英语论文网

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Before defining the literature review, let us have a look at what a researcher must not do. First of all we do not argue for the pros and cons like in an argumentative essay. Also we must not only list the sources one by one. Finally a literature review is organised around ideas, not the sources themselves as an annotated bibliography would be organised. Instead of providing a theoretical definition of literature review let us now explain what a researcher must do to write it. First of all the researcher must make a critical and evaluative account of what has already been written on his topic. He needs to sum up, synthesise and analyse others point of view on the chosen topic. Then the researcher describes and analyse the knowledge that already exist and the gaps which cropped up in the research related to the topic. He/she must also explain the connection between his/her own study and the research which has been formerly done. Finally a literature review must disclose things which are similar or different, the consistencies and inconsistencies and controversies in the previous work. The conclusion of a literature review must re-focus the lenses of the researcher, and bring together the different views of different theorists into one main idea centered on the topic. For example, after having investigated the different theorists on leadership and management, now we have to bring the argument around student leadership in school based management.

2.2 Importance of literature review

The study and search of literature is a very important aspect while conducting a research. In fact before we can create a new knowledge, we must know the current state of knowledge about our research subject. Researchers need to make full use of knowledge and insights of others and draw on elements of prior research as in literature review the aim is to learn as much as we can from the efforts and work of others which has been published. According to Chitu Okoli and Kira Schabram (2010) a literature review “include providing a theoretical background for subsequent research; learning the breadth of research on a topic of interest; or answering practical questions by understanding what existing research has to say on the matter.”

According to Hart (1998), the literature review consists of the following purposes:

Distinguishing what has been done from what needs to be done;

Discovering important variables relevant to the topic;

Synthesising and gaining a new perspective;

Identifying relationships between ideas and practice;

Establishing the context of the topic or problem;

Rationalising the significance of the problem;

Enhancing and acquiring the subject vocabulary;

Understanding the structure of the subject;

Relating ideas and theory to applications;

Identifying methodologies and techniques that have been used;

Placing the research in a historical context to show familiarity with state-of-the-art developments.

For instance, in the case of our study I will be doing a literature review on management, administration, leadership, the school culture, the school management, distributed leadership, student leadership, etc An example of literature review about school management is:

The one responsible for managing al