What do researchers want to accomplish?  Where do academics find the themes for their research?   These questions had surfaced recently when I read Dr. Gorrell’s article about the Learning Connections Program (Gorrell, 2000).  They returned  as I read the abstract for Teacher Perceptions of Mainstreaming/Inclusion, 1958-1995:  A Research Synthesis by Thomas E. Scruggs and Margo A. Mastropieri.  Another question was added:  why do researchers review what others have already studied?   The research team of Scruggs and Mastropieri explain in the abstract that their study summarizes responses to the question of whether classroom teachers support the idea of including students with disabilities in their classrooms.   Their study also looks at the answers to questions about whether the classroom teachers feel they have the training and resources to deal with children with special needs.  After reading the abstract, I quickly reviewed my answers to those questions, scanned the article to find that my experience matched what the research found and promptly dismissed the article as nothing new.  But the questions nagged me.   This article reviewed the literature compiled from almost 40 years of research on this obvious topic of teacher attitudes towards  inclusion of students with disabilities.   Why had intelligent people spent years, money and energy writing what any classroom teacher could have told them point blank?   As with Dr Gorrell’s study,  the importance of this kind of research comes to light by looking at what the study does not say.

       The Gorrell article presented an evaluation study of a teacher improvement program which showed that after three years, teachers in the program did not show much if any improvement. The evaluation study began with a program (Learning Connections Program) to evaluate.  But the focus on the measurable variables shifted from teacher improvement to student standardized test scores.  With this change from what had been set up as a studied variable to scores which had not been intended to be studied,  the project lost its focus and the study presented the question of why it was undertaken in the first place.  There seemed to be some factors left out.  Only with Dr Gorrell’s explanation did the valuable lessons surface.  In the project, the people involved in doing the study, funding the study and evaluating the study were not operating on the same mindset.   This did not come across in the article.  From Dr. Gorrell’s talk,  I learned that in an evaluation study the focus of the parties involved must be clear from the beginning so that the research can become a valuable learning tool.  His article presented a study where this did not happen.

       In the  article about inclusion of the child with special needs, the questions as to its utility also were resolved only after listening to Dr. Scruggs.  The article compiled  information from 28 reports from all geographic areas in the US, from New South Wales, Australia and from Montreal, Canada.    His article detailed how the willingness of the classroom teacher to include  children with disabilities increased as the severity of the disability decreased. The research also showed that classroom teachers needed more planning time, more training and more resources if they had special needs children in their classes.  The findings from the research synthesis showed that attitudes about including special needs children have not changed in the past 40 years.  It also showed that there was very little if any deviation according to geographic area.  With such undramatic  and commonly accepted outcomes, what was the value of the study?  Dr. Scruggs adroitly pointed out that a research synthesis or a review of literature shows where the research hasn’t gone.  It shows where the gaps in the research lie.  A research synthesis also puts everyone on the same footing.  It ties together everything which has been done and can point the researcher to the areas which still need to be studied.

     The Scruggs article  teaches us by example how to organize our information in order to know how to proceed in our research.  The importance of knowing everything possible about the research topic is stressed.  We also need to know where we are coming from to know where we should be heading.  In the Gorrell article we are presented with a study which loses its focus because the players change where they are heading.  If the Gorrell study had begun with a synthesis of research done on evaluating teacher improvement programs, the three groups involved might have had more closely aligned goals.  The confusion presented in explaining the outcomes of the study would have been resolved if the parties involved had resolved before they began where they were coming from and where they were headed.

     In conclusion, the two articles show us two distinct kinds of research projects, an evaluation study and a review of literature.  Looking at both of them together we see the importance of knowing what went on before us in the field we are studying in order to anticipate what we will find.  If we are not organized, focused and directed in our approach then the research will reflect our confusion.  If we follow Dr Scruggs’ method of researching a topic then we will know not only what is out there but also what is not there.  That gives us a  valuable starting point.

References

Gorrell, J. (2000) Learning Connections:  Evaluation Report for Year Three.  Presented to the
 Baptist Community Ministries.

Scruggs, T.E., & Mastropieri, M.A. (1996) Teacher perceptions of mainstreaming/inclusion,   1958-1995:  A research synthesis.  Exceptional Children, 63, 59-74.