It still comes down to methodology

"Corresponding to theories in a field are methods of research and analysis, ways that a given discipline characteristically employs to study its chosen objects and topics. Method is in a sense the dynamic or processual counterpart to theory ... . Any comprehensive theory in composition studies implies a corresponding research method that defines a field of knowledge and the terms of a project for deriving knowledge about objects and events in that field." (Ann Wetherbee Phelps, Composition as a Human Science, p. 183)

I want to start with Phelps' contention that a "theory of composition" implies a research methodology. In my own search for a research methodology (how in the world am I going to study post-draft reflections?), I need to begin with my understanding of a "theory of composing." Phelps seems to imply that if you have the theory then BOOM you also have the research methodology. I'm not so sure.

My recent reading of Ann Bertoff's The Making of Meaning has been enormously helpful in thinking and rethinking about my theory of composition. I'm easily influenced by the scholars I read, but I find myself in full agreement with her notion of composing being a forming, shaping process--the making of meaning. It aligns with my notions of "constructionism" and writing and learning. I found a surprising echo of Berthoff in Phelps in this line: "The notion of writing as a discursive practice--the composing of meaning--becomes the abstract principle of reflection" (76). Without doubt, my own theories of composition and thus reflection are built on the discursive nature of writing, that language shapes and constitutes our understanding and interpretations.

Berthoff herself directly address the question of research methodology (or what she calls REsearch). She makes what I think is a startling statement: "The notion that 'research' can provide direction is absurd" (30). The absurdity comes from the equating of "basic research" in science fields like physics with research in education. In the hard sciences, basic research is needed to "advance" learning. However, Berthoff says that education is not comparable to the natural sciences. Here's here answer why: "Because education profoundly and essentially involves language--and language is not a natural process but a symbolic form and a social process" (31). Since we study language, we must adopt research methods appropriate to our subject. Phelps I believe says something similar in her book about how language as the subject of our study essentially distinguishes our type of research from the hard sciences. She states these methods as appropriate for composition studies: "I see composition as favoring hermeneutical and dramatistic methods of inquiry because it is primarily interested in the terms that make events and processes of literacy or reflection intelligible to their participants" (77). By these terms, I hear her saying qualitative methods would be more appropriate or fitting.

Berthoff makes an interesting statement that gives me an idea for a research project. She says, "if the questions and the answers [of research] are not continually RE-formulated by those who are working in the classroom, educational research is pointless" (31).

Study Design #3: Casting reflection to the winds
This study would not study any narrow practice of using reflection between drafts (as in specific prompts). This, in a way, is the problem with Beach's study of self-evaluations because it is a study of his particular use of self-evaluations in that one context. Instead, what if I were to formulate general principles and theories of rhetorical reflection, perhaps with some examples of use. If I then shared these principles and theories with teachers who would then adopt them into their classroom practice. They would follow the general principles but adapt them to their teaching context. These teachers would collect data and I would interview them and perhaps their students and study the students' work. I can forsee this being a kind of case study research design along the line of Hillocks study of different teachers teaching methods. What would be interesting is not just the "results" of their practice, but their customizing of this practice to their environment as well as their perceptions of their students results.

This study seems like a design more suitable to my subject. I sounds complicated to administer or manage however, and would I face the problem that these teachers practices might be to varied. How large would my sample need to be? Hmm...

I think that I need to go back to the starting point: What is my theory of composition? What is my theory of language? What is my theory of learning? What is my theory of knowledge? ...Then methodology will fall into place, right?