Mostly Concerning Quantitative Research

What new insights have you gained? What have you learned that will make a difference to you as a researcher?
I enjoyed reading a quantitative research article for my final research summary chart.  I read a lot of qualitative and it was interesting to think about comparing and contrasting the two.  It made me think about how different they are and I spent a little time thinking about which I would like to conduct.  They are both extremely interesting to me, and I would enjoy either, but I think I would like to do a quantitative study just because of the concrete results you get.  I will try both, but I think I would like a quantitative better.
 
What do you understand about research, or components of research that you didn’t know before?   
I loved the article I read this week it had some great ideas that I would like to see become the norm.  It was about teachers being trained by interactive, multimedia DVDs.  I thought this was particularly interesting since it eliminates the need for a person to train the teachers.  It sounded like the DVDs gave a very clear picture of how teachers should tackle teaching different reading strategies.  It seems like such a good idea because the teachers could do it on their own time.  I would love to eliminate some meetings and learn at my own pace!! Every corporate job I have ever had has used DVDs to train, it is pretty nice to watch them at your own pace so you can stop and re-watch if needed.


What else do you want to learn about designing and conducting research?
I would like to learn more about the methods of analysis used for the collection of quantitative data.  I guess that means I would need to take a statistics course...not sure how well that would go for me. Math is definitely not my strongest academic area, but I could try!

Karchmer and Technology

What new insights have you gained? 
What have you learned that will make a difference to you as a researcher?
I think that I believed that research had to be complicated.  I think I thought that you had to have some technical way to collect your data and make it sound studious and fancy.  As I read this article, I realized that it doesn't have to be that way! The way that Karchmer found her participants and compiled her data were simple and I totally understood what she was doing.  This was encouraging to me because it makes me feel much less overwhelmed at the thought of creating a study.

 What do you understand about research, or components of research that you didn’t know before?
I liked the way that Karchmer gathered data.  Emails with personal journals and interviews seems like a very logical and simple way to get data that is thought through by the participants.  I think that having time to think about your answers to an interview question is very helpful, it seems like you would get more accurate and helpful data this way.  I think that I would use this method if I were doing a similar study.
 
 What is bothering or disturbing you about research?  
It is scary to think that research my uncover the need for more research and practice! It is overwhelming to think about all the teachers who do not know how to use technology and think about how much more they need to know.  It would go on  and on if I started to list the things that would have to happen to change the way that things are in our schools right now.

 What else do you want to learn about designing and conducting research?
 I am just ready to try it! I think that reading about it is helpful so that I know what my format will be, but I am a total hands-on learner and I need to do something in order to be able to fully grasp a concept.  I am looking forward to my master's project in the fall!

Technology and the Theoretical Framework

What new insights have you gained?

With this chapter reading and my self-selected article (which I felt went very well together!), I have learned a lot more about the concept of “new literacies”.  Even as I am writing this I am participating in the new literacies that are emerging as the rule rather than the exception in education, using the Internet and technology to learn and communicate for professional purposes.  As a person who has grown up in the information technology age, I am so thankful that we have these resources at our disposal.  It is so nice to be sitting here in my pajamas on a Saturday morning doing my schoolwork! 

What have you learned that will make a difference to you as a researcher?

I have learned more about how a theoretical framework is important to a research study.  It seems to me that it will be very helpful to establish as much detail as I can about the perspective from which I will approach a topic as I start my masters project in the fall.  It helped to read about the many different frameworks surrounding new literacy research.  This reading broadened my framework concerning theoretical framework! (ha)   I am excited to put what I am learning in this class into practice.

 What do you understand about research, or components of research that you didn’t know before?

I think that reading about theoretical framework and thinking about the different ways a topic can be approached gave me deeper insight into what I need to consider when choosing a research topic.  I don’t think that I had thought about how deep issues can go and how many ways people can see them.

 What is bothering or disturbing you about research?

It makes me sad that most literacy is becoming digital and internet based.  I love ink and paper books and I am sad to see book stores closing (Bookstar, Borders, etc.) and Amazon.com taking over.  I have not given in to the Kindle craze yet and I order my pleasure reading books from half.com (I know, hypocritical since I hate that bookstores are closing…), but eventually I will probably have to make the switch.  Technology will always prevail in today’s society, no matter how much we fight it. 

What else do you want to learn about designing and conducting research?

I would like to learn more about choosing a topic for research.  I am not sure that I am confident enough in my knowledge base to choose a topic and stick to it.  I guess I will have plenty of time to think and read about it between now and when I actually need to do an action research project!

Research: What will make a difference, in the midst of injustice, and data collection

What new insights have you gained? / What have you learned that will make a difference to you as a researcher?
 I had really never thought about the difference that a word can make in research.  I thought it was interesting what Dr. Anderson had to say about her use of "explore" versus "examine" in her dissertation.  It is amazing how much of a difference there is between two words.  I am learning the value of carefully choosing my words and making sure that I am saying exactly what I mean.  

What is bothering or disturbing you about research?   
 It is hard for me to look at a research study where there is obviously a problem with one of the teachers (as with the case of Mr. Brown in Offering or limiting opportunities...) and imagine being the researcher just observing and not doing anything about the injustice being served to those ELLs.  I think it would be hard in a situation like that to be objective and not want to do something about it or at least mention it to the teacher.  Do the subjects of a research study like that usually read the finished article or is it anonymous? I would be really embarrassed if I were Mr. Brown.

What else do you want to learn about designing and conducting research?
 I do not know very much about the different methods of collecting data.  I know that there are many useful methods available, but I am not sure that I would really know where to start if I had to pick one!  I think I would be overwhelmed with making sure that I picked the right one. Hopefully, when the time comes for me to pick one, I will have my research questions in stone so they may function as a guide  to which type of data collection to use.


I am looking forward to conducting my Masters Project in the fall after taking this class!  I feel like I will be ready!

Collaboration is Key

As I have read the articles for this course, I have been thinking about how the researchers see the topics.  I assume that they are passionate about their chosen topics and it is interesting to see their findings as I wonder how they feel about them.  With the topic of ELLs in these particular articles, I get the feeling that these researchers are finding a lot of dead ends when it comes to ensuring the success of ELLs.  I started thinking about how this must affect them as they pursue methods and ideas to help these students.  It opened my eyes to the fact that, in research, there is not always a cut and dry answer.  This is a hard thing to realize that after you have potentially put in long hours and lots of work into a research study, the results can be inconclusive.  Someone very close to me was a researcher in a lab and he kept on and on with a research project and it kept coming up with inconclusive results.  He became frustrated and I saw how it wore on him.  Research is not always a glamorous as the published article can seem, it is hard and often frustrating work.  I guess the best way to look at it is (as we discussed a lot in our responses to Why Mei still cannot read) that we can work together with other researchers and slowly piece together the answers to problems in the realm of education.