Learning through Variation in an Introductory Research Methods Course: a Case in the Higher Education Setting

DOI: 10.5176/2251-1814_EeL18.125

Authors: Huang Biyun and Hew Khe Foon

Abstract: Contrast, separation, generalization, fusion are four main patterns of variation theory that have been widely adopted in K-12 settings. Educators and researcher have used variation theory as a guiding theory for informing pedagogical design, lesson analysis, and lesson evaluation. However, there is paucity of studies exploring the effectiveness of variation theory in guiding pedagogical design in the higher education setting. Unlike most empirical variation studies that target K-12 learners, this paper focuses on the tertiary level students, and explores how variation theory may be applied to scaffold the design of an introductory research methods course. The designing survey questionnaire module of this course was selected as an experiment module. To evaluate the effectiveness of this design, a pre- & post- test was conducted to check students’ improvements in learning. The paired sample ttest results indicated that learners’ knowledge about survey questionnaire was significantly improved after the implementation. Participants successfully achieved the learning objects of enumerating the different types of survey questions, identifying and revising inappropriate wordings of survey questions, and designing a complete survey questionnaire for a certain research purpose. This experiment provided empirical evidence that the variation theory is effective in guiding pedagogical design in the higher education setting. Discussions and suggestions for future implementations are also included

Keywords: variation theory, learning design, higher education