3. Research Methodology
This research was research and development consisting of the process of developing program theory as follows:
3.1 Study of related theoretical documents and research.
The study of related theoretical documents and research work consisted of: (1) documents relating to education
reform including the Education Act, reports on the implementation of educational reform in Thailand, research
reports on educational reform in Thailand (2) theoretical documents such as the theory related to policy
implementation, theory of change and self-determination theory, and (3) research papers about educational reform
including research on the design of the implementation of education reform policy, the successful implementation
of education reform policy, and the success of education reform policy.
3.2 Assumption of hypothesis creation from the theory.
The relation was determined using the “if ... then” concept. We then made a draft of the program theory for the
evaluation of the success of education reform policy implementation that consisted of an action model and a change
model.
3.3 Creating program theory with the model simulating the ideas of the stakeholder mental model
The program theory draft obtained from the hypothesis and from the studied documents should be adjusted in
terms of stakeholders’ ideas,. This involves the formation of a team of eight persons in the form of a data
collection focus group. Of these, two are the planners of the educational reform, four persons are involved in
monitoring and following up the educational reform, and two persons are involved in working in compliance with
the education reform policy.
3.4 Program theory adjustment from actual performance observation
This step was to observe the implementation of the education reform policy in schools in accordance with the
actual working conditions, to adjust the program theory reconstructed from the simulation of the stakeholders’ ideas
in the foregoing phase. This was conducted by visiting sites (site visits) at six schools which had different
characteristics, including three schools with different external quality evaluation results and three schools with
different national test results. With regard to the collection of data, the participating observation and interviews
concerned persons involved in the implementation of the education reform policy in schools. These were
administrators, teachers and students. The results from the observation and interviews were then used to adjust the
program theory once more.