Educational Research Tools of Educational Research

1. EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH
UNIT 8: TOOLS OF RESEARCH
Dr. Zaheer Ahmad
Course Coordinator

2. Objectives of the Unit
 Identify the tools of research
 Explain the types of research tools
 Discuss the characteristics, scope and types of the following
 Questionnaire,
 Check list
 Rating scale
 Score card
 Attitude scale

3. introduction
 In every research work, if is essential to collect factual material or data
unknown or untapped so far. They can be obtained from many sources,
direct or indirect. Relevant data, adequate in quantity and quality should
be collected. They should be sufficient, reliable and valid.
 For checking new, unknown data required for the study of any problem
you may use various devices, instruments, apparatus and appliances. For
each and every type of research we need certain instruments to gather
new facts or to explore new fields. The instruments thus employed as
means for collecting data are called

4. selection of suitable instruments or
tools
 The selection of suitable instruments or tools is of vital importance for
successful research. Different tools are suitable for collecting various kinds
of information for various purposes. The research worker may use one or
more of the tools in combination for his purpose.

5. Significance of research tools
 The progress of any educational program very much depends upon well
conduction research
 It postulates sufficient, reliable and valid facts. Such facts are nominally
obtained through a systematic procedure which involves various devices.

6. Major tools
 A. Inquiry forms
 Questionnaire
 Checklist
 Score-card
 Interview Schedule
 Rating Scale
 Attitude Scale
B. Observation
C. Interview
D. Sociometry
E. Tests

7. 1. Questionnaire:
 “A questionnaire is a systematic compilation of questions that are
submitted to a sampling of population from which information is desired.”
Barr, Davis & Johnson

8.  Characteristics of a Good Questionnaire:
 deals with an important or significant topic.
 Its significance is carefully stated on its covering letter.
 It is as short as possible, only long enough to get the essential data. It is attractive in
appearance,
 Directions are clear and complete, important terms are clarified.
 The questions are objective, with no clues, hints or suggestions.
 Questions are presented in a order from simple to complex
 Double negatives, adverbs and descriptive adjectives are avoided.
 Double barreled questions or putting two questions in one question are also avoided

9. Merits of Questionnaire Method
1. it’s very economical.
2. 2. It’s a time saving process.
3. 3. It covers the research in wide area.
4. 4. It’s very suitable for special type of responses.
5. 5. It is most reliable in special cases.

10. Demerits of Questionnaire Method:
1. Through this we get only limited responses.
2. 2. Lack of personal contact.
3. 3. Greater possibility of wrong answers.
4. 4. Chances of receiving incomplete response are more.
5. 5. Sometimes answers may be illegible
6. . 6. It may be useless in many problems.

11. 2. interview schedule
 An interview schedule is basically a list containing a set of structured
questions that have been prepared, to serve as a guide for interviewers,
researchers and investigators in collecting information or data about a
specific topic or issue.

12. advantages
 An interview schedule facilitates the conduct of an interview
 It increases the likelihood of collecting accurate information or data.
 It allows interviewers and researchers to get more information,
 The rate and amount of responses are higher.
 It offers flexibility and high customization,

13. 3.Checklist
 A checklist, is a type of informational job aid used to reduce failure by
compensating for potential limits of human memory and attention. It helps
to ensure consisting and completeness in carrying out a task. A basic
example is ‘to do list’. A more advanced checklist which lays out tasks to
be done according to time of a day or other factors.

14. useful in educational field in the
following way.
• To collect acts for educational surveys.
• To record behavior in observational studies.
• To use in educational appraisal, studies – of school buildings, property,
plan, textbooks, instructional procedures and outcomes etc. • To rate the
personality.
• To know the interest of the subjects also. Kuder’s interest inventory and
Strong’s Interest Blank are also checklists.

15. Hints on Constructing Checklist :
 Items in the checklist may be continuous or divided into groups of related
items.
• Items should be arranged in categories and the categories in a logical or
psychological order.
• Terms used in the items should be clearly defined.
• Checklist should be continuous and comprehensive in nature.
• A pilot study should be taken to make it standardized.
• Checklist can be constructed in four different ways by arranging items
differently.

16. 4. RATING SCALE
 Rating scale is one of the enquiry form. Form is a term applied to
expression or judgment regarding some situation, object or character.
Opinions are usually expressed on a scale of values. Rating techniques are
devices by which such judgments may be quantified. Rating scale is a very
useful device in assessing quality, specially when quality is difficult to
measure objectively. For Example, “How good was the performance?” is a
question which can hardly be answered objectively.

17.  Rating scales record judgment or opinions and indicates the degree or amount of
different degrees of quality which are arranged along a line is the scale.
 For example: How good was the performance? Excellent Very good Good Average
Below average Poor Very poor ___|________|_______|_____|_________|_________|_____|____
 This is the must commonly used instrument for making appraisals. It has a large variety
of forms and uses.
 Typically, they direct attention to a number of aspects or traits of the thing to be rated
and provide a scale for assigning values to each of the aspects selected.
 They try to measure the nature or degree of certain aspects or characteristics of a
person or phenomenon through the use of a series of numbers, qualitative terms or
verbal descriptions

18.  (1) In one of the arrangement all items found in a situation are to be checked. For
Example, a subject may be asked to check ( ) in the blank side of each activity undertaken
in a school.
 (2) In the second form, the respondent is asked to check with a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ or asked to
encircle or underline the response to the given item. For Example, (1) Does your school
have a house system? Yes/No (3) In this form, all the items are positive statements with
checks ( ) to be marked in a column of a right. For Example, (1) The school functions as a
community centre ( ).
 (4) The periodical tests are held – fortnightly, monthly, quarterly, regularly. The
investigator has to select any one of the format appropriate to his problem and queries
or the combination of many as it requires.

19. four primary types of rating scale:
 Graphic Rating Scale: Graphic Rating Scale: Graphic rating scale indicates
the answer options on a scale of 1-3, 1-5, etc. Likert Scale is a popular
graphic rating scale example.
 Numerical Rating Scale: Numerical rating scale has numbers as answer
options and not each number corresponds to a characteristic or meaning.
For instance, a Visual Analog Scale or a Semantic Differential Scale can be
presented using a numerical rating scale.

20.  Descriptive Rating Scale: In a descriptive rating scale, each answer option is elaborately
explained for the respondents. A numerical value is not always related to the answer
options in the descriptive rating scale. There are certain surveys, for example,
satisfaction survey, which needs to describe all the answer options in detail so that
customer has thoroughly explained information about what is expected from the
 Comparative Rating Scale: Comparative rating scale, as the name suggests, expects
respondents to answer a particular question in terms of comparison, i.e. on the basis of
relative measurement or keeping other organizations/products/features as a reference.

21.  Purpose of Rating Scale:
• Teacher Performance/Effectiveness
• Personality, anxiety, stress, emotional intelligence etc.
• School appraisal including appraisal of courses, practices and programs.
 Useful hints on Construction of Rating Scale:
 i) The subjects or the phenomena to be rated.
 ii) The continuum along which they will be rated and
 iii) The judges who will do the rating.

22. 5.Score card
 It is an elaborative form of rating scale which usually evaluate items in
numerical form. Sometimes the two terms the rating scale and score card
are interchangeable.
 Score card is normally used to evaluate the worth of communication,
building sites, schools, textbooks, socio economic status of a family and an
educated work.

23. 6.Attitude scale
 “An attitude may be defined as a learned emotional response set for or
against something.” - Barr David Johnson
Purpose of Attitude Scale : finding the attitudes of persons on different
issues like:
• Co-education
• Religious education
• Corporal punishment
• Democracy in schools
• Linguistic prejudices
• International co-operation etc.

24. Characteristics of Attitude Scale :
 It provides for quantitative measure on a one-dimensional scale of
continuum.
• It uses statements from the extreme positive to extreme negative position.
• It generally uses a five point scale as we have discussed in rating scale.
• It could be standardized and norms are worked out.
• It disguises the attitude object rather than directly asking about the attitude
on the subject.

25. Examples of Some Attitude Scale :
 Thurstone Techniques of scaled values.
 • Likert’s method of summated ratings.

26. Limitations Of Attitude Scale :
• An individual may express socially acceptable opinion conceal his real attitude.
• An individual may not be a good judge of himself and may not be clearly aware of his real
attitude.
• He may not have been controlled with a real situation to discover what his real attitude
towards a specific phenomenon was.
• There is no basis for believing that the five positions indicated in the Likert’s scale are
equally spaced.
• It is unlikely that the statements are of equal value in ‘forness’ or “againstness”.
• It is doubtful whether equal scores obtained by several individuals would indicate equal
favourableness towards again position.
• It is unlikely that a respondent can validity react to a short statement on a printed form in
the absence of real like qualifying Situation.
• In sprite of anonymity of response, Individuals tend to respond according to what they
should feel rather than what they really feel. However,

27. B.The Interview:
 Interview is a two way method which permits an exchange of ideas and
information.
Characteristics of an Interview
1. The interviewer can probe into casual factors, determine attitudes, discover
the origin of problem.
2. Its appropriate to deal with young children and illiterates person.
3. It can make cross questioning possible.
4. It helps the investigator to gain an impression of the person concerned.

28. continued
5. It can deal with delicate, confidential and even intimate topics
6. It has flexibility.
7. Sincerity, frankness, truthfulness and insight of the interviewee can be
better judged through cross questioning.
8. It gives no chance for respondent to modify his earlier answer
. 9. It is applicable in survey method, but it is also applicable in historical,
experimental, case studies and clinical studies.

29. Merits of Interview:
1. Direct research.
2. 2. Deep research
3. 3. Knowledge of past and future.
4. 4. Knowledge of special features.
5. 5. Mutual encouragement is ossible.
6. 6. Supra-observation is possible.
7. 7. Knowledge of historical and emotional causes.
8. 8. Examination of known data.

30. Disadvantage of Interview:
 1. May provides misleading information.
 2. Defects due to interviewee(low level of intelligence or may be
emotionally unbalanced)
 3. Result may be affected due to prejudices of interviewer.
 4. Result may be affected due to the difference in the mental outlook of
interwee and interviewer.
 5. One sided and incomplete research.

31. C. OBSERVATION :
 Observation offers the researcher a distinct way of collecting data. It does
not rely on what people say they do, or what they say they think. It is more
direct than that. Instead, it draws on the direct evidence of the eye to
witness events first hand. It is a more natural way of gathering data.
Whenever direct observation is possible it is the preferable method to use.

32.  Purpose :
• To collect data directly.
• To collect substantial amount of data in short time span.
• To get eye witness first hand data in real like situation.
• To collect data in a natural setting.
Characteristics :
• Observation is systematic
. • It is specific.
• It is objective.
• It is quantitative.
• The record of observation should be made immediately
. • Expert observer should observe the situation
. • It’s result can be checked and verified.

33. Types of Observation :
On the basis of the purpose of observation may be of varied type like: •
Structured and Unstructured: in the first stage of observation, the
observation is wide and unstructured and as the investigation proceeds
observation gets restricted and structured.
• Participant and Non-participant: In participant observation, the observer
becomes more or less one of the groups under observation and shares the
situation as a visiting stranger, an attentive listener, an eager learner or as a
complete participant observer, registering, recording and interpreting
behaviour of the group.

34. Steps of Effective Observation:
 As a research tool effective observation needs effective
 • Planning
 g • Execution
 • Recording and
 • Interpretation

35. Limitations of Observation
• Establishing validity is difficult.
• Subjectivity is also there.
• It is a slow and labourious process.
• It is costly both in terms of time of time and money
. • The data may be unmanageable.
• There is possibility of biasness

36. Advantages of Observation :
 • Data collected directly
 • Systematic and rigorous
 • Substantial amount of data can be collected in a relatively short time
span.
 • Provides pre-coded data and ready for analysis.
 • Inter observer reliability is high.

43. tests
 Tests are constructed to test a group of persons to ascertain the prevailing
condition with respect to the traits measured by the test.
 Tests normally used in research are
 Achievement tests
 Aptitude tests
 Intelligence tests
 Interest inventories
 Personality measures.