Remember to engage the senses for the class…food, music, lighting, materials, provocation

(From the Text Book) -Quality in qualitative research-pull out the root woods

-quality and credibility

Headings: learning from philosophy, learning from social theory, learning from methodology, and learning from practice (case studies)

-perhaps each of us take each of these topics and go deeper with them and then link them to the digital nation/merit pay cases

-Jeannie to do philosophy, Dale social , Linda methodology, and Lana practice

-each person to pull the key points out from this section of the paper…rewrite headings as a question…pull out quotes from the reading and make further sense of them

Learning from Methodology

Learning from Methodology pp. 382- 384

Research Materials- methodologists call this ‘data’

In order for a methodologist to do ‘good research’, “We have to think about our research while we are doing it if work of good quality is to be produced” (Becker 1998)

- “blindly following methodological rules can close things down and lead to accounts that don’t hold up under criticism” p. 838

-author feels that methodology can improve the quality of research (p. 382)

“…if researchers learn to read methodological writings as moments of scholarly reflection in a research career that…encapsulate some research skills that the writer has learned.” P. 383

-when reading research, the reader must be aware that the findings of any given study may only be relevant for the present research context and not work outside of this context…so if they want to include the findings/ideas into their own context, but do this with good judgment

-author believes that methodological reflections from the quantitative method have a lot to offer qualitative researchers (p. 283)- goes onto to say that in quantitative research cannot be valid or invalid but instead be cited as ‘approximately’ or ‘tentatively’…control groups, stats are technical procedures that do not make a study ‘valid’

-quote on P. 283 explains what Campbell and Stanley believe

“…rules for proper research are not universally applicable are modified by pragmatic considerations…”

-the evaluations that happen in research depend upon, “linguistic practices, social norms, and contexts, assumptions and traditions that the rules had been designed to eliminate”

-the author also refers to these ‘rules’ as ‘threats’

-the author seems to say that qualitative research allows the researcher to enter into the ‘thoughts’ of the researcher to figure of the context in which the research is being done…this then adds to the ‘richness of the eventual account’ p. 283

-the internal dialogue shows transparency from the researcher and the author believes that methodological procedures assist with this initial inner dialogue and then help with sharing the dialogue with the external audience p. 283

More Metaphors - about QR

I found this bit in a text by Denzin and Lincoln - Collecting and Interpreting Qualitative Materials helpful.  

Metaphors seem to help with my understanding of this complex topic.

Qualitative research is a field of inquiry in its own right.  I crosscuts disciplines, fields, and subject matters.  A complex, interconnected family of terms, concepts, and assumptions surround the term qualitative research.

In North America QR operates in a complex historical field that crosscuts seven historical moments. (pg 3)

Any definition of QR must work within this complex historical field.  QR  means different things in each of these moments.  Nonetheless an initial generic definition can be offered:  QR is a situated activity that locates the observer iin the world.  It consists of interpretive, material practises that make the world visible. (Pg 4

The qualitative researcher may take on multiple and gendered images:  scientist, naturalist, field-worker, journalist, social critic, artist performer, jazz musician, filmmaker, quilt maker, essayist.  

The researcher may in turn be seen as a bricoleur, as  a maker of quilts, or, as in filmmaking, a person who assembles images into montages.

A bricoleur  is a "Jack of all trades or a kind of professional do-it-yourself person.  There are may kinds of bricoleurs - interpretive, narrative theoretical, political.

My image for social learning theory. :)

Linking philosophy, methodology, and methods in qualitative research

As I search for information on the Philosophy of Qualitative Research I came across this article. In it is a definition of Epistemology or the Philosophy of Knowledge.

"Qualitative research methods should be congruent with a philosophy of knowledge. Philosophy of knowledge is known as epistemology. Epistemology assumes a separation between knowing and being. A holistic philosophy that knowledge cannot be dissected from life experience is known as ontology. Philosophers have different visions of what constitutes knowledge. A researcher needs to align his or her personal perspective with a philosophy, which will underpin the assumptions of a study. Methodology, therefore, can be thought of as being embedded with a guiding philosophy and method as a concrete process of research steps.

An analogy of cooking can be used to facilitate understanding of this terminology. If your vision (ie, philosophy) is of French gourmet cuisine (ie, methodology), you would not follow a recipe (ie, method) to make franks and beans. You probably would expect a recipe (ie, method) related to crepes suzette or creme puffs. Realize, though, that more than one method can fall under a guiding philosophy. To complicate matters further, specific philosophers (ie, chefs) may fall under the same methodology (ie, French cuisine) but disagree as to the method (ie, recipe).

How does a researcher choose a philosophical perspective and method? There is no easy answer. A novice researcher may use the single tool provided by a professor without being aware of different choices and perspectives. Qualitative researchers must read extensively to broaden their views and identify their personal epistemology. This will generate an awareness of the diverse methodologies and the congruence or conflict with specific research methods. The research question and phenomenon under study also will guide the methodology and method. In addition, some disciplines lend themselves to specific methodologies and philosophies. In education, for example, researchers often perform narrative research. Narrative research is similar to nursing's phenomenologic methods; however, the guiding philosophies differ.

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0FSL/is_1_73/ai_70361334/pg_2/?tag=content;col1

Information about Social theory I found

Martin O’Brien (1993) has used the example of a kaleidoscope to answer the question what is theory?

A kaleidoscope is a child’s toy …

When you turn the tube and look down the lense of the kaleidoscope the shapes and colours, visible at the bottom, change. As the tube is turned, different lenses come into play and the combinations of colour and shape shift from one pattern to another. In a similar way we can see social theory as a sort of kaleidoscope – by shifting theoretical perspective the world under investigation also changes shape. (1993:10-11)

Pg 76 (Doing QR – Silverman)

The point is that none of these data are more real or more sure than the others.

It all depends on our research question. And research questions are inevitably theoretically informed. So we do need social theories to help us address even quite basic issues in social research. (pg 76 Doing QR – Silverman)

Theories arrange sets of concepts to define and explain some phenomenon. As Strauss and Corbiin put it: “Theory consists of plausible relationships produced among concepts and sets of concepts” (1994: 728).

Theory provides both:

· a framework for critically undestading phenomena

· a basis for considering how what is unknow might be orgniz (Gubrium, personal correspondence)

(Pg 78 – Doing QR – Silverman)

COMPETING PARADIGMS IN QR

by Egon G. Guba and Yvonna S. Lincoln

I found this article helpful for trying to understand the ontology, epistemology, and methods questions of our case.

PPT notes from Linda

SLIDE 1

The Case for Qualitative Research case #6

Linda, Lana, Dale, and Jeannie

Notes:begin with a disclaimer that this is our interpretation/ “we are not here to make a claim, but we are here to share our interpretations and to invite your stories about qualitative research”Setting the environment… “opening explorations”…food, music, images

SLIDE 2

• Begin with a story or a poem as a provocation on research or the book, “why research”

• John Dewey quote

• Question: As a researcher, what is it that you believe about qualitative research?

How can we create a connected understanding of qualitative research through expressive languages? (groups to create their own understandings and then place them on a larger ‘chicken wire’ piece for a large art piece’)

Notes:Remember to engage the senses for the class…food, music, lighting, materials, provocation(From the Text Book) -Quality in qualitative research-pull out the root woods -quality and credibility

Headings: learning from philosophy, learning from social theory, learning from methodology, and learning from practice (case studies)-each person to pull the key points out from this section of the paper…rewrite headings as a question…pull out quotes from the reading and make further sense of them

SLIDE 3

-we take one each of these topics and go deeper with them and then link them to the digital nation cases

-Jeannie - philosophy, Dale social , Linda methodology, and Lana practice

• “Languages of Learning” – book by Karen Gallas

• Stories- epistemological research…narratives

Could pull from this book to validate using the wire…this is a thread that is present throughout the presentation

Notes:-Dale to send an email to all the students and ask them to let us know what their country of origin is- then we will find images from each country to include in a visual presentation of images

-each of to send our notes to be included on the blog…we can then share this with the class and our prof

Linda's Notes on Digital Nation video

Notes on “Virtual Nation” news documentary

(Hi ladies- since I was at home today as my son is sick, I decided to watch the documentary and take down some notes of what stood out for me… an idea that came up as I was watching. I began to wonder about the research that is currently being done- it seems very quantitative from the way it is described in the documentary…I wonder how a qualitative approach to these same ‘issues or problems or questions’ could be implemented? Perhaps this is a guiding question we give the students as they look at a piece of this?? Just a thought….hope these notes help! Linda)

Clip #2: NASA Research

-this research is all about multitasking

-demonstrates more of a quantitative style of research

Clip #3: Korean Study

-video game addiction

-again, stats are stated, quantitative research

-clip then highlights a 2 week treatment camp called ‘internet rescue’

-this is a more qualitative look…if this were studied, the long term effectiveness of the camp/intervention

-social issues addressed

Clip #4: reporter at home in Brooklyn

-son uses blogs

-immigrants to technical nation…those who have not grown up with technology vs. those who have (the natives)

-children in Bronx school- principal feels ‘technology is like oxygen’

-multitasking is welcomed at the Bronx school

“the world has sped up in many ways and school has not” quote from the principal

Clip #5: NEA study on reading and writing cited

-again stats are cited

-writing in paragraphs- then students get distracted…have little bursts and snippets in writing but no connection between thoughts…no big picture

Clip #6: North America “the verbs” vs. “the nouns” – learning may stay the same but the teaching differs

-there are gains and losses as we move into new realms (as in our past…moving from the visual language to written language, we lost memories)

-“issue of distraction” not a new issue – another social phenomenon emerging – need to be open minded with a sense of new exploration

Clip #7: testimonials – stories of people on how technology has impacted their lives

-Bubbi’s kitchen cooking show (83 yr old woman who reaches out to people through the internet and her cooking)

-world of war craft game- both examples of social phenomena that people use to reach over to the ‘other side’ – connecting with others through technology

-games give people a place to be someone else

-games are more powerful than books for fantasy

-meeting online and attending gaming conventions- shows the urge to connect with other people

-technology was not isolating them but giving them another way to connect

Clip #8: Second life creator

-people can become someone else in second life

-creator worked to rewrite the rules of interaction

-he believes that through virtual realities it solves the crisis of the technology crisis of being alone…does it eradicate this issue?

Clip #9: IBM clip- meetings are now virtual

-reporter went to the IBM building and found no one there- everyone works from home/hotel room/somewhere else and logs in

-growing market for research – to see how virtual realities impact us, how the virtual and the real world are becoming blurred

-impact even more profound when our avitars look just like us – research that is being funded by US government (military is also very interested)

-most stunning research is that being done with children “swimming with whales” research – children will believe virtual experiences (children that have virtually swam with whales believe they actually did this)

Clip #10: Military – treating vets for Post traumatic stress disorder through virtual

Realities

“technologies that re-write the rules of the game” – drone planes

-these planes are manned by pilots in the US while the planes are flown in Iraq

-what are the consequences of these air strikes? On the pilots? On the people in the country being fired upon?

Army experience Centre: for kids 13 and over

-soft sell to recruiting…kids can come in and play army games for free

-soldiers mingle and talk with the kids

-criticism- army is using the ‘adrenaline rush’ of the games to get kids to join up

-protests- army has blurred the lines between reality and the virtual world

“war is not a game”

-kids disagree- they seem to have the ability to distinguish between the virtual world and real world of war

Final Clip:

School highlighted- a school that uses gaming

“gaming as a lens for the entire curriculum”

-game world- children are as engaged in games as they have ever been in books, if not more so in games

-not all agree with this claim

-time will tell as the children grow up

-resistance to change is futile

ppt from yesterday

Hi everyone,
I have sent the ppt to Dale to post to this blog as I am a bit technologically challenged!
Thanks for the meeting yesterday...we are going to have a wonderful presentation!
Linda

Children's Literature ... WHY EXPLORE?

Why Explore

Themes emerging

THEMES - Dale's View

o inner and outer dialogue - determine quality in good social research

o need to consider philosophy, social theory, methodology

o we learn from others so look at their research to help us create own quality research - practice

o can look at case study to understand quality - newspaper article, clip from Digital Nation - what is demonstrated in this research for both these examples

o where would we go from here? Merit pay for teachers, digital nation

o (maybe each of us goes deeper into one of the areas - philosophy, social theory and methodology)

o look at extra readings to find more info on this topic

o What it is? "what counts as quality research?

o What makes it different from quantitative research?

o Essential features of qualitative research

o Reflexivity -in concepts and methods of the qual research. *more impt to understand than diff between qual and quant research

o Culture - WHAT IS CULTURE? Pg 72 case study

o is it a thing or something that people create as explanation for behaviour?

o Qualitative study of culture?

• Gender issues

Intercultural communication research (find this area confusing

Notes from Linda

Qualitative Research Methods

EDER 603.16

Notes on Case #6

Case Study

-most social research is positivist- its actual research practices treat the phenomenon of interest as a ‘thing’, separate and apart from the observer

-ethnographic studies (viewed as interpretive) are positivist when they use informants, cultural variables and cultural context as a resource to explain phenomena

Some qualitative studies show that they understand reflecting on social phenomena and show this by their descriptions of the interaction of the phenomena and why they exist

-this case study is looking for whether or not the ‘reflexivity’ in the concepts and methods of the qualitative research is present or not

The Narrative (from the case study): demonstrates that the student must be aware what culture means, the ideas around it, and school performance (how is this defined?) What are the realities of these, do they actually exist? Is there even a relationship between them?

-shows how assumptions can enter into research and so must open up these assumptions and think about them

Themes: “seeing the world in patterns in order to make sense of it; we wouldn’t be able to deal with the daily onslaught of people and objects if we couldn’t predict a lot about them and feel that we know who and what they are” p.5 of case study

“Generalizations, while capturing similarities, obscure differences.” p. 5

- in reference to gender…”pretending that women and men are the same hurts women, because the ways they are treated are based on the norms for men. It also hurts men who, with good intentions, speak to women as they would to men, and are nonplussed when their words don’t work as they expected, or even spark resentment and anger.” P.5)

“Looking for truth in all the wrong places” – paper examining how we may have been misguided in research

the problem: a positivistic paradigm? The most evident problem is that it mistakes social phenomena for things in the world with an existence independent and apart from people’s reflexive determination of those things. It treats culture as a ‘thing’ in the scientific sense of the word (p. 7)

-in this study, assumptions are made (see p. 8)…Brazilian Indians do not share information without sensing a practical and personal purpose to the other’s knowing it…however, within the research, the reader is not told where this rule comes from

-this study is seen to view culture as a ‘thing’

-problem with research reviewed- when looking at ‘culture’ see it as an ‘object’ in people’s collective subconscious which controls their behaviour which is a problem because: “I think this is a problem because no matter where we look for this thing called culture we will only find people saying and doing things with each other. And that is not the solution to the problem of culture which these researchers hope to find” p. 10

see 5 key points of how the research can be characterized p. 10

Themes emerging from the reading: assumptions (i.e. seeing the world in patterns, making generalizations), social phenomena as a ‘thing’ –separate from the observer

The Solution: -two senses of culture found in the studies examined…commonsense one and a social scientific one- author feels they are both the SAME and both WRONG

Wrong & Same: “they misconstrue the way culture exists and are the same because they explain people’s behaviour by using the same commonsense observations that tell us that people of different cultures are different and that when we know about these differences we can explain people’s thought and action for all practical purposes…they use what everyone knows about cultural identify to justify their findings” p. 10

Quote from Harvey Sacks on Culture (p. 11)

“A culture is an apparatus for generating recognizable actions; if the same procedures are used for generating as for detecting, that is perhaps as simple a solution to the problem of recognizability as is formulatable”

-culture is not a resource for explaining behaviour…culture exists as and in the everyday practices of members doing the mundane work of living in society with others showing their membership through what they say and do p. 11

-Sacks’ analysis explains that are way of understanding a description of people and relationships depends on our knowledge…of membership, categorization- but this knowledge depends on encounters we have had with others…

-in this approach culture is not a thing available t analysts, but is located in members’ actions and descriptions of the world and their ways of holding each other accountable for the adequacy of those actions and descriptions (p. 12)

-need to ask “what counts as culture” p. 12

-see 7 principles on p. 12 to describe the ‘benefits’ of viewing culture in this way

Last Section of case study: p. 15 supports the notion that “social activities are observable; you can see them all around you, and you can write them down…If you think you can see it, that means we can build an observational study, and we can build a natural study”

Pose some questions for our presentation:

Who are we as citizens in this world and how do we interpret qualitative research?

Introductions: each group member will share our interpretations/beliefs about qualitative research….meaning making of this…

-connecting themes and threads…need to identify them….culture, assumptions, gender, identity, reflexive

• words have power, language has power (dialogue)
• seeking the truth … What is truth?
• Dissonance/discourse/tension; knowing how to live with uncertainty
• What is good quality work? P.380
• You don’t have to be concerned with the philosophical foundation
• Themes: assumptions, reflexivity, dissonance
• Bring out the voices of silence
• Silent conversation (pose Qs around the room and ask Ss to comment on each-

test

Hi I'm here!

Lana's Provocation

Provocation Video

Hello

I created my profile and am now online.

Jeannie

Thoughts

Maybe we can identify some of the themes we are finding in the readings. Any other articles books we find that may shed some light on our topic. Questions - perhaps between the four of us we can get better understanding of some of these terms.