questionnaire to study education

Question 1

practical: questionnaires are quick and cheap when doing a research within education context

Answer 1

• it would be hard to do other labour intensive methods like interviews
• so questionnaires are quicker since you send out multiple copies which allows you to gather information

Question 2

sampling frames: schools are good source of ready made sampling

Answer 2

• schools keep lists of staff, students and parents which provides accurate sampling frames
• already made samples of pupils and teachers e.g. teaching departments and form classes

Question 3

sampling frames: unable to obtain representative sample in school

Answer 3

• sociologist may want to find particular ethnic group but school may not keep lists of people sorted in ethnic background

Question 4

response rate: conducted in school response rate is higher than other areas because..

Answer 4

• once gatekeeper gives permission and put their authority behind the research
• teacher and pupils may be pressured to cooperate

Question 5

response rate: teachers may not complete questionnaires at all

Answer 5

• too busy to complete questionnaires and i’ll reduce response rate

Question 6

researching pupils: questionnaires must be short when given to children because..

Answer 6

• children have shorter attention span than adults so questions needs to be brief to complete it
• but this limits the amount of info that can be gathered

Question 7

researching teachers: teachers can guess researcher’s aims

Answer 7

• teacher are well educated professionals who are able to analyse pattern of questions and recognise the aims and intentions

Question 8

researching parents: questionnaires effective way to locate and contact parents

Answer 8

• parents are harder to locate than pupil so using the school to distribute it can over come the problem
• E.G: pupils can take it home for their parents to complete

Question 9

anonymity and detachment: easier to study sensitive data e.g. bullying

Answer 9

• respondents wouldn’t change their answers (valid) since the researcher wouldn’t see their name so the researcher cant identify who experienced what

Question 10

anonymity and detachment: INTERPRETIVISTS criticise questionnaires due to being detached

Answer 10

• they emphasise on the importance of rapport with the participants this means they will obtain dishonest answers

Question 11

validity: children may not know answers to questions given

Answer 11

• some pupils in anti - subcultures may refuse to cooperate which leads to invalid data