Description
Book SynopsisTeaching Research Methods in Political Science brings together experienced instructors to offer a range of perspectives on how to teach courses in political science. It focuses on numerous topics, including identifying good research questions, measuring key concepts, writing literature reviews and developing information literacy skills.
Illustrating the ways in which research methods courses connect with wider topics in political science, contributors discuss how methodological considerations can result in recognition of previously silenced voices, and consider the civic education mission of research methods in political science. Chapters outline quantitative and qualitative methods, feminist methodologies and techniques for studying African-American politics, to review and demonstrate the many avenues that instructors of research methods courses might take.
This crucial guide to teaching will benefit instructors of courses in research methods in political science, as well as faculty leaders instituting new courses in political science. Its theoretical insights into civic education will also be useful to scholars of education more broadly.
Trade Review‘This book provides thoughtful and practical explorations of accessible pedagogical tools and approaches which can vastly improve any political science program. Bernstein and his contributors effectively make an argument for how the methods course is fundamental to achieving our discipline’s goals of developing active citizens who can evaluate information and evidence regarding problems which our democracies face in the 21st century. It should be required reading for every PhD candidate, methods course instructor, and department chair.‘Table of ContentsContents: Introduction: the citizenship imperative and the Political Science Research Methods course 1 Jeffrey L. Bernstein PART I GUIDANCE FOR TEACHING THE RESEARCH METHODS COURSE 1 Getting the basics right: finding the right research question 13 Zsolt Nyiri 2 Incorporating information literacy in political science research design 28 Amanda Shannon and Vaughn Shannon 3 Beyond the annotated bibliography: improving student literature reviews through structured heuristics 43 Shane Nordyke and Peter Yacobucci 4 Promoting course coherence by teaching with an invisible pet and other case studies 58 Kristin Makszin 5 Effectively teaching research methods as a series of simulation exercises 69 Jason Enia 6 Political methodology without the politics: reshaping the methods course to focus on real-world content and skill building 82 Amanda M. Rosen 7 Engaged statistics: building statistical skills by focusing on answering interesting and important questions 96 Michael A. Bailey 8 Teaching transparency: principles and practical considerations with illustrations in Stata and R 114 Matthew C. Ingram 9 Effectively teaching research methods in an online course 131 Robert Postic PART II FITTING RESEARCH METHODS WITHIN THE BROADER CURRICULUM AND DISCIPLINE 10 Designing and implementing methods curricula 146 Johan Adriaensen, Patrick Bijsmans and Afke Groen 11 Scaffolding research methods across the curriculum: an exploration of embedded curricular design 161 Kelly A. Clancy and Kelly Bauer 12 Incorporating and assessing methods across the political science curriculum 177 Christi Siver and Claire Haeg 13 Are students failing research methods or are research methods failing students? 194 William D. Blake and Carolyn Forestiere 14 What the traditional critiques from marginalized groups bring to comprehending political science research today 208 Harwood K. McClerking 15 Mainstreaming gender in research methods 222 Alexis Leanna Henshaw 16 A Deweyan pragmatist view on political science methods 238 Jonathan B. Isacoff Index
