1. The embryonic period of educational scientific research methods

With the development of human society, the progress of science, culture and technology, especially the expansion of educational demand and practice, the improvement of educational scale and level, the gradual improvement of educational quality and the gradual development of people's understanding of education, educational research methods have emerged and developed. School education, in particular, is constantly innovating and improving with the improvement of productivity, the development of science and technology and the progress of human culture. In primitive society, education was carried out in productive labor. On the one hand, people pass on their knowledge and experience to the next generation through role models, on the other hand, they naturally observe the methods of teaching process and the educational effect of the younger generation, and attack and summarize them in the original way, so as to continuously improve. It is true that the observation and summary at that time were often unplanned, unconscious, scattered and low-level; The new discovery obtained through observation is very accidental, and the summary only stays in thinking, so it is impossible to describe and summarize it in words like today. In the slave society and feudal society, with the appearance of figures, the emergence and development of school education, the deepening of educational practice, the accumulation and enrichment of cultural and scientific knowledge in all aspects, observation, experience summary and other educational research methods were consciously used by educators.

Historical methods, literature methods, measurement and evaluation methods, speculative methods and other educational research methods have also appeared one after another. Famous educators in ancient China, such as Confucius and Zhu, studied education mainly through observation, research and experience summary. In order to deeply study the educational thought and practice of ancestors, many educators in ancient times often consulted historical documents or annotated their educational remarks. These practices belong to historical research and literature research. In ancient China, examinations, especially imperial examinations, were a measure and evaluation of candidates. Speculation is a research method that relies on insufficient observation of facts, uses intuitive speculation and simple logical reasoning to grasp the general nature of phenomena as a whole. Ancient speculative methods have reached a fairly high level. For example, China's "Five Elements Theory", Indian's "Four Elements Theory" and ancient Greek Ptolemy's "Geocentric Theory" had great influence on the study of educators, especially Aristotle's syllogism and speculative speculation in ancient Greece, which became the thinking mode of early scientists, philosophers and educators. The research method of ancient education has strongly promoted the research of ancient education, but it only stays at the level of qualitative description and subjective analysis and inference, lacking comprehensive and systematic logical argumentation, accurate quantitative analysis and strict scientific experiment verification. Therefore, the various educational research methods adopted at that time have not yet reached the level of real scientific research. For example, the observation method at that time was not systematic, and the educational observers were often based on incomplete experience or evidence, while ignoring the complex educational factors at work, and it was easy to make generalizations or conclusions about intuitive phenomena. The concept of belief in "authority" prevailed in ancient times, and blind obedience to authority and superstition of the ancients were common. Therefore, people often take authoritative instructions as the criterion to observe educational phenomena, sum up educational experience, think about educational problems and explore educational laws. For example, the words "sage's words" and "first from Wang Zhidao" recorded in China's ancient books are full of dogmatism and authoritarianism. In the Middle Ages of Europe, God and God were above everything else, and religious thoughts also severely restricted people's scientific thinking.

2. The prosperous period of educational scientific research methods

(1) experimental method

After the Renaissance in Europe, research methods gradually attached importance to hypothesis and experiment. Experimental methods were first applied by scientists in the form of physics, and Francis Bacon in Britain was the first person to systematically study experimental methods. Bacon pointed out in the book New Tools that science should be experimental science. To break the religious "speculative shackles" in the Middle Ages, we should use rational methods to sort out perceptual materials, really advocate the combination of experience and reason, and advocate the induction and sublimation of experience. /kloc-Galileo, an Italian scientist in the 6th century, initiated a research method combining experimental methods with rational methods and mathematical methods. /kloc-after the 0/7th century, the method of combining empirical method with rational method has been widely used, and various scientific methods such as mathematical method and logical method have developed relatively independently. The development of various research methods in the field of science has promoted the development of educational research methods, especially the experimental research and quantitative analysis of natural science, which laid the foundation for future educational science research. /kloc-Since the 7th century, a group of outstanding educators, such as Comenius, Pestalozzi, Dostoevsky and ushinski, have closely combined the theory and practice of educational research methods, thus greatly enriching the theory and practice of modern educational research.

From19th century to the end of World War II, the development of educational research methods was in its heyday. During this period, educational research methods have taken on an unprecedented brand-new look. First of all, the educational experiment movement has developed rapidly. /kloc-around the 0/9th century, famous educational experiments were: 1768 "Xinzhuang" experimental school founded by Swiss educator Pestalozzi; 1825, an educational experiment conducted by Owen, England, who founded the "Xinhe Harmonious Village" in the immigrant area; 1896, Dewey founded the experimental school of the University of Chicago in the United States. From the end of 19, the experimental education movement flourished in Germany, Britain and the United States. Since Feng Te initiated the Psychology Laboratory (1879) to study people's psychology through experiments, Gao Erdun of Britain set up an anthropology laboratory in London in 1882 to study individual differences. At the beginning of the 20th century, psychologists and educators strongly advocated and promoted educational experiments. For example, Man Mei and Rai advocated to study and realize education by experiment, and put forward the theory of "experimental pedagogy". French Binet.Alfred. Alfred advocated using experimental methods to study children's intellectual development; Thorndike, USA, applied the methods of animal and psychological experiments to education, arguing that educational phenomena and theories must be strictly verified by experiments. Subsequently, the development of measurement tools and the progress of statistical methods provide technology and methods for educational experiments. Since then, educational experiment, as a relatively strict scientific research method, has been widely used in the field of education. China's educational experiment movement began in the 1920s. At that time, under the influence of the American educational experimental movement, educational experimental areas were established everywhere. By 1935, there are 193 educational experimental zones in China. Among them, the experimental rural normal school and the Shanhai Engineering Corps founded by Tao Xingzhi, the Dingxian experimental area of the China Association for the Promotion of Civilian Education and Liang Shuming's "rural construction" experiment have great influence.

(2) Educational measurement

During this period, the educational measurement movement also flourished. 1864, George Fisher, England compiled the world's first achievement scale. Later, Rice of the United States actively advocated educational measurement and compiled tests on arithmetic, spelling and language during 1895- 1905. At the same time, the educational measurement movement rose rapidly, and various objective and standardized educational measurements appeared one after another, including Binet.Alfred's intelligence measurement. Alfred and T. Simon (1905). 1909, American educational psychologist Thorndike, known as the originator of educational measurement, used the "equidistant principle" of statistics to invent the unit for compiling scales, and compiled standard measurement tools such as calligraphy scale, spelling scale and composition scale, which made educational measurement embark on a scientific road. Since then, the rise of various objective and standardized educational measurement such as academic achievement test, intelligence test, aptitude test, diagnostic test and personality test has promoted the rapid development of educational measurement movement.

(3) Education survey

During this period, educational investigation began to be valued, and gradually became standardized and scientific. /kloc-after the 0/9th century, educational researchers began to pay attention to the application of investigation methods. The famous early education survey was the spelling practice survey conducted in the United States from 65438 to 0897. In addition, at the end of 19 and the beginning of the 20th century, some influential education surveys appeared in the United States. For example, at the end of 19, Stan and J Hall in the United States conducted education surveys by questionnaire; 19 10 A school survey conducted by Paul Hanus, a professor at Harvard University; 1911-1912 A large-scale school survey in new york. All these educational surveys pay attention to the standardization and scientificity of their methods and means to some extent. In the future, with the wide application of educational survey methods, educational survey methods have also developed greatly in complexity and scale of use. In addition, the emergence and development of educational technologies such as educational statistics have also opened up a broad road for the scientific development of educational research.

Generally speaking, the research methods of natural science and other social sciences were widely transplanted into the field of educational research during this period, which made the educational research method a big step forward to science. At the same time, educational researchers have also inherited and developed traditional educational research methods, and constantly created new educational research methods, thus gradually forming a unique research method system in the field of education.

3. Development trend of educational scientific research methods

Since 1950s, with the increasing progress of science and technology, especially the appearance and development of information technology, the traditional educational research methods have been further improved, and new ideas, methods and technical means of modern educational research have emerged constantly, enriching the content and system of educational scientific research methods. There are many new breakthroughs in the system and application technology of modern educational research methods. From the vertical observation, the development of educational research methods in the past 50 years has reached a fairly high level both in theory and technology, and the professional level has become more and more full and perfect. From the perspective of horizontal scanning, educational research has expanded from the traditional field of school educational science research to wider research fields such as school education and distance education, classroom teaching and distance education, preschool education and lifelong education, and the extension or application field of educational science research methods has been further expanded due to the differentiation of educational disciplines and the formation of new academic specialized fields. Its development trend is:

(1) More and more education surveys. Research method is the most basic research method in social science. Since 1950s, more and more educational researchers all over the world have adopted this method. In China, educational surveys conducted by tens of thousands of individuals and many cooperative or collective organizations have appeared in recent years, including local educational surveys, cross-county, inter-provincial or national educational surveys. Among them, the survey of universal compulsory education in China was conducted in 1986. The survey was led by the Education, Culture, Health and Science Committee of the National People's Congress, with the participation of relevant central departments. Three investigation teams were formed and went to Jiangsu, Hunan and Sichuan provinces for investigation and study. At present, some provinces and cities have generally organized and planned investigations and studies on popularizing nine-year compulsory education, ideological and moral education for students, the relationship between socialist market economy and education, and quality education.

(2) Various educational experiments centered on developing intelligence are more and more extensive. Since 1950s, the former Soviet Union, the United States and the former West Germany have carried out many teaching reform experiments centered on developing students' intelligence. For example, in the curriculum reform, there are three typical reform experimental schools, and in the teaching methods, there are reform experiments such as "discovery method", "inquiry method" and "problem solving method". In the past 20 years, Japan and other countries have been actively carrying out educational reform experiments with the core of "cultivating students' creative thinking ability" and early educational experiments of early intellectual development. In China, there are many educational experiments aimed at developing students' intelligence. For example, the teaching experiment of "Overall Construction of Teaching System" designed by Professor Zhao of Guangzhou Xinghai Conservatory of Music tries to build a "derrick" in children's psychology, so that children's intellectual potential can gush out like underground crude oil. This experiment started from 1978 and achieved gratifying results in some primary schools and kindergartens. Another example is the experiment of "all-round development of primary school students' Chinese ability" hosted by Lu Jingxian, a special teacher in Beijing. This experiment focuses on the development of students' thinking and language, and promotes the all-round development of primary school students' Chinese ability through the overall reform of Chinese teaching structure. This experiment started with 1962, and educators in many provinces and cities are still expanding this experiment.

(3) A striking typical example of the long-term follow-up research method is 192 1- 1972, a follow-up study on the development and cultivation of American supernormal people's creative ability. Many research data show that due to the complexity and long period of education, it is difficult to see substantial changes in the problem in a short time. Therefore, long-term follow-up study or longitudinal study has attracted people's attention. In recent 50 years, more and more people have studied education in this way. For example, Bloom's research on the importance of early education in the United States has conducted a long-term follow-up study of nearly 1,000 children from kindergarten to adulthood. The research on "Teaching and Development" in zankov, the former Soviet Union, based on the data obtained from long-term follow-up lectures and records, analyzes various teaching effects of experimental classes. Suhomlinski of the former Soviet Union also conducted a long-term follow-up study on students' physical and mental development and moral education growth for several years or even a decade or two. Judging from many educational research reports published abroad in 1970s and 1980s, a considerable part of them have achieved results through long-term follow-up research or longitudinal research. According to the long-term practical experience of educational research in China and the influence of foreign educational research, in recent 20 years, the educational circles in China have begun to pay attention to long-term follow-up research. For example, Lv Jingxian's experiment mentioned above adopted a follow-up experiment, and conducted a follow-up study from junior grade to senior grade (1-5 grade) in class 18 in five districts and counties of Beijing.

(4) The rise of modern educational evaluation, as one of the important fields of educational science research, its theoretical and methodological research came into being around the 1940s. After 1950s, educational evaluation rose rapidly. After 1957, the American government launched a large-scale education evaluation. Evaluation methods attach importance to summative evaluation, diagnostic evaluation and formative evaluation. The "eight-year research" led by American educator Taylor, who is known as the "father of evaluation", established the theory and method of modern educational evaluation. China joined the International Association for Evaluation of Educational Achievement on 1983.

(5) Introducing a new research method (cross-cultural research) ...... is taking different cultures as samples, comparing their data, and exploring the relationship between variables of different cultural backgrounds. This method was first widely used by anthropologists and sociologists abroad, and then gradually transplanted into educational research. In recent years, it has been gradually mastered and applied by educational researchers in China. Content analysis is an objective and systematic method to quantify and describe the obvious communication content. This method is first used in the study of communication, and then widely used in other social sciences. Now it has become a major data analysis method in educational research. For example, some people have analyzed the contents of articles published since the publication of Educational Research, and found that there is a certain tendency in publishing articles in magazines. Path analysis is a method to find the causal structure between different variables in educational phenomena. It is not used to infer the causal relationship between variables, but to test the accuracy or reliability of an imaginary causal model (it has the function of backtracking). This law was founded in 192 1 year. Originally used to study population genetics, it was applied by sociologists in the late 1960s and gradually applied to educational research. At present, there are a large number of foreign research documents about using this method to study educational problems. Fuzzy theory method is a mathematical method based on fuzzy set theory, which quantitatively describes and deals with complex fuzzy phenomena in education to reveal its regularity. It was founded in 1960s, and its principle has been applied to educational research in 1980s in China. Various new research methods have been introduced into the field of educational research, providing new weapons for solving various complex educational research topics.

(6) Pay attention to comprehensive research methods. Because educational problems often involve social, psychological, political, economic and many other issues, especially the expansion of the influence of psychological research and development on education, people attach importance to the methods of comprehensive research on educational problems, such as psychological diagnosis, analyzing conditions in various ways, and putting forward teaching suggestions. For example, the United States is increasingly adopting this law, and the former Soviet Union has also strengthened its research. For example, to discuss the problem of shaping students' world outlook, they think that to solve this problem, it is necessary to establish psychological diagnostics to form beliefs, and comprehensively study social, school, family and other factors and the role of mass media.

(7) The wide application of electronic computers in education and scientific research The emergence of electronic computers has led to the innovation of scientific research methods, intervened in the field of thinking, and replaced some functions of the human brain. The educational and scientific research projects that could not be started in the past because of too complicated calculation can be carried out smoothly; It also shows a good prospect in logical judgment and reasoning proof. At present, the computer has become a powerful assistant engaged in educational research, storing enough research information for educational research, conducting information retrieval, conducting simulation experiments, and quickly processing redundant research data, providing tools for large-scale, large-scale and long-term educational research.

(8) Pay attention to the combination of qualitative research methods and quantitative research methods. Qualitative research method is to determine whether the research object has a certain nature or to determine the reason and process of a phenomenon change. Commonly used logical analysis, nature analysis, causal analysis, contradiction analysis and other methods. What it wants to answer is not the number of questions, but the nature of "what is" and "what belongs to". There are many phenomena in educational research that can't be described quantitatively or easily. Generally, they are only analyzed qualitatively, such as the function of education and the characteristics of education in the primary stage of socialism. The disadvantage of qualitative analysis is inaccuracy, and some descriptions are flexible and vague. Quantitative analysis is a quantitative analysis of the research process and results. On the one hand, as a cognitive tool, it reflects the characteristics and tendency of an educational phenomenon; On the other hand, it is also a language, which can be used as a means of expression to accurately describe complex educational problems. In the past, China's educational research paid more attention to qualitative research, but since the 1980s, China's published educational papers have begun to focus on quantitative research, paying more and more attention to the combination of quality and quantity. According to relevant research, from 1979 to 1986, the articles published in China's Educational Research are much more qualitative than quantitative (qualitative:1380; Quantization: 140 articles), but the number of quantified articles is gradually increasing. Quantitative research has attracted the attention of theoretical workers and publications, and the research methods of educational researchers have also changed from simple qualitative analysis to the combination of qualitative analysis and quantitative analysis.

(9) Extensive open educational research activities and collaborative research methods In recent years, it has been very active to organize educational researchers to exchange visits and carry out academic research activities among provinces, regions and countries around the world in China; There are more and more cooperative research methods across countries and regions. Looking at the evolution and development trend of modern educational scientific research methods, we can find that the development of educational research methods is closely related to the development of education, educational theory and science and technology. On the one hand, the evolution of educational research methods always follows the development of educational undertakings and educational theories. In order to meet the requirements of educational development, researchers always carry out reform and innovation in combination with the reality of educational development while inheriting traditional educational research methods. On the other hand, with the development of modern science and technology, researchers continue to transplant and apply other scientific research methods to education, which effectively promotes the transition of educational research methods from experience description stage to scientific exploration stage. Especially at present, transplanting and applying other scientific methods are no longer in the stage of simple copying and imitation, but focus on combining the characteristics of education, trying to create a set of educational research law system with educational characteristics on the basis of inheritance and transplantation. Of course, the current educational research method system is still far from perfect, and the theoretical basis is very weak. People generally pay attention to the specific application of a single method. As for the research on the epistemological basis of various educational research methods and the internal relations between them, it is not in-depth at present, so there is no solid theoretical basis for how to combine some methods scientifically to obtain the best scientific research results.

Several historical stages of the development of science education

(A) Several historical stages of the development of science education

1. Encyclopedia period

With the development of social economy, people's understanding of education is deepening. Natural science courses entered the school much later than humanities courses such as language and logic, and scientific knowledge was separated from other empirical courses until16th century. However, it is precisely because of the close relationship between natural science curriculum and human life and social progress that various educational reform thoughts always strongly influence natural science curriculum. /kloc-in the 0/7th century, due to the requirements of manufacturing technology with navigation, mining and military as the main axis, natural sciences such as physics, mineralogy, botany, zoology and chemistry have made remarkable progress, which led to the introduction of natural science courses into European schools and the establishment of an encyclopedic knowledge system. Thus, science education entered its first development period-encyclopedia period.

2. The period of essentialism

At the end of 19, with the arrival of the new industrial revolution, natural science has made great progress. People then realize that teaching listed scientific knowledge to students can no longer meet the needs of production and scientific development, so they turn to the stage of teaching science with basic facts, concepts, principles, symbols and measurement systems as the content elements. This stage is called essentialism period. During this period, the curriculum of science education is based on minimum knowledge, skills and attitudes. Schools are regarded as "institutions that preserve traditional values and adapt people to society", while students are in the position of "being guided, exercised and taught". Based on this understanding, science education has gradually evolved into a "discipline-centered course", which emphasizes teaching people to master cultural heritage systematically, requires students to learn logically organized textbooks in an orderly manner, and teachers should teach and teach in an orderly manner. The above thought, which was formed in the essentialism period, had a far-reaching influence on science education, so that it became the dominant educational philosophy at that time, but the problems it brought were gradually recognized by people. For example, emphasize memory and ignore understanding; Emphasis on knowledge, ignoring children's social development and physical and mental health; The knowledge acquired by students through formal training cannot be automatically "migrated" to the solution of practical problems; Teaching can not be completely based on the differences of each student; Science courses are difficult to communicate and synthesize with other disciplines, and so on.

3. "Progressive Education" Movement Period

The above problems led to the "progressive education" movement in the 1920s and 1930s. Under the influence of Dewey, a famous American educator, the science curriculum boldly carried out a child-centered and experience-centered reform attempt, abolished the scientific system of the subject, introduced children's life into the teaching materials based on students' needs and interests, and turned the teaching materials into personal direct experience, so that children could learn science by doing. At this time, the science curriculum is not a list of subject knowledge, but is composed of students' activities or lives. In teaching, students are emphasized to discover knowledge by themselves in experiments, rather than stuffing and swallowing "ready-made" knowledge. In teaching, teachers are required to respect children's "spontaneous heart" and "initiative", emphasize children's main role in education and teaching, and attach importance to the free development of students' individual interests and lively learning process. Dewey clearly pointed out that the subject must have positive creative activities. "We should always keep a lively desire to learn. When he is an adult, he is naturally willing to learn more from him. " Under the influence of Dewey's thought, the science curriculum has appeared an unprecedented vivid situation.

4. The period of "structuralism" educational thought.

At the end of 1950s, this reform was challenged by fierce international competition. People began to re-attach importance to the academic nature of science courses. The "structuralism" educational trend of thought, represented by Bruner, clearly advocates that students should master the basic structure of knowledge in various disciplines and strengthen the theoretical and systematic study of science courses. At this time, the science course is called "knowledge center" course, which is represented by American PSSC physics. Through the teaching of scientific basic structure (basic concepts) and scientific methods, students' application ability is developed. "Structuralism" educational trend of thought holds that if students understand the structure of a subject, they can understand the content of the subject, keep their knowledge in the structured concept network, and "migrate" to other concepts and fields. During this period, the difficulty of science curriculum was greatly deepened, which made a large number of children who developed in the non-academic direction feel uncomfortable and criticized by educators. However, it is worth noting that this round of science curriculum reform has absorbed Dewey's "progressive" educational thought on the basis of inheriting the educational idea of essentialism, such as advocating students to study like scientists, attaching importance to scientific research methods, paying attention to selecting typical teaching materials, and opposing simple memory and training.

5. The scientific, technological and social period

In the 1970s, the rapid development of science and technology had a strong impact on science education, and people began to realize that "in today's high-tempo society, we can't just impart knowledge to students, but must pay attention to the education of methods and skills. Let students know that knowing the source of knowledge and the means of acquiring knowledge are much more important than knowledge itself. Because knowledge itself may become outdated at any time. " Fraser, a British scientist, clearly put forward the slogan "Science for the public", advocated future-oriented science education, popularized science education to all people and cultivated children's innovative ability. The science curriculum reform in this period began to explore the close relationship between the concept and content of science and society, economy and technology, and emphasized that students should be the real masters of learning.

From the above simple review, we can easily see that science education has experienced a spiral development stage in the development history of nearly 400 years. From the encyclopedia period to the scientific, technical and social period, the presentation of scientific knowledge has undergone fundamental changes, and the changes in the presentation of knowledge show obvious progress in the concepts and methods of science education. In this change, there has always been a contest between the two curriculum concepts of "subject-centered" and "children-centered", but we can clearly see that the development trend of science education will be the mutual integration of these two concepts. This integration is not a simple patchwork, but a reorganization of teaching content and a reform of teaching methods aimed at cultivating new people needed by society. History is advancing, and science education is opening a new chapter with the evolution of human civilization.

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