This article will revise the conceptions of research and research methods with paradigms such as Positivism or Anti-positivism as the progress of history in scientific researching. It also offers the Critical Educational Research to be used for ideologies search in the curriculum. The author also suggests a link with Critical Discourse Analysis for a concrete study of English course-books. | Cao Duy Trinh Tạp chí KHOA HỌC & CÔNG NGHỆ 91(03): 53 - 57 RESEARCH METHODS - CRITICAL EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH IN CURRICULUM STUDY Cao Duy Trinh* College of Sciences – TNU SUMMARY Researchers must know what they are doing in their researches: the concepts related and the methods; the natural or social nature of the inquiry; the viewpoints and attitude of the researchers towards the objects they are working on. If we want to study the curriculum, for example the exercise of power in the English course-books, then we can use research methods of Critical Educational Research. Exactly, we can use Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) methods. These methods will help reveal the inequality established in the course-books for solutions for that abolishment. This article will revise the conceptions of research and research methods with paradigms such as Positivism or Anti-positivism as the progress of history in scientific researching. It also offers the Critical Educational Research to be used for ideologies search in the curriculum. The author also suggests a link with Critical Discourse Analysis for a concrete study of English course-books. Key words: Research, research method, critical educational research, curriculum study. RESEARCH & RESEARCH METHODS* As language teachers, we know that Applied Linguistics, since its foundation in the 1950s, ashas stressed the relationship between experience of language teaching and the study of linguistics. Language teaching methodology has relied on linguistic traditions such as Chomsky’s Transformational - Generative Linguistics, Hyme’s Sociolinguistics and Halliday’s Systemic-Functional Linguistics. It has also been basing on psychological traditions such as Behaviorism, Cognitivism, Constructivism and Humanism (Canh, ., 2004, pp15-58) [1]. Research also has its own underlying assumptions, theories, methodologies and methods. Educational research is the investigation of activities and the undertakings of a science: the systemic .
