Teachers Researching, Children Designing

The recent AAAS Research on Technology Education Conference (see Cajas, 2000) established both the need for research and some of the directions it should take. There was general consensus among the participants that research needs to focus on what actually happens in the classroom: how teachers teach and how students learn. Research should begin with some conception of the goals appropriate for technology education, and then look for the ways in which these are or are not achieved. Schoenfeld (1998), Lewis (1999), McCormick (2000) and Hennessy & McCormick (1994) also make the case for investigations grounded in classroom practice.