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Submitted  Manuscript:  Kumar,  S.  &  Antonenko,  P.  (2014).  Connecting  practice,  theory  and  method:  Supporting  professional  doctoral  students  in  developing  conceptual  frameworks.  TechTrends.  58(4),  54-­‐61.    

   

Connecting  practice,  theory  and  method:  Supporting  professional  doctoral  students  in  developing  conceptual  frameworks.      

 Introduction    In  its  broadest  definition,  inquiry  is  a  systematic  and  thoughtful  process  of  planning  and  implementing  observations.  Scaffolding  of  student  inquiry  in  traditional,  face-­‐to-­‐face  doctoral  programs  presents  multiple  challenges  for  mentors  (Becker,  2007)  and  these  challenges  are  multiplied  in  the  context  of  mentoring  graduate  research  in  an  online  environment  (Kumar,  Johnson,  &  Hardemon,  2013).    Any  sort  of  deliberate  empirical  planning  involves  a  careful  analysis  of  what  to  observe,  whom  to  observe,  and  how  to  observe.  Anyone  who  has  advised  graduate  student  research  knows  that  novice  researchers  struggle  with  putting  all  the  “what”,  “who”,  and  “how”  pieces  together  to  conceptualize  a  useful  and  doable  empirical  study  (Leshem  &  Trafford,  2007).  Supporting  doctoral  students  in  designing  and  conducting  empirical  inquiry  involves  intensive  mentoring  on  how  to  approach  and  align  these  various  components  and  design  a  study  as  a  coherent  whole,  a  gestalt,  based  on  a  sound  conceptual  framework.  In  the  case  of  online  and  hybrid  graduate  programs,  this  process  takes  place  within  the  online  supervisor-­‐student  relationship,  but  can  be  greatly  improved  and  facilitated  by  purposeful,  structured  scaffolding  during  coursework.      We  describe  conceptual  frameworks  as  practical  tools  for  organizing  all  aspects  of  professional  practice  inquiry,  a  task  that  professional  practice  students  and  advisors  can  find  daunting  due  to  the  complex  nature  of  mentoring  in  the  online  environment  (Kumar,  Johnson,  &  Hardemon,  2013).  In  this  article  we  detail  how  the  development  of  such  a  conceptual  framework  that  helps  professional  practice  students  structure  their  inquiry  can  be  scaffolded  and  facilitated  in  an  online  doctoral  program,  in  this  case  the  Ed.D.  in  Educational  Technology  at  the  University  of  Florida.  Finally,  we  discuss  program  design  elements  that  contributed  to  the  success  of  this  approach  with  our  students  and  some  challenges  that  we  faced  while  doing  so.  Our  description  of  conceptual  framework  scaffolding  and  development  can  be  useful  to  all  professional  doctorates,  but  especially  those  offered  online.    An  Instrumental  Perspective  on  Conceptual  Frameworks    In  a  broad  sense,  a  conceptual  framework  can  be  defined  as  a  system  of  assumptions,  expectations,  beliefs,  theories,  and  concepts  that  support  and  inform  research  (Maxwell,  2012;  Robson,  2011).  The  definition  of  a  conceptual  framework  can  also  be  approached  from  an  instrumental  view  of  theory  (Dewey,  1938).  

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According  to  this  perspective,  a  conceptual  framework  should  serve  as  a  tool  to  structure  inquiry,  a  map  that  connects  the  point  of  departure  on  the  quest  for  research  (i.e.,  the  problem)  and  the  potential  destination(s)  or  possible  solutions  to  the  research  problem  –  with  all  the  stops  throughout  the  journey  (key  concepts,  research  questions,  data  collection  and  analysis  methods,  and  data  interpretation  strategies).  Conceptual  frameworks  are  used  to  organize  the  exploration  of  the  problem  at  hand  (Shields  &  Tajalli,  2006)  providing  the  researcher  with  the  “logical  instruments”  for  connecting  research  problem  and  outcomes  (Dewey,  1938,  p.  283).  Maxwell  (2012)  goes  on  to  explain  that  a  conceptual  framework  is  a  tentative  theory  or  model  of  the  phenomena  under  analysis  that  clarifies  what  these  phenomena  are,  what  is  going  on  with  them,  and  why.  “Without  a  theory,  however  provisional  or  loosely  formulated,  there  is  only  a  miscellany  of  observations,  having  no  significance”  (Kaplan,  1964,  p.  268).      One  important  feature  that  helps  define  conceptual  frameworks  from  an  instrumental  perspective  is  that  a  conceptual  framework  is  something  that  is  carefully  assembled  piece  by  piece  by  the  researcher  rather  than  identified  as  one,  ready-­‐to-­‐use  theory  or  model  in  the  literature.  Education  is  an  interdisciplinary  field  of  inquiry  (McMillan  &  Schumacher,  2001),  therefore  educational  technology  researchers  also  rely  on  the  theories,  concepts,  terminology,  methodology,  instrumentation,  and  empirical  findings  from  psychology,  anthropology,  political  science,  economics,  management  of  information  systems,  mass  communication,  computer  science  and  so  on.  The  use  of  concepts,  theories,  and  methodologies  from  various  disciplines  enriches  and  extends  research-­‐based  knowledge  in  education.  Thus,  in  most  cases  it  is  the  researcher’s  responsibility  to  construct  a  conceptual  framework  by  critically  analyzing  the  relevant  theories  and  empirical  evidence  and  extracting  the  most  useful  and  pertinent  pieces  or  “modules”  (Becker,  2007)  in  a  way  that  makes  most  sense  in  the  context  of  the  research  problem.  Just  like  a  handyman  selects  the  most  appropriate  tools  for  each  individual  job,  a  researcher  puts  together  a  “toolbox”  of  concepts  from  theories  and  modules  that  are  most  useful  in  the  context  of  each  research  study.      The  aspect  of  constructing  a  conceptual  framework  based  on  knowledge  from  multiple  diverse  sources  and  disciplinary  areas  is  particularly  important  in  the  case  of  inductive,  practitioner  research  that  is  typically  driven  by  a  problem  of  practice  that  is  embedded  in  the  researcher’s  local  context  rather  than  an  established  theory  with  its  explanations,  predictions,  and  design  guidelines  that  can  inform  the  design  of  a  tightly  controlled  laboratory  study.  In  the  next  sections  we  describe  the  Ed.D.  at  the  University  of  Florida,  and  how  the  program  is  structured  to  scaffold  the  development  of  such  conceptual  frameworks.    Scaffolding  Conceptual  Frameworks  in  the  UF  Ed.D.  program    The  online  Ed.D.  in  Educational  Technology  at  the  University  of  Florida  is  modeled  on  the  professional  practice  doctorate  (CPED,  2010).  It  aims  to  prepare  educational  technology  leaders  who  will  apply  research-­‐based  knowledge  and  generate  

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contextually  useful  knowledge  in  educational  technology  to  facilitate  change  in  educational  environments.  Students  are  expected  to  possess  and  apply  foundational  knowledge  in  educational  technology  and  deep  knowledge  in  an  area  of  specialization  to  solve  contextual  problems  and  conduct  research  in  practice.  Students  in  the  program  complete  two  years  of  required  online  coursework  as  a  cohort,  and  take  their  qualifying  exams  at  the  end  of  the  two  years.  Once  students  successfully  pass  qualifying  exams,  they  begin  work  on  their  dissertations  with  a  faculty  mentor.  Detailed  descriptions  of  program  design  and  online  teaching  and  learning  can  be  found  in  Dawson  et  al.  (2011)  and  Kumar  et  al.  (2011).      All  students  in  the  UF  Ed.D.  program  are  professionals  who  work  with  educational  technology  in  diverse  educational  environments  (K-­‐12,  post-­‐secondary,  virtual  or  online  education,  non-­‐profit,  etc.).  Dissertations  in  the  program  are  thus  focused  on  research  conducted  to  address  a  problem  in  the  student’s  professional  practice.  Students  are  expected  to  describe  the  problem  in  the  context  of  educational  theories  and  prior  research,  identify  and  implement  relevant  methods  applicable  to  the  context,  and  propose  potential  solutions.  The  guiding  principles  for  the  dissertations  are  described  in  Dawson  &  Kumar  (this  issue)  along  with  an  analysis  of  the  first  23  dissertations  completed  in  the  program.    Given  the  multidisciplinary  nature  of  Educational  Technology,  students  in  the  Ed.D.  program  come  from  and  work  in  multiple  disciplines,  making  it  challenging  for  them  to  identify  and  inventively  combine  relevant  information  pieces  from  more  than  one  discipline,  research  area,  paradigm,  theory,  method,  or  instrument  for  their  conceptual  frameworks.  We  expect  them  to  draw  on  foundational  knowledge  in  Educational  Technology  as  well  as  foundational  knowledge  in  their  discipline,  and  specialized  knowledge  in  the  area  that  is  the  focus  of  their  research.  Online  coursework  that  builds  up  to  the  qualifying  exams  and  dissertation,  therefore,  is  structured  to  help  students  acquire  knowledge  and  critically  select  and  assemble  the  different  pieces  that  would  contribute  to  their  conceptual  framework.      In  the  UF  Ed.D  in  Educational  Technology  we  encourage  students  to  approach  empirical  research  from  a  pragmatic  perspective,  which  defines  the  function  of  thought  as  an  instrument  for  prediction  and  action  and  emphasizes  practical  solutions  to  real-­‐world  issues  (James,  1890).  To  this  end,  in  the  first  two  years  of  online  coursework  in  the  UF  Ed.D.  program,  we  focus  on  students’  development  of  a  conceptual  framework  that  connects  what  can  be  described  as  “the  trifecta  of  inquiry”  –  practice,  theory,  and  methodology  in  their  professional  practice.  At  the  end  of  the  two  years,  the  conceptual  framework  and  a  written  report  of  a  small  research  project  conducted  by  students  are  submitted  as  papers  for  qualifying  exams.  The  following  sections  describe  specific  courses  and  activities  in  the  UF  Ed.D.  program  that  scaffold  the  connections  between  practice  and  theory,  and  between  practice,  theory,  and  method  to  facilitate  students’  development  of  their  conceptual  frameworks.    Connecting  Practice  and  Theory  

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 Defining  a  significant  problem  of  practice  is  the  first  step  in  the  scholarship  of  professional  practice  researchers  and  is  foundational  in  the  UF  Ed.D.  program  in  Educational  Technology.  Students  in  the  program  are  educational  practitioners  who  regularly  encounter  problems  of  practice  that  they  solve  based  on  their  knowledge  of  the  context,  prior  experience  and  sometimes,  available  data.  They  enter  the  doctoral  program  with  a  keen  understanding  of  the  practical  reasons  for  change  in  their  practice  and  bring  in  vast  amounts  of  experiential  knowledge  regarding  the  successes  and  failures  of  implementing  such  interventions.  This  subjective,  experiential  knowledge  is  an  important  source  of  insight,  hypotheses,  and  external  validity  checks  (Strauss,  1987)  in  professional  practice  scholarship.  Systematic  reflection  on  this  knowledge  is  a  first  step  in  students’  definition  of  the  problem  of  practice  for  their  doctoral  studies  and  finally,  for  their  dissertation.    The  first  semester  in  the  Ed.D.  program  thus  focuses  on  two  areas:  a)  to  help  students  identify  one  or  two  problems  of  practice  that  might  be  worth  focusing  on  during  their  doctoral  studies,  and  b)  to  familiarize  students  with  foundational  theories  in  Educational  Technology  so  that  they  can  make  connections  between  these  theories  and  their  practice.  These  areas  are  addressed  in  two  courses  that  run  parallel  to  each  other  and  that  were  designed  to  complement  each  other:    Foundations  of  Educational  Technology:  Students  learn  about  educational  technology  paradigms  and  educational  theories,  discuss  these  in  detail,  and  complete  activities  during  which  they  connect  the  approaches  used  in  their  practice  to  theories  and  paradigms  in  Educational  Technology.  For  example,  one  of  these  activities  requires  students  to  describe  three  innovative  uses  of  technology  in  their  professional  context  and  align  these  technology  applications  with  behaviorist,  cognitivist,  or  constructivist  theoretical  perspectives  covered  in  class.  Another  activity  focuses  on  students  creating  a  collaborative  multimedia  timeline  of  the  history  of  educational  technology.  Students  are  asked  to  contribute  timeline  entries  relevant  to  their  professional  practice  and  research  interests.  Discussion  of  the  media-­‐method  debate  in  educational  technology  (Clark,  1983;  Kozma  1991)  is  another  central  component  of  this  course,  which  allows  our  students  to  analyze  their  current  approaches  to  solving  educational  problems  with  technology  and  identify  the  relevant  relationships  between  the  properties  of  methods  and  media  on  one  hand  and  contextual  characteristics  of  the  educational  problem,  on  the  other  hand.      Doctoral  Colloquium  on  Research  in  Curriculum  and  Instruction:  Unlike  students  in  traditional  programs  who  might  struggle  to  find  a  problem  to  study,  practitioners  in  the  Ed.D.  program  often  struggle  with  the  question  of  which  problem  of  practice  merits  research  during  their  doctoral  studies.  To  this  end,  this  course  is  designed  to  help  them  define  their  problem  of  practice.  Students  first  describe  and  reflect  on  their  professional  practice  and  their  experiential  knowledge.  Second,  they  identify  several  problems  of  practice  and  narrow  down  on  one  or  two  that  they  find  most  significant  and  that  would  lead  to  significant  change  in  their  environment  if  researched.  Students  then  conduct  an  initial  literature  search  to  determine  whether  

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prior  research  has  already  addressed  their  problem  of  practice  in  professional  contexts  similar  to  their  own.  These  activities  expose  students  to  prior  research  in  their  area  of  interest  and  help  students  narrow  down  their  problem  of  practice  to  one  or  two  areas  that  they  might  explore  in  their  two  years  before  they  decide  on  a  dissertation  topic.        Connecting  Practice,  Theory  and  Method    Once  students  have  identified  one  or  two  potential  problems  of  practice  and  are  familiar  with  major  educational  technology  paradigms,  courses  offered  during  the  second  and  third  semester  in  the  Ed.D.  program  familiarize  them  with  the  predominant  theories  in  Educational  Technology  research,  existing  methodological  approaches  in  Educational  Technology,  and  prior  literature  relating  to  their  problem  of  practice.  During  these  semesters,  students  shared  their  work  and  progress  in  these  areas  with  faculty  and  peers  in  monthly  online  synchronous  sessions  to  receive  feedback.    Issues  and  Trends  in  Educational  Technology  Research:  Connecting  the  problem  of  practice  to  relevant  theories  and  empirical  findings  allows  practitioner-­‐scholars  to  refine  their  research  goals,  operationalize  concepts,  and  develop  research  questions  that  are  precise  and  grounded  in  the  literature.  This  process  involves  examining  the  current  state  of  knowledge  on  how  to  assess  or  measure  the  phenomena  of  interest.  Methodological  rationale  –  that  is,  a  critical  analysis  of  the  existing  data  collection  and  analysis  methods  to  investigate  the  phenomena  of  interest  –  should  be  an  important  component  of  a  study’s  conceptual  framework.  In  order  to  “expose  the  methodology  to  sunlight”  (Kaplan,  1964,  p.  268),  researchers  must  explicitly  align  relevant  methodological  strategies  with  the  nature  of  the  variables,  theoretical  foundations  for  each  key  concept,  research  questions,  and  consider  the  contextual  constraints  such  as  the  number  of  individuals  or  groups  available  and  willing  to  participate  in  the  study.  This  analysis  and  alignment  of  the  practical  problem,  relevant  theories  and  concepts,  and  methods  that  have  previously  been  used  to  study  these  concepts  allows  students  to  select  the  most  appropriate  methodology,  as  well  as  justify  and  clearly  articulate  all  methodological  decisions.      In  this  course,  students  learn  about  the  common  conceptual  frameworks  in  Educational  Technology  research,  existing  methodological  approaches  in  Educational  Technology,  and  learn  to  be  critical  about  empirical  claims  and  evidence,  rigor,  and  the  alignment  of  different  elements  in  a  research  study  in  educational  technology.  Students  begin  by  critically  analyzing  a  very  simple  empirical  study.  They  learn  to  differentiate  between  claims  and  evidence  by  determining  and  comparing  the  number  of  claims  and  pieces  of  evidence  in  a  very  influential  and  highly  cited  educational  technology  article  (Prensky,  2001).  As  they  go  through  the  course,  Ed.D.  students  examine  the  standards  of  quality  and  rigor  in  qualitative,  quantitative,  and  mixed  method  research  collaboratively  assembling  evaluation  rubrics  for  each  research  tradition  to  externalize  their  emerging  

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understanding  of  these  methodological  paradigms.  Much  of  the  work  in  the  course  focuses  on  using  these  rubrics  as  well  as  the  rubrics  created  by  professional  journals  and  conferences  to  analyze  the  quality  of  recently  published  empirical  reports  in  educational  technology.  One  specific  activity  is  designed  to  allow  students  to  try  their  hand  at  devising  a  conceptual  framework  around  their  problem  of  practice  and  linking  this  conceptual  framework  to  appropriate  data  collection  and  data  analysis  methods.      Core activities include analyzing the structure of empirical reports, devising a conceptual framework for a study, evaluating claims versus evidence in a popular educational technology journal article, developing a collaborative rubric for evaluating the rigor of an empirical study using a particular methodological tradition (e.g., grounded theory, quasi-experimental study, concurrent mixed-method design etc.) and evaluating an empirical report based on this rubric.

Doctoral  Seminar  in  Educational  Technology:  There  is  a  common  misconception  among  novice  researchers  in  Educational  Technology  that  the  problems  they  encounter  are  new  or  connected  with  a  particular  technology,  leading  them  to  review  literature  in  the  last  5-­‐10  years.  While  there  is  no  denying  the  importance  of  reviewing  the  current  methodological  approaches  and  empirical  results  on  a  topic,  most  educational  theories  were  developed  several  years  ago  and  current  problems  related  to  educational  technology  and  teaching  and  learning  are  often  similar  to  those  that  occurred  with  older  technologies.  Having  had  a  foundation  in  theories  of  educational  technology,  empirical  approaches  and  methodological  rationale  in  previous  courses,  students  in  the  UF  EdD  in  Educational  Technology  spend  this  course  reviewing  literature  related  to  their  problem  of  practice.  Given  the  diverse  contexts  in  which  they  work,  they  review  literature  not  only  in  Educational  Technology,  but  also  in  the  disciplines  in  which  they  work  or  that  are  related  to  their  problem  of  practice.      The  document  produced  at  the  end  of  this  course  is  not  a  literature  review  in  the  traditional  sense  but  a  critical  review  of  theories,  prior  research  and  methodological  approaches  related  to  the  problem  of  practice  that  will  fold  into  their  conceptual  framework  for  the  dissertation.  Both  faculty  members  and  students  are  aware  that  this  is  the  first  attempt  at  selecting  from  a  large  body  of  existing  scholarship  to  craft  a  conceptual  framework,  and  that  this  will  constantly  be  tweaked  as  they  continue  to  find  more  literature  and  change  any  aspect  of  the  problem  of  practice  they  plan  to  study.  Moreover,  the  assembling  of  a  conceptual  framework  usually  leads  to  changes  in  students’  initial  research  question,  which  then  causes  students  to  review  new  areas  of  literature.  Since  a  conceptual  framework  is  a  model  consisting  of  multiple  pieces  that  can  be  highly  interrelated  and  non-­‐hierarchical,  integrative  diagrams  and  concept  maps  are  initially  employed  as  tools  for  the  visual  presentation  of  students’  conceptual  frameworks  (Novak  &  Gowin,  1984;  Strauss,  1987).  Students  are  required  to  create  a  visual  representation  of  their  emerging  conceptual  framework  as  a  mid-­‐course  activity  that  they  present  to  faculty  and  their  peers  for  feedback,  before  they  begin  writing  a  literature  review-­‐like  document.      

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Quantitative  and  Qualitative  Research  Courses:  During  the  first  and  second  year,  students  also  take  four  required  research  courses  -­‐  a  qualitative  methods  course,  two  quantitative  methods  courses,  and  a  program  evaluation  course  -­‐  that  are  intended  to  prepare  them  to  conduct  research.  Professional  practice  scholars  often  design  studies  intended  to  improve  some  aspect  of  their  professional  practice  rather  than  test  theories,  replicate  studies,  or  produce  generalizable  empirical  evidence,  and  work  with  small  samples  of  students.  In  the  qualitative  course  students  learn  about  different  qualitative  approaches  and  conduct  a  small-­‐scale  qualitative  research  project  based  on  one  of  the  problems  of  practice  they  have  identified.  The  project  gives  them  an  opportunity  to  collect  and  analyze  data  on  their  problem  of  practice  and  communicate  the  same  in  a  qualitative  written  report.  The  first  quantitative  course  introduces  students  to  quantitative  research  methods  while  the  second  course  focuses  on  the  solving  of  small  practical  problems  using  datasets  in  SPSS.    Qualifying  exams      At  the  end  of  the  first  two  years  of  required  coursework  in  the  UF  Ed.D.  program,  students  submit  their  conceptual  framework  as  a  written  document  for  their  qualifying  exams.  During  the  second  year,  this  conceptual  framework  informs  a  small  research  project  that  students  undertake.  In  a  written  document,  they  articulate  their  problem  of  practice,  pose  a  research  question,  design  a  research  study,  collect  and  analyze  data,  and  discuss  the  results.  The  qualifying  exams  serve  as  a  culmination  of  students’  learning  in  the  first  two  years  of  the  Ed.D.  program,  with  students  applying  their  foundational  knowledge  and  specialized  knowledge  in  the  form  of  their  conceptual  framework  and  research  report.      Table  1  summarizes  our  approach  to  scaffolding  conceptual  framework  development  in  the  context  of  an  online  Ed.D.  program.    

Pragmatic  empiricism  and  trifecta  of  professional  practice  inquiry:    practice  –  theory  –  methodology  

1.  Foundations  of  Educational  Technology  2.  Doctoral  Colloquium  on  Research  in  Curriculum  and  Instruction  3.  Issues  and  Trends  in  Educational  Technology  Research  4.  Doctoral  Seminar  in  Educational  Technology  5.  Quantitative  and  Qualitative  Research    6.  Monthly  synchronous  sessions    Qualifying  Exam  (Conceptual  framework  literature  and  small  research  project)    Conceptual  Frameworks  in  Professional  Practice  Dissertations    In  this  section  we  illustrate  the  types  of  conceptual  frameworks  developed  and  where  and  how  such  conceptual  frameworks  are  used  in  our  students’  dissertations.  

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The  conceptual  framework  provides  our  students  who  are  educational  technology  practitioners  with  a  theoretically  based  and  empirically  supported  model  for  conducting  research  and  discussing  research  findings  –  regardless  of  whether  the  study  produces  results  that  were  anticipated  by  the  researcher  or  not.  It  also  serves  the  important  function  of  connecting  research  findings  with  the  statement  of  the  original  problem  of  practice  and  provides  contextual  relevance  to  research  results.      Below  are  three  examples  of  how  theory,  practice,  and  method  converged  in  students’  conceptual  frameworks  and  contributed  to  their  dissertations  in  various  contexts:    Example  1:  A  professor  of  nursing  defined  her  problem  of  practice  as  the  lack  of  time  in  the  nursing  curriculum  to  focus  on  developing  caring  efficacy  among  nursing  students.  With  a  particular  focus  on  geriatric  and  long-­‐term  care,  she  wanted  to  explore  whether  digital  storytelling  could  increase  nursing  students’  understanding  and  knowledge  of  the  art  of  caring.  To  this  effect,  she  spent  the  first  year  of  the  Ed.D.  program  exploring  the  use  of  digital  storytelling  in  higher  education,  reflective  learning  in  higher  education,  and  the  literature  on  caring  and  caring  efficacy.  For  her  qualifying  exams,  she  carefully  selected  and  assembled  her  conceptual  framework  from  these  various  sources,  narrowing  in  on  Kolb’s  experiential  learning  theory  (1984)  as  most  appropriate  for  her  context,  and  drawing  from  prior  research  on  digital  storytelling  in  various  disciplines  to  design  and  include  a  digital  storytelling  activity  as  a  reflective  exercise  in  the  nursing  curriculum.  She  then  investigated  the  impact  of  the  reflective  digital  storytelling  activity  on  nursing  students’  self-­‐efficacy  based  on  methodological  decisions  informed  by  her  conceptual  framework,  such  as  the  caring  efficacy  scale  (Coates,  1997).  As  the  student  was  developing  her  proposal  for  her  dissertation,  she  was  simultaneously  involved  in  the  development  of  a  caring  framework  on  this  topic  at  a  national  professional  organization  in  her  field.  She  thus  included  the  Aging  Care  Excellence  for  Seniors  framework  (NLN,  2011)  in  her  conceptual  framework  and  analyzed  digital  stories  that  resulted  from  the  reflective  exercise  according  to  the  knowledge  domains  of  this  framework  for  her  dissertation.  This  example  illustrates  how  students'  research  interests  stem  from  a  problem  of  practice,  are  grounded  in  the  conceptual  framework,  and  continue  to  be  informed  by  and  inform  their  practice.      Example  2:  A  community  college  librarian  was  interested  in  how  best  to  impart  information  literacy  instruction  and  support  online  undergraduate  students  in  their  research  during  coursework.  Her  initial  conceptual  framework  focused  on  how  libraries  are  addressing  the  information  literacy  needs  and  skills  of  online  students  in  higher  education  and  included  prior  literature  on  library  instruction  in  distance  learning,  theories  related  to  distance  learning  and  online  interaction,  and  literature  on  instructional  design  and  assessment  of  library  instruction.  She  designed  online  information  literacy  instruction  in  the  form  of  embedded  librarianship  (Dewey,  2004)  based  on  her  conceptual  framework,  and  studied  students’  perceptions  of  the  instruction  and  interactions  with  the  librarian  online  for  her  qualifying  exam  research  project.  Revisions  to  her  conceptual  framework  revealed  a  peak  in  the  

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research  on  online  embedded  librarianship  in  her  field  and  increased  interest  in  information  literacy  support  on  her  campus,  leading  her  to  refine  her  problem  of  practice  to  the  sustainability  and  timing  of  online  information  literacy  instruction  in  online  courses.  Her  dissertation  was  grounded  in  distance  learning  theories  and  instructional  design  as  well  as  methodological  frameworks  from  information  literacy.  This  example  illustrates  the  symbiotic  relationship  between  information  literacy  and  distance  education  literature  in  this  student’s  conceptual  framework  and  the  close  connection  between  practice  and  theory  in  her  research.    Example  3:  A  middle  school  science  teacher  entered  our  Ed.D.  program  with  an  interest  in  STEM  in  middle  school  girls  and  developing  strategies  to  encourage  them  to  pursue  STEM  careers,  intended  to  build  an  after-­‐school  program  for  middle  school  girls.  Her  initial  conceptual  framework  at  the  end  of  the  first  year  included  history  of  girls  and  STEM  in  the  US  with  a  focus  on  the  barriers  to  participation  and  need  for  girls  in  STEM  careers,  social  constructivism,  cognitive  apprenticeship,  situated  learning,  symbolic  interactionism,  learning  communities,  online  learning  communities,  expanded  learning  time  and  mentoring.  Her  qualifying  research  project  focused  on  the  design  of  an  after  school  STEM  program  for  middle  schools.  She  carefully  researched  other  after  school  programs  developed  across  the  country  and  modeled  hers  after  best  practices  from  many  other  programs.    Her  dissertation  involved  developing  an  online  mentoring  component  to  the  after  school  program  and  her  final  conceptual  framework  consisting  of  social  constructivism,  principles  from  STEM  education,  online  learning  communities,  mentoring,  situated  cognition  and  cognitive  apprenticeship  and  student-­‐centered  learning  environments  informed  the  design  and  impact  of  this  online  mentoring  community  to  support  STEM  interest  in  middle  school  girls  for  her  dissertation.      Discussion    Dissertation  research  is  challenging  for  all  doctoral  students  because  of  their  lack  of  research  knowledge  and  the  newness  of  the  experience  (Onwuegbuzie,  1997).  In  the  absence  of  face-­‐to-­‐face  research  interactions  with  faculty  and  the  apprenticeship  model  in  an  online  doctoral  program,  proposing  and  implementing  a  research  design  can  be  a  formidable  challenge  for  a  doctoral  student.  We  attempted  to  address  these  challenges  in  our  program  by  helping  students  connect  practice,  theory,  and  methodology,  and  by  scaffolding  the  identification  of  “who”,  “what”  and  “how”  of  empirical  research  during  online  coursework,  before  they  begin  working  on  their  dissertations.  An  analysis  of  student  dissertations  (Dawson  &  Kumar,  this  issue)  and  interviews  conducted  with  students  after  they  graduated  (Kumar,  Johnson  &  Hardemon,  2013)  revealed  that  the  acquisition  of  knowledge  and  the  ability  to  critically  examine  existing  theories,  paradigms,  literature  or  research  methods  that  apply  to  their  problem  of  practice  helps  students  to  learn  the  “how”  and  complete  a  dissertation  that  furthers  contextual  knowledge  and  improves  practice.  While  the  program  design  as  a  whole  and  individual  student  engagement  and  efforts  contributed  to  the  dissertations  analyzed  and  student  success,  we  would  

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like  to  highlight  some  program  design  elements  that  contributed  to  the  successful  scaffolding  of  conceptual  frameworks  in  our  program:    Activities  connecting  doctoral  curriculum  and  practice.  While  traditional  Ph.D.  students  sometimes  struggle  with  what  to  focus  on  in  their  dissertation  research  and  who  they  should  (and  can)  observe  as  study  participants,  professional  practice  doctoral  students  usually  have  a  rich  professional  context  in  which  they  face  multiple  problems  of  practice  that  could  constitute  the  “what”  in  a  research  study.  Course  activities  that  explicitly  require  professional  students  to  make  connections  between  the  content  of  their  doctoral  studies  and  their  problems  of  practice  accelerate  the  research  process  and  help  maintain  the  relevance  of  doctoral  research  to  students’  practice.  Further,  the  clear  communication  of  how  these  activities  build  upon  each  other  and  will  be  of  value  to  students  in  the  long  run  can  help  students  complete  them  better.      Course  sequencing  and  activity  alignment  in  the  curriculum.  In  this  case,  the  one  advantage  of  creating  a  new  online  professional  doctorate  was  that  we  created  and  structured  a  new  curriculum.  The  activities  required  to  scaffold  a  conceptual  framework  could  thus  be  integrated  into  new  courses  and  the  courses  were  offered  in  a  specific  sequence.  The  program  coordinator  oversees  the  curriculum,  interacts  with  all  instructors,  and  makes  changes  to  the  curriculum  or  course  sequence  (within  the  parameters  of  university  requirements)  based  on  data  collected  from  students.    Alignment  of  faculty  views  and  faculty  collaboration.  Although  the  program  coordinator  leads  the  implementation  and  evaluation  of  the  UF  Ed.D.  program,  all  core  faculty  in  the  Educational  Technology  program  are  actively  engaged  in  the  program  (Dawson  et  al.,  2011).  All  faculty  members  believe  in  the  importance  of  scaffolding  conceptual  frameworks,  contributed  to  the  design  of  activities  in  the  courses  described  above,  and  collaboratively  reflect  on  how  the  design  can  be  improved.        The  process  of  identifying  problems  of  practice,  assembling  a  conceptual  framework  connected  to  a  specific  problem,  and  conducting  research  in  that  area  is  also  accompanied  by  challenges  for  students  in  Educational  Technology  in  our  Ed.D.  program.  Their  problems  of  practice  are  often  influenced  by  current  needs  in  their  practice  and  initiatives  or  policies  that  they  did  not  choose  to  adopt.  Such  needs,  initiatives  and  policies  are  subject  to  change  based  on  political,  institutional,  or  administrative  decisions  in  their  contexts.  Students  need  to  be  flexible  and  responsive  to  such  changes,  which  sometimes  means  they  have  to  make  substantial  changes  to  their  research  questions  and  conceptual  frameworks.  Occasionally,  institutions  do  not  support  research  on  problems  of  practice  that  students  identify,  or,  students  might  be  too  involved  in  the  context  to  be  able  to  design  a  rigorous  study.  Students  also  sometimes  experience  changes  in  their  job  roles,  responsibilities  and  unfortunately  even  lose  their  jobs  during  their  doctoral  studies,  

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leading  them  to  rethink  their  problem  of  practice  and  consequently,  their  conceptual  framework      Doctoral  students  who  are  professional  practitioners  might  approach  a  conceptual  framework  or  a  research  design  relying  solely  on  personal  experiences  and  knowledge  of  the  local  context.  Reason  (1994)  and  Maxwell  (2012),  warn  that  even  in  the  qualitative  research  paradigm,  which  describes  the  researcher  as  the  instrument  of  study,  subjective  perspectives  need  to  be  critically  examined  by  researchers,  otherwise,  there  is  a  risk  of  being  “swept  away  and  overwhelmed”  by  the  personal  experience  (Reason,  1988,  p.  12).  Such  critical  examination  of  experiential  knowledge  and  assumptions  can  be  accomplished  through  the  process  of  designing  a  conceptual  framework  and  connecting  personal  experiences  and  contextual  information  with  the  existing  theories  and  empirical  data  that  has  already  been  generated  in  the  field.  This  process  allows  the  researcher  to  provide  not  only  practical  reasons  for  the  significance  of  the  research  problem  but  also  the  theoretical  and  empirical  rationale  for  the  study.        Conclusion    A  conceptual  framework  is  a  practically  useful  research  tool  whose  importance  is  often  overlooked  by  both  student  researchers  and  their  advisors.  It  helps  connect  all  aspects  of  inquiry  –  from  problem  justification  to  the  development  of  precise  and  focused  research  questions,  selection  of  the  most  appropriate  data  collection  and  analysis  methods,  and  interpretation  of  research  findings.  As  a  tool  for  organizing  professional  practice  inquiry,  conceptual  frameworks  allow  practitioner-­‐scholars  to  connect  their  problems  of  practice  with  their  experiential  knowledge,  contextual  features,  and  relevant  theoretical  foundations  and  design  studies  that  provide  both  practical  and  theoretical  contributions  to  the  field.    Our  approach  to  scaffolding  conceptual  frameworks  is  applicable  to  all  professional  doctorates  where  students  have  to  connect  theory,  practice  and  research,  but  plays  a  significant  role  in  an  online  professional  doctorate  where  students  are  not  embedded  in  on-­‐campus  research  culture,  do  not  attend  peers’  proposal  and  dissertation  meetings,  and  do  not  hold  informal  or  formal  research  conversations  with  faculty  and  peers.  As  this  article  demonstrates,  deliberate  and  careful  planning  of  learning  activities  across  multiple  semesters  of  coursework  and  qualifying  examination  experiences  can  help  scaffold  the  development  of  conceptual  framework  for  professional  practice  scholars  in  an  online  learning  environment.        

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