Process-Product Research on Teaching: A Review of Criticisms

Recent criticisms of process-product research on teaching have attacked its conceptualization, methodology, productivity, and interpretation-application. These 4 kinds of criticism are reviewed and evaluated. Conceptual criticisms refer to the treatment of teachers' intentions, the context of teaching, the normative character of teaching, the conception of causality, and theory. Methodological criticisms bear upon plausibility, predetermined coding categories, ignoring of content, the role of cognitive mediation, the need for experiments, and quality of outcome measures. Criticisms of productivity concern the yield in understanding (theory), predictive power, and control (improvement) of teaching. Criticisms of interpretation-application relate to the use of meta-analysis and the conversion of findings into rules for teaching. Whether the criticisms apply to the essence or the accidents (incidental features) of process-product research provides an overall basis for evaluating the criticisms. Finally, an agenda for such research is outlined.