I'm plugging along this week with my Pilot Study Report. I'm currently writing up the summary of findings from the multiple choice questions about demographics. I guess what I'm struggling most with is finding the balance between reporting my findings and analyzing them. In such a small study, it is easy to report the data, but hard to say for sure why the data is what it is. I am able, based on the responses, to provide a snapshot of a "typical" collaborator, but without comparative data from teachers who have not collaborated, it is difficult to say whether the traits I've identified are really what are making a difference. Still, it is interesting to see what factors these teachers have in common and which don't seem to matter. It's a good place to start.
Next up, I'll be coding the short essay responses, looking for patterns in how teachers responded to the questions about how they view the media specialist's roles, benefits and barriers to collaboration, and factors that would encourage more collaboration. I think I'll do this by hand. NVivo seems a bit complicated, and I just don't know that the effort to use it is worth it in such a small study. Instead, I've printed the responses out and am marking the text for categories and sub-categories. I'll see how that goes before I make a final decision about NVivo.
Saturday, May 2, 2015
Friday, April 24, 2015
Blog #11: Information Behavior in Professional Contexts
For my research project, I am looking at the information seeking behaviors of teachers. Case categorizes school teachers as practitioners under the umbrella of social scientists and claims they make "little use of research findings" (p. 295). From my experience, unfortunately, this is very true.
Outside of coursework for master's degrees, most practicing teachers seem to spend very little time looking at research in education or their subject area journals and even less time contributing to them. There are exceptions, of course: I adapted one of my most successful and long-standing lessons from an article that I just happened to see in the English Journal. Certainly it's not for lack of interest, but like most things, the barrier is time. Between lesson planning, delivering, and assessing; clerical work; communicating with parents; dealing with special cases; monitoring the hallway, playground, and lunchroom, etc., etc.; teachers simply do not have much extra time to devote to reading or conducting real research. And since there is no financial advantage or professional expectation to do so, it falls to a very low priority task.
There is a clear and large divide between theoretical research and practice in education. So, how then do practicing teachers find out what they need to know? Personal learning communities provide the bulk of the information. Teacher-written websites, teacher-created district curriculum guides, and grade level or subject area PLC meetings can help teachers with lesson plans, teaching strategies, and rubrics. Taking time off to attend statewide or national conferences can also help spark new ideas. Mostly, though, teachers have to rely on day-to-day creative planning, monitoring and adjusting in the classroom, and a healthy dose of self-reflection to develop a sound practice.
In terms of my progress this week, a couple more teachers completed my survey and I ended up with 21 responses, almost 50%. I have created graphs and tables based on the quantitative responses via Google Forms, but have not yet officially started coding the longer essay responses.
Outside of coursework for master's degrees, most practicing teachers seem to spend very little time looking at research in education or their subject area journals and even less time contributing to them. There are exceptions, of course: I adapted one of my most successful and long-standing lessons from an article that I just happened to see in the English Journal. Certainly it's not for lack of interest, but like most things, the barrier is time. Between lesson planning, delivering, and assessing; clerical work; communicating with parents; dealing with special cases; monitoring the hallway, playground, and lunchroom, etc., etc.; teachers simply do not have much extra time to devote to reading or conducting real research. And since there is no financial advantage or professional expectation to do so, it falls to a very low priority task.
There is a clear and large divide between theoretical research and practice in education. So, how then do practicing teachers find out what they need to know? Personal learning communities provide the bulk of the information. Teacher-written websites, teacher-created district curriculum guides, and grade level or subject area PLC meetings can help teachers with lesson plans, teaching strategies, and rubrics. Taking time off to attend statewide or national conferences can also help spark new ideas. Mostly, though, teachers have to rely on day-to-day creative planning, monitoring and adjusting in the classroom, and a healthy dose of self-reflection to develop a sound practice.
In terms of my progress this week, a couple more teachers completed my survey and I ended up with 21 responses, almost 50%. I have created graphs and tables based on the quantitative responses via Google Forms, but have not yet officially started coding the longer essay responses.
Friday, April 17, 2015
Blog #10: Successes
This week, I am mostly feeling success! I feel good about my survey questions, I was able to enter them into a Google Form and figure out how to send it to the teachers identified by my media specialist, and I am now having fun watching the responses roll in. As of this writing, I have 18 respondents. Out of the 44 teachers to whom I sent the survey, that is a 40% response rate. Pretty good, right? I did set a deadline of next Wednesday, so I may get a few more trickling in early next week, but most likely by then many of the non-respondents will have forgotten about it. Even if this is it, though, I feel like it is a good sample size for a pilot study. I am very grateful to my colleagues for taking the time to help me out.
As I briefly glance over the results, I am feeling glad I asked a combination of multiple-choice and short essay questions. It is so interesting to read the longer answers. I am already noticing some preliminary patterns. The word "time, " for instance, appears far more frequently than any other word. This is not surprising and seems to confirm the studies I cited in my lit review. At the same time, it is surprising to see the diversity of responses. How teachers perceive the role of the school media specialist is quite different depending upon the individual. And answers are all over the board about whether our administration explicitly supports SLMS-teacher collaboration. I never would have guessed this.
Of course, my feelings of success will surely dissipate as I start to try to make real sense out of all of this data. My next step, after the survey closes next Wednesday, will be to try to input my data in NVivo and start coding. I know that will be a major learning curve for me, and next week I probably will be writing about challenges, issues, and concerns instead of successes. But for now, I'm feeling good!
As I briefly glance over the results, I am feeling glad I asked a combination of multiple-choice and short essay questions. It is so interesting to read the longer answers. I am already noticing some preliminary patterns. The word "time, " for instance, appears far more frequently than any other word. This is not surprising and seems to confirm the studies I cited in my lit review. At the same time, it is surprising to see the diversity of responses. How teachers perceive the role of the school media specialist is quite different depending upon the individual. And answers are all over the board about whether our administration explicitly supports SLMS-teacher collaboration. I never would have guessed this.
Of course, my feelings of success will surely dissipate as I start to try to make real sense out of all of this data. My next step, after the survey closes next Wednesday, will be to try to input my data in NVivo and start coding. I know that will be a major learning curve for me, and next week I probably will be writing about challenges, issues, and concerns instead of successes. But for now, I'm feeling good!
Friday, April 10, 2015
Blog #9: Potential Pitfalls
One of the greatest pitfalls of sending a voluntary email questionnaire to teachers is simply the rate of return. Being a busy teacher myself who doesn't often have time to check my email during my teaching day, let alone take a survey, I know that not all of my subjects, no matter how nicely I ask, will end up completing the survey. This may result in a thin data set and a threat to coming up with credible results. One way to address this is to think carefully about timing. I don't want to send the survey, for example, over the weekend or on a Friday afternoon. Because we have an advisement period on Wednesdays and teachers might have some time during that hour, I plan on sending the survey out next Wednesday morning. I have also considered offering cookies as a bribe for completing the survey.
It may also be difficult to generalize from the data what factors encourage SLMS-teacher collaboration. My subjects are complex individuals who are unique in lots of ways (age, gender, length of career, past experiences, attitudes, etc.) while my survey, though reliable and consistent, is short, simple, and has a lot of multiple choice questions. I may not get the depth of answers that will allow me to truly find out what is going on. To combat this, I added the option of filling in"other" boxes on many of my questions, and did add a few short answer boxes as well. I am hoping that the combination of multiple choice and short answer will result in the appropriate depth for a pilot study.
Another pitfall of qualitative studies is the transferability of the results to other situations. Because I am doing a local study of one high school with unique characteristics, the findings may not be applicable to other high schools even within my own district. In my discussion of findings, I will need to be sure to include demographic information about my school so others can determine if their situations are similar enough to consider the findings useful for them.
It may also be difficult to generalize from the data what factors encourage SLMS-teacher collaboration. My subjects are complex individuals who are unique in lots of ways (age, gender, length of career, past experiences, attitudes, etc.) while my survey, though reliable and consistent, is short, simple, and has a lot of multiple choice questions. I may not get the depth of answers that will allow me to truly find out what is going on. To combat this, I added the option of filling in"other" boxes on many of my questions, and did add a few short answer boxes as well. I am hoping that the combination of multiple choice and short answer will result in the appropriate depth for a pilot study.
Another pitfall of qualitative studies is the transferability of the results to other situations. Because I am doing a local study of one high school with unique characteristics, the findings may not be applicable to other high schools even within my own district. In my discussion of findings, I will need to be sure to include demographic information about my school so others can determine if their situations are similar enough to consider the findings useful for them.
Saturday, March 28, 2015
Blog #8: Challenges, Issues, Concerns, Successes
After I presented my lit review to the class last week, I felt a bit worried that I didn't explicitly frame my topic as a study of "information seeking behaviors," and I started to panic that maybe it wasn't. But, the more I think about it, that's exactly what it is. I am trying to determine, in my pilot study, what individual and institutional factors influence teachers at my school to work with the school library media specialist. The "information" in this case would be the media specialist's knowledge of resources, information literacy skills, technology tools, etc. The "seeking" aspect of this study would be whether/to what extent/why teachers seek out or agree to collaboration with the the SLMS as they design, deliver, and assess lessons. As I revise my lit review, I am working on incorporating this more explicitly into an introduction to the topic.
I also have been working on my survey this week and have a draft of the questions I will ask. I am planning to do a combination of open ended and multiple choice questions. So far, I have about 15. I think this is a good number, but I am still working on refining them. Although I feel good about my progress with the questions, I haven't started to input them into a Google Form. This will be the first time I've created one (besides a few practice exercises in my tech and learning course), so I am a bit concerned about how that will go. All in all, though, I feel pretty good about my pilot study design. I think I will wait to actually send out the survey until after class next week. Of course, I have concerns about the next steps: mostly, how many of the 46 will actually complete my survey and will I be able to effectively analyze and see patterns in the data? But, one step at a time!
I also have been working on my survey this week and have a draft of the questions I will ask. I am planning to do a combination of open ended and multiple choice questions. So far, I have about 15. I think this is a good number, but I am still working on refining them. Although I feel good about my progress with the questions, I haven't started to input them into a Google Form. This will be the first time I've created one (besides a few practice exercises in my tech and learning course), so I am a bit concerned about how that will go. All in all, though, I feel pretty good about my pilot study design. I think I will wait to actually send out the survey until after class next week. Of course, I have concerns about the next steps: mostly, how many of the 46 will actually complete my survey and will I be able to effectively analyze and see patterns in the data? But, one step at a time!
Thursday, March 19, 2015
Blog #7: Challenges, Issues, Concerns, Successes
This week, I have been focusing on my literature review, which I must say I've found to be seriously depressing. The literature seems a variation on the same theme: it would be great if we (SLMS and teachers) could work together more, but without serious culture changes, it's just not happening very often.
Although the literature shows a direct correlation between this type of collaboration and student achievement, the barriers are many and difficult to overcome. Administrators and teachers don't often seem to understand the role of the SLMS or have the time to commit to developing a collaborative partnership, media specialists themselves often feel overwhelmed with all they have to do, and schools are increasingly cutting library support staff and even media specialists themselves. Yet the stakes, especially now with the adoption of Common Core, have never been higher. Some of the studies I cite do show that with a supportive administration, dedicated time for structured planning, and the right partnership, collaboration can happen and be very effective, but getting all of those elements in place is rare.
In terms my own study, I am curious to see not whether there are barriers at my own school (I know there are as the same ones seem to exist in most schools), but rather how the teachers who do collaborate were able/willing to overcome them. I've decided to survey just the 46 teachers who do collaborate with our SLMS to get a sense of the "type" of teacher who collaborates in our building and the factors that encouraged them to do so. I'll start to develop questions this week and will probably focus on the following aspects:
Although the literature shows a direct correlation between this type of collaboration and student achievement, the barriers are many and difficult to overcome. Administrators and teachers don't often seem to understand the role of the SLMS or have the time to commit to developing a collaborative partnership, media specialists themselves often feel overwhelmed with all they have to do, and schools are increasingly cutting library support staff and even media specialists themselves. Yet the stakes, especially now with the adoption of Common Core, have never been higher. Some of the studies I cite do show that with a supportive administration, dedicated time for structured planning, and the right partnership, collaboration can happen and be very effective, but getting all of those elements in place is rare.
In terms my own study, I am curious to see not whether there are barriers at my own school (I know there are as the same ones seem to exist in most schools), but rather how the teachers who do collaborate were able/willing to overcome them. I've decided to survey just the 46 teachers who do collaborate with our SLMS to get a sense of the "type" of teacher who collaborates in our building and the factors that encouraged them to do so. I'll start to develop questions this week and will probably focus on the following aspects:
- What they were taught/not taught about collaboration in teacher ed
- If they had worked with with a media specialist in a previous building
- Their teaching style/personality
- Their understanding of the roles of an SLMS
- The degree to which they feel administration supports this collaboration
- Professional development experience
- "Marketing" by SLMS or others who collaborated with her in the past
Saturday, March 14, 2015
Blog #6: Decisions and Data Analysis
As I am working on my lit review, several themes are emerging:
a. Media specialist-teacher collaboration is connected to student achievement.
b. Media specialists, teachers, and administrators all want this collaboration to happen.
c. It is often not happening because of several common barriers: administrative support, time/communication, and the independent nature of teaching culture.
For my pilot study, I would like to explore to what extent these factors are influencing this type of collaboration in my own high school, and if there are others. To start my project, I gave my media specialist a list of all teaching staff and asked her to highlight those with whom she had "collaborated on a lesson." Out of 130 staff, she highlighted 46, which is roughly 35%.
At first glance, this percentage seemed low to me. However, when I conducted a brief interview with the media specialist, she reported that she was happy with this percentage and that she didn't believe she could fit in working with many more teaching staff into her busy days. I haven't found any concrete data in any of the literature to compare this percentage to, so I'm not sure what to think. One article recommended media specialists spending 50% of their time in the role of instructional partner. I could ask my media specialist about this. Others conceded it was impossible to work with many teachers (particularly in a large high school), but what is more important is the quality of the co-teaching. Maybe I don't have to make any judgments about whether media specialist-teacher collaboration should be increased in my building anyway, as I am just focusing on why it's happening and why it isn't happening.
The next step for me is making a final decision about my sampling for my survey. I definitely want to stratify so I don't end up with all non-instructional partners, but I am still debating between the following options:
a. Survey all 46 instructional partners only. Focus just on why they did collaborate. This should result in data about how/why partner teachers were able to overcome the typical barriers.
b. Survey half instructional partners and half non-instructional partners. Ask questions about why they did or didn't collaborate. This should result in data about partners and non-partners equally.
c. Survey 35% instructional partners and 65% non instructional partners to more accurately represent the entire staff. This may tip the survey to focusing on reasons collaboration isn't happening.
I would love any feedback on these sampling options!
Which ever sampling method I choose, I will likely create my survey on a Google Form. I have limited knowledge of Google Forms and will have to spend some time getting to know how it all works. Once the surveys are collected, I will likely have to read Richards and Morse again. I understand about grouping data into categories and then conceptualizing what it all means. But, I have zero experience actually doing the coding of data and have never used coding software. I'm sure I have a big learning curve ahead of me.
a. Media specialist-teacher collaboration is connected to student achievement.
b. Media specialists, teachers, and administrators all want this collaboration to happen.
c. It is often not happening because of several common barriers: administrative support, time/communication, and the independent nature of teaching culture.
For my pilot study, I would like to explore to what extent these factors are influencing this type of collaboration in my own high school, and if there are others. To start my project, I gave my media specialist a list of all teaching staff and asked her to highlight those with whom she had "collaborated on a lesson." Out of 130 staff, she highlighted 46, which is roughly 35%.
At first glance, this percentage seemed low to me. However, when I conducted a brief interview with the media specialist, she reported that she was happy with this percentage and that she didn't believe she could fit in working with many more teaching staff into her busy days. I haven't found any concrete data in any of the literature to compare this percentage to, so I'm not sure what to think. One article recommended media specialists spending 50% of their time in the role of instructional partner. I could ask my media specialist about this. Others conceded it was impossible to work with many teachers (particularly in a large high school), but what is more important is the quality of the co-teaching. Maybe I don't have to make any judgments about whether media specialist-teacher collaboration should be increased in my building anyway, as I am just focusing on why it's happening and why it isn't happening.
The next step for me is making a final decision about my sampling for my survey. I definitely want to stratify so I don't end up with all non-instructional partners, but I am still debating between the following options:
a. Survey all 46 instructional partners only. Focus just on why they did collaborate. This should result in data about how/why partner teachers were able to overcome the typical barriers.
b. Survey half instructional partners and half non-instructional partners. Ask questions about why they did or didn't collaborate. This should result in data about partners and non-partners equally.
c. Survey 35% instructional partners and 65% non instructional partners to more accurately represent the entire staff. This may tip the survey to focusing on reasons collaboration isn't happening.
I would love any feedback on these sampling options!
Which ever sampling method I choose, I will likely create my survey on a Google Form. I have limited knowledge of Google Forms and will have to spend some time getting to know how it all works. Once the surveys are collected, I will likely have to read Richards and Morse again. I understand about grouping data into categories and then conceptualizing what it all means. But, I have zero experience actually doing the coding of data and have never used coding software. I'm sure I have a big learning curve ahead of me.
Wednesday, March 4, 2015
Blog #5: Ethical Concerns
I am going to survey teachers in my school as well as the media specialist and perhaps the administration. Most of them will know me as I have taught in the school for over 20 years. This will likely, at least I hope, work in my favor in terms of response rate. I know that I am much more willing to do a favor like filling out a survey for someone I know. However, it may also work against me in some ways. I hope they will be honest with me instead of telling me what they think I want to hear, or being reluctant to criticize the media center or administration in fear that it may "get back to them."
Although my survey will not cause any physical harm, I am a bit concerned that it may cause "psychological discomfort" or embarrassment on the part of the media specialist. I certainly am not conducting this survey to point out any flaws she has or criticize any lack of collaboration with teachers. In fact, if anything, I am confident that she has been doing an excellent job reaching out to the staff. To address this, however, I will need to make it clear, particularly to her, that this study is more about teacher attitudes, perceptions, and blocking forces on their part. I will be sure to be honest about that in my survey directions so that participants are not misled. Certainly, participation will be optional and the information will remain (sort of) confidential. Because I am studying my own school, it will be difficult to truly keep the media specialist and administration anonymous, even though I won't name them.
Although my survey will not cause any physical harm, I am a bit concerned that it may cause "psychological discomfort" or embarrassment on the part of the media specialist. I certainly am not conducting this survey to point out any flaws she has or criticize any lack of collaboration with teachers. In fact, if anything, I am confident that she has been doing an excellent job reaching out to the staff. To address this, however, I will need to make it clear, particularly to her, that this study is more about teacher attitudes, perceptions, and blocking forces on their part. I will be sure to be honest about that in my survey directions so that participants are not misled. Certainly, participation will be optional and the information will remain (sort of) confidential. Because I am studying my own school, it will be difficult to truly keep the media specialist and administration anonymous, even though I won't name them.
Saturday, February 28, 2015
Blog #4: Data Collection Methods
Initial design:
For my new research project topic on teacher-librarian collaboration, I will be using a simple survey (questionnaire) of teachers in my building to collect my data. I may also conduct a semi-structured interview with the media specialist. I have created short, informal surveys before, but this will be my first longer, formal survey.
Aim:
The aim of my survey is to collect answers to my research question: what factors affect media specialist-teacher collaboration in my high school? I will need to ask about the following factors, and I'm concerned about writing questions that will elicit honest, detailed feedback:
a. Opinions and beliefs about this type of collaboration
b. Attitudes behind those beliefs (their experience discussing this in teacher ed)
c. Past behavior (did they collaborate, to what extent), and the motives behind that behavior (why)
d. Maybe: future behavior
Construction:
I am still debating between using a web survey or paper surveys. Because I will be surveying the staff at my high school, I can easily use mailboxes to distribute and collect the surveys. I am wondering which would give me the highest response rate. I find web-based surveys easy to take, but I also tend to put it off until later, and by then the email is buried underneath new emails. Paper surveys, too, can get lost under piles of papers to grade, but they do seem "more important."
Sampling:
I am also debating about whether to survey the entire teaching staff, or choose a sample. Currently, there are around 134 teachers in my building. Not all of them are full time and some are special education, counselors, etc. who may not be in the classroom. If I do decide to sample, I'll have to decide how many to sample and how to choose. I could simply do a random sampling of the teachers, or I could stratify based on subject area. If I do stratify, it might make sense to use disproportionate stratification to account for the fact that some subject areas are much larger than others. Another way I might approach this is to ask the media specialist to identify teachers she has worked with in the last few years and those she hasn't and stratify the sample that way.
I am also now having second thoughts about the teacher ed piece. Should I also survey students in teacher ed classes at Augsburg, or should I just focus on my building? It seems like it might be too broad, too far away from my research question to bring a whole other population into the mix.
Obviously, I still have lots of decisions to make. I am finding the Gibbs' videos very helpful in thinking through these issues, and I hope we can discuss them in class next week.
For my new research project topic on teacher-librarian collaboration, I will be using a simple survey (questionnaire) of teachers in my building to collect my data. I may also conduct a semi-structured interview with the media specialist. I have created short, informal surveys before, but this will be my first longer, formal survey.
Aim:
The aim of my survey is to collect answers to my research question: what factors affect media specialist-teacher collaboration in my high school? I will need to ask about the following factors, and I'm concerned about writing questions that will elicit honest, detailed feedback:
a. Opinions and beliefs about this type of collaboration
b. Attitudes behind those beliefs (their experience discussing this in teacher ed)
c. Past behavior (did they collaborate, to what extent), and the motives behind that behavior (why)
d. Maybe: future behavior
Construction:
I am still debating between using a web survey or paper surveys. Because I will be surveying the staff at my high school, I can easily use mailboxes to distribute and collect the surveys. I am wondering which would give me the highest response rate. I find web-based surveys easy to take, but I also tend to put it off until later, and by then the email is buried underneath new emails. Paper surveys, too, can get lost under piles of papers to grade, but they do seem "more important."
Sampling:
I am also debating about whether to survey the entire teaching staff, or choose a sample. Currently, there are around 134 teachers in my building. Not all of them are full time and some are special education, counselors, etc. who may not be in the classroom. If I do decide to sample, I'll have to decide how many to sample and how to choose. I could simply do a random sampling of the teachers, or I could stratify based on subject area. If I do stratify, it might make sense to use disproportionate stratification to account for the fact that some subject areas are much larger than others. Another way I might approach this is to ask the media specialist to identify teachers she has worked with in the last few years and those she hasn't and stratify the sample that way.
I am also now having second thoughts about the teacher ed piece. Should I also survey students in teacher ed classes at Augsburg, or should I just focus on my building? It seems like it might be too broad, too far away from my research question to bring a whole other population into the mix.
Obviously, I still have lots of decisions to make. I am finding the Gibbs' videos very helpful in thinking through these issues, and I hope we can discuss them in class next week.
Tuesday, February 24, 2015
Blog #3.5: New Topic!
So, I have been doing lots of thinking since Saturday.....and after struggling quite a bit with my topic and methodology, and reconsidering other interests, I've decided I'd like to change gears. It's something that I discourage my own students from doing, but I feel good about the change and it's still early in the process.
New topic:
1. Establish purpose: As a classroom teacher who hasn't collaborated much with media specialists over the years and as a media specialist-in-training who wants to collaborate with teachers, I am interested in finding out why teachers do or don't collaborate with media specialists in lesson planning, teaching and assessing.
I plan to survey teachers in my own building as well as my media specialist. I am also interested in whether K-12 teacher preparation programs discuss this type of collaboration. I have contacted a professor in teacher education at Augsburg and she has agreed to let me survey her students as well.
2. Methodological location: Like most qualitative research projects, my project will be inductive, meaning I will be looking at particular instances and trying to make a generalization of some sort.
3. Scoping: I will survey and/or interview teachers in my own building: those who frequently, sometimes, and never work with our media specialist to create lessons; and I will interview my media specialist about strategies she has used to increase collaboration. I will also survey new teachers in a teacher ed program about their perceptions of media specialists and their experience learning about or being encouraged to collaborate with a media specialist in their teacher education program.
4: Nature of Data: Survey results and/or interview transcripts
5: Thinking Ahead: I believe this study should help shed light on factors that influence teacher-librarian partnerships, starting from teacher education on to the real world of everyday lesson planning.
New topic:
1. Establish purpose: As a classroom teacher who hasn't collaborated much with media specialists over the years and as a media specialist-in-training who wants to collaborate with teachers, I am interested in finding out why teachers do or don't collaborate with media specialists in lesson planning, teaching and assessing.
I plan to survey teachers in my own building as well as my media specialist. I am also interested in whether K-12 teacher preparation programs discuss this type of collaboration. I have contacted a professor in teacher education at Augsburg and she has agreed to let me survey her students as well.
2. Methodological location: Like most qualitative research projects, my project will be inductive, meaning I will be looking at particular instances and trying to make a generalization of some sort.
3. Scoping: I will survey and/or interview teachers in my own building: those who frequently, sometimes, and never work with our media specialist to create lessons; and I will interview my media specialist about strategies she has used to increase collaboration. I will also survey new teachers in a teacher ed program about their perceptions of media specialists and their experience learning about or being encouraged to collaborate with a media specialist in their teacher education program.
4: Nature of Data: Survey results and/or interview transcripts
5: Thinking Ahead: I believe this study should help shed light on factors that influence teacher-librarian partnerships, starting from teacher education on to the real world of everyday lesson planning.
Thursday, February 19, 2015
Blog #3: Research Project Design
My previous experience working with undergraduates (and high school seniors, as well), is that they are, as a group, very unlikely to independently seek help from librarians or writing lab tutors when working on research assignments. I assume the factors for this are any combination of the following:
a. They do not know about the type of help that is available to them
b. They feel confident in their work and don't feel they need help
c. They have procrastinated so long on the assignment that there is no time for help
d. They know there is help available and that they would benefit from it, but they feel intimidated about asking for it.
Using Richards and Morse's five steps, the following is a potential research design for my study:
1. Establish purpose: After working with undergraduates that did stop at the reference desk, it was common for them to remark about how valuable the service was, or that they wished they would have known earlier they could ask for help here. I would like to know more about why students are not using these services and how librarians and writing centers might work together to invite more students in.
2. Methodological location: Like most qualitative research projects, my project will be inductive, meaning I will be looking at particular instances and trying to make a generalization of some sort.
3. Scoping: I will interview a number of students (3-5?), reference desk librarians (2?), and writing tutors (2?) at two local private colleges, one with a writing center inside the library and one outside of it. By talking with 14-18 people, I hope to have enough responses to make my pilot study valid as well as manageable.
4: Nature of Data: I will be asking students who do/do not visit the writing centers and reference desks why they did/did not, what their understanding of the two services are, and how helpful they found them. I will be asking reference desk librarians and writing lab tutors about their perceptions of students, each other, and ways that they have/have not collaborated.
5: Thinking Ahead: I believe this study should help shed light on the value of these two services and how they could be more helpful to students. Because I plan to study two campuses with different models, I am obviously looking to compare and contrast. If it seems positioning the writing center within the library does lead to more use of and collaboration between services, I will focus on that. If, however, there is no discernible difference between the two models, then I will look at factors outside of their locations that may help explain students' perceptions and use.
a. They do not know about the type of help that is available to them
b. They feel confident in their work and don't feel they need help
c. They have procrastinated so long on the assignment that there is no time for help
d. They know there is help available and that they would benefit from it, but they feel intimidated about asking for it.
Using Richards and Morse's five steps, the following is a potential research design for my study:
1. Establish purpose: After working with undergraduates that did stop at the reference desk, it was common for them to remark about how valuable the service was, or that they wished they would have known earlier they could ask for help here. I would like to know more about why students are not using these services and how librarians and writing centers might work together to invite more students in.
2. Methodological location: Like most qualitative research projects, my project will be inductive, meaning I will be looking at particular instances and trying to make a generalization of some sort.
3. Scoping: I will interview a number of students (3-5?), reference desk librarians (2?), and writing tutors (2?) at two local private colleges, one with a writing center inside the library and one outside of it. By talking with 14-18 people, I hope to have enough responses to make my pilot study valid as well as manageable.
4: Nature of Data: I will be asking students who do/do not visit the writing centers and reference desks why they did/did not, what their understanding of the two services are, and how helpful they found them. I will be asking reference desk librarians and writing lab tutors about their perceptions of students, each other, and ways that they have/have not collaborated.
5: Thinking Ahead: I believe this study should help shed light on the value of these two services and how they could be more helpful to students. Because I plan to study two campuses with different models, I am obviously looking to compare and contrast. If it seems positioning the writing center within the library does lead to more use of and collaboration between services, I will focus on that. If, however, there is no discernible difference between the two models, then I will look at factors outside of their locations that may help explain students' perceptions and use.
Thursday, February 12, 2015
Blog #2: Topic Selection
In chapter 2, Richards and Morse (2007) list some common considerations in topic selection. Of the five they list, the one that best reflects my current thinking is number 4: What is going on here? Answers to pragmatic questions.
While working at the reference desk here at St. Kate's, I noticed that students were often confused and frustrated by the different roles--and locations--of the writing center tutors and librarians. As a writing instructor and librarian-in-training, I was also torn. My directive was to help only with research and citation questions, but to send students downstairs to the O'Neill Writing Center if they had writing questions. But I'll admit I "cheated" more than once and helped students with spelling, grammar, punctuation, and usage questions as well as larger writing issues such as thesis statements, paragraph cohesion, and transitions when I had time. In every one of those cases, students were incredibly appreciative.
This experience raised questions I would like to explore in this project. When undergraduates have questions about their college research assignments:
Who: Undergraduate college students, reference desk librarians, and writing center tutors
Where: During one of my observations for a reference class, I noticed the writing center at Augsburg College is located within the library. So, I am considering studying students at two private Minnesota colleges: St. Catherine University and Augsburg College.
Research methods: As of now, I'm a bit unclear about which of the three approaches Richards and Morse discuss (phenomenology, ethnography, or grounded theory) fit my research questions best, but I will likely use interview, observation, and possibly surveys in my research.
While working at the reference desk here at St. Kate's, I noticed that students were often confused and frustrated by the different roles--and locations--of the writing center tutors and librarians. As a writing instructor and librarian-in-training, I was also torn. My directive was to help only with research and citation questions, but to send students downstairs to the O'Neill Writing Center if they had writing questions. But I'll admit I "cheated" more than once and helped students with spelling, grammar, punctuation, and usage questions as well as larger writing issues such as thesis statements, paragraph cohesion, and transitions when I had time. In every one of those cases, students were incredibly appreciative.
This experience raised questions I would like to explore in this project. When undergraduates have questions about their college research assignments:
- To what extent/in what ways do they use the reference desk librarians vs. the writing center tutors?
- What is their understanding of the roles of these different resources?
- How helpful do they find these resources?
- To what extent do the following factors affect their use/understanding:
- The location of the writing center (within or outside of the library)?
- The level of collaboration between the library and writing center staff?
- Others?
Who: Undergraduate college students, reference desk librarians, and writing center tutors
Where: During one of my observations for a reference class, I noticed the writing center at Augsburg College is located within the library. So, I am considering studying students at two private Minnesota colleges: St. Catherine University and Augsburg College.
Research methods: As of now, I'm a bit unclear about which of the three approaches Richards and Morse discuss (phenomenology, ethnography, or grounded theory) fit my research questions best, but I will likely use interview, observation, and possibly surveys in my research.
Sunday, February 8, 2015
Blog #1: Goals and Introduction
When this class was offered as an alternative for the research requirement, I jumped at the chance to take it. Not only because I have really enjoyed taking classes with Joyce previously, but because I am excited for the opportunity to conduct in depth research on a topic of my choice. My goal is to design and complete a research project that will be of interest to me and my classmates, and that will contribute to the field of LIS. I am still refining my topic ideas, but as a writing instructor, I am very interested in looking at how students use (or don't use) writing centers and libraries to meet their information needs when working on research assignments, and how writing tutors and librarians might work together more effectively to help students succeed.
My experience doing research is mainly in academic settings. I conducted both primary and secondary research projects as an undergraduate student in English and psychology as well in both of my graduate programs for teaching and now LIS. Outside of the classroom, I was involved in a research committee studying school schedules and graduation requirements for my school district a few years ago. In addition, I have been teaching research skills to my 12th grade English students for many years. In the field of English, our research involves mainly explication of texts, but I also teach a writing class in which students conduct ethnographic and library research. For the past few years, I have also worked with IB students on the Extended Essay which is a 4000 word research project in a field of their choice. It will be fun for me now to be on the other side of the process.
Certainly, this class will help me be a better writing teacher as well as a better librarian. Obviously, studying information seeking behavior is crucial for LIS professionals. In our world of information overload, the more we understand about how people search and how we can help them search more efficiently and effectively, the more successful they will be at meeting their information needs.
My experience doing research is mainly in academic settings. I conducted both primary and secondary research projects as an undergraduate student in English and psychology as well in both of my graduate programs for teaching and now LIS. Outside of the classroom, I was involved in a research committee studying school schedules and graduation requirements for my school district a few years ago. In addition, I have been teaching research skills to my 12th grade English students for many years. In the field of English, our research involves mainly explication of texts, but I also teach a writing class in which students conduct ethnographic and library research. For the past few years, I have also worked with IB students on the Extended Essay which is a 4000 word research project in a field of their choice. It will be fun for me now to be on the other side of the process.
Certainly, this class will help me be a better writing teacher as well as a better librarian. Obviously, studying information seeking behavior is crucial for LIS professionals. In our world of information overload, the more we understand about how people search and how we can help them search more efficiently and effectively, the more successful they will be at meeting their information needs.
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