Hey Everybody! So this is the last week that I have until I am out on my own actually implementing my research! I am really excited about starting all of this and have made pretty significant progress since last week.
When I wrote my blog post last week, I did not have a schedule for when I would be sitting in on classrooms, my consent forms did not provide sufficient assurances that confidentiality and anonymity would be kept, and my methods section was a total mess. Although I have not completely finished all of these tasks, I am a lot closer than I was before.
During this past week, I met with the last teacher that I needed to talk to, developed a tentative schedule for when I will be observing all of the classes, developed drafts of emails to send to all of the teachers, improved my consent forms and interview questions, changed my blog formatting to be more user friendly, edited my literature review, and completely reworked my methods section.
(Me this past week)
I know that was a pretty long list of stuff that I did, so I am going to break it down and explain what still needs to be done and what exactly I did.
The first thing that I am going to talk about is about the logistics for my project. Since I only have two weeks to conduct my primary research, I developed a tentative schedule for when I will be sitting in on the different classes that I need to observe. Before I email these teachers about this schedule though, I still need to figure out when exactly I will be interviewing each teacher. I have a draft of an email that is ready to send, and so I just need to do that. Once I have planned my interviews out, then I can solidify my observation schedule.
Second, this week I finished working on all of the supporting documents that I need for my project. Although most of these documents were already written, I edited and finalized these documents this week so that they are ready to be used for my research. In addition to finalizing these documents, I also created an overall coding sheet that specifically states the information that I need to collect for my research. Before this week, I did not know what information I actually wanted to collect for my research, and so developing this document was really useful in justifying my methods, determining what information I need, and organizing my methods section.
Lastly, in terms of the actual paper itself, I am almost done editing my literature review and am currently working on my methods section. Besides coordinating logistics with teachers, editing, finishing, and perfecting this paper is going to be my primary focus this week. Since I am pretty much done with the rest of my classes, I will have a lot of time to dedicate to finishing up these two sections of my paper. After I finish this though, then I will be ready to go out on my own and do my research.
(When class finally ends and I get to conduct my research!)
That’s all for this week. I look forward to updating everybody again next week with the status of my project!
Hey Brian! You're doing an awesome job with everything you've been up to! It sounds like you've made a lot of progress in the past week. As long as you keep working as efficiently as you have been in the past week, you will be on a good track to completing all your research. Two weeks is kind of short to collect all of your data, especially because you have so many aspects to consider so I would make sure to do everything as quickly as possible! Having a coding sheet should be super helpful for you because it helps you focus on the most important aspects of what you are analyzing. Make sure to justify how you got that coding sheet though if you haven't already! Everything seems like it's right on track and that you're making good progress. Proud of you froggy frog.
ReplyDeleteAlso, make sure to get your documents done! It is super important to have all the technical stuff in order before you go out and do your research. But that should be intrinsic in finishing your methods and literature review so just go get it done son! alright, good luck!
ReplyDeleteHi Brian! I agree with Daphne that you are in a lot better shape than last week! Make sure you send those emails as soon as possible so you can schedule everything in that short two week period. Also, making sure your methods and literature review are perfected before you actually start implementing your research is essential (I also am working on this)! The sooner the better for everything you are doing, especially for the stuff that requires outside variables like teacher permission and observation scheduling. I would make sure your surveys and all the materials you will need for conducting the research are completely done well in advance and perfect, so when you are conducting the research you do not need to go back and modify anything. Other than that, you seemed to be getting more efficient week by week! Good luck!
ReplyDeleteBrian - I think you're starting to feel the logistical nightmare that is doing research with real life human beings. Everyone has their own lives, so it's hard to work around each person's schedule and get what you need from them. It does sound, however, like you have taken significant strides towards getting where you need to be in order to be successful. I look forward to meeting with you tomorrow to see what the next steps are moving forward on getting started with it all.
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