Course Identification

Prior knowledge of educational research and its methodologies is required (e.g., knowledge gained upon successful completion of one of the following cocourses: "Introduction to the Methodology of Science Education Research", "Quantitative Methods in Educational Research", "Qualitative Methods in Educational Research").

The course will comprise 15 synchronous 2-hour lectures, along with asynchronous weekly assignments, and two assignments of a larger scope in the middle and at the end of the course.

The goals of this course are: (1) to get acquainted with and better understand, the specificity, goals, and methods of evaluation research in STEM education; (2) to get initial practical experience in planning, conducting, and reporting evaluation research related to ongoing projects in STEM education. 

In the first part, the course will provide an overview of trends and main characteristics of different generations of evaluation research, from the Measurement Generation (1910s–1930s), through Descriptive Evaluation (1930s–1950s), Judgment-Oriented Evaluation (1960s–1970s), Decision-Oriented Evaluation (1970s–1980s) and up to Participatory Evaluation (1980s–present). Special attention will be given to analysis of evaluation studies based on the current STEM education project in Israel. In the second part, the course will be focused on acquainting practical experience in educational evaluation.

Upon successful completion of the course, the students should be able to:

1. Critically compare different approaches to evaluation research and understand the differences between evaluation research and basic research in education. 
2. Plan evaluation studies in negotiation with stakeholders of educational projects.
3. Conduct and report small-scope evaluation studies based on the ongoing STEM education projects.

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