(I’m super tired, sorry if you read this and it’s not great.)
So this week delved a little bit more into program evaluation history, from positivist to post-positivist approaches, and furthermore explored the argument based approach to developmental program evaluation.
Although not much was touched on about the positivist approach, it was basically in the era of Industrial Revolution and beyond, where external evaluators would come in and lambast everyone lol. This made teachers and institutions overall weary of evaluation. Might involve things like pre- and post-testing to determine program effectiveness.
Post-positivist approaches developed from 1970′s onward. Won’t list of all of these, but one I found quite interesting by the sound of it was Educational Connoisseurship which focused on an impressionistic narrative, considering the program as an artistic object.
The difference between research and evaluation largely comes down to practical application. Research has the purpose of discovering new knowledge and better understanding issues, research questions originate from theories or previous research, their is no applicability necessary, or at least not immediately. Evaluation has the purpose of serving decision making for any number of stakeholders, questions originate from informational needs of stakeholders, and applicability is crucial.
There are a number of challenges for (language) program evaluation, including understanding the sociopolitical context, involving stakeholders, understanding what constitutes success or achievement in the program, understanding what evidence is needed to back claims and considering applicability beyond the immediate context of the evaluation.
Something I liked about the description of developmental approaches to language program evaluation was their goal of “nurturing a hunger for learning as opposed to using methods for striving for goals that engender a fear of failure”.
I might post my notes from the key reading separately.
