Many studies report changes taking place in the field of higher education, changes which present considerable challenges to educational practice. Educational science should contribute to developing design guidance, enabling practitioners to respond to these challenges. Design patterns, as a form of design guidance, show potential since they promise to facilitate the design process and provide common ground for communication. However, the potential of patterns has not been fully exploited yet. We have proposed the introduction of a task conceptualization as an abstract view of the concept chosen as central: the task. The choice of the constituting elements of the task conceptualization has established an analytical perspective for analysis and (re)design of (e)learning environments. One of the constituting elements is that of ‘boundary objects’, which has added a focus on objects facilitating the coordination, alignment and integration of collaborative activities. The presented task conceptualization is deliberately generic in nature, to ease the portability between schools of thought and make it suitable for a wide target audience. The conceptualization and the accompanying graphical and textual representations have shown much promise in supporting the process of analysis and (re)design and add innovative insights to the domain of facilitating the creation of design patterns.
In the course of our supervisory work over the years, we have noticed that qualitative research tends to evoke a lot of questions and worries, so-called Frequently Asked Questions. This journal series of four articles intends to provide novice researchers with practical guidance for conducting high-quality qualitative research in primary care. By ‘novice’ we mean Master’s students and junior researchers, as well as experienced quantitative researchers who are engaging in qualitative research for the first time. This series addresses their questions and provides researchers, readers, reviewers and editors with references to criteria and tools for judging the quality of papers reporting on qualitative research. This first article describes the key features of qualitative research, provides publications for further learning and reading, and gives an outline of the series.
In the course of our supervisory work over the years, we have noticed that qualitative research tends to evoke a lot of questions and worries, so-called frequently asked questions (FAQs). This series of four articles intends to provide novice researchers with practical guidance for conducting high-quality qualitative research in primary care. By ‘novice’ we mean Master’s students and junior researchers, as well as experienced quantitative researchers who are engaging in qualitative research for the first time. This series addresses their questions and provides researchers, readers, reviewers and editors with references to criteria and tools for judging the quality of qualitative research papers. This second article addresses FAQs about context, research questions and designs. Qualitative research takes into account the natural contexts in which individuals or groups function to provide an in-depth understanding of real-world problems. The research questions are generally broad and open to unexpected findings. The choice of a qualitative design primarily depends on the nature of the research problem, the research question(s) and the scientific knowledge one seeks. Ethnography, phenomenology and grounded theory are considered to represent the ‘big three’ qualitative approaches. Theory guides the researcher through the research process by providing a ‘lens’ to look at the phenomenon under study. Since qualitative researchers and the participants of their studies interact in a social process, researchers influence the research process. The first article described the key features of qualitative research, the third article will focus on sampling, data collection and analysis, while the last article focuses on trustworthiness and publishing.
