Category Archives: research methods

The importance of neutral results

This is the third posting in this morning’s trilogy about research methods, and this one was prompted by an article in this month’s issue of Physics World : Ball, P. (May 2016), No result, no problem? Physics World, 29(5), 38-41. … Continue reading

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The unscientific method

The title of this post is copied from another New Scientist article, this time by Sonia van Gilder Cooke, and published in Issue number 3069 (16th April 2016) on pages 39-41. The article starts “Listening to When I’m Sixty-Four by The Beatles … Continue reading

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Simpson’s paradox

Back in November, I posted about the fact that I was going to be more bullish about the fact that I am a physicist but that I do educational research. As I try to build my confidence to say some … Continue reading

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Researching engagement with assessment, as a physicist

I have not posted as much as I might have wished recently, and when I have, I’ve tended to start with a grovelling apologies on the grounds of lack of time because of my head of department duties. I sometimes … Continue reading

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More lies, damned lies and statistics

This second ‘rant of the day’ focuses on practice which, I think, arises from the fact that most people are not as fortunate(?) as me in having data from hundreds and thousands of students on each module each year. It … Continue reading

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Victorian clergymen

This is more ‘rant of the day’ than ‘quote of the day’ but I’d like to start with a quote from my own ‘Maths for Science’ (though I’m indebted to my co-author Pat Murphy who actually wrote this bit): ” … Continue reading

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