Handbook of Design in Educational Technology

33 Educational Design Research in the 21st Century

William A. Sandoval

Introduction

Since the term “design experiments” was coined two decades ago (Collins, 1992), what is now more commonly known as educational design research has moved out of the nascent learning sciences community and into the mainstream of educational research (Levin & O’Donnell, 1999; NRC, 2002; Schoenfeld, 2006). The strengths and weaknesses of the approach have been described and dissected over the last decade, reflecting a tension between advocates for educational design research and observers who worry about the rigor and epistemic standing of the alleged methodology (for example, in Barab, 2004; Kelly, 2003). Historically, educational design research is closely tied ...