Blog 8

Pose a research question about what is going on in the Gaming transcript.  Do your best to ask a question that will allow you to discuss criteria requested on the Short Analysis Assignment Sheet.   List/point out the evidence from the transcript that you will use to develop your answer.  (One important criterion for a good research questionis that it is a question your data set can answer. That is, there needs to be evidence in the data to support an answer.)  

 

Question:

How does the interviewee (B) deal with interviewer's (CH) resistance to his answers?

 

Throughout the data, it seemed as though B's answers were met with resistance. The interview did not have a natural flow because the interviewer persisted in trying to get a certain answer out of B. The following serves as evidence in the data that shows what B did to answer the questions despite the resistance.   

 

Evidence: 

Example A: 

Ch   I wanted to talk a little, you  talk about your self as a hardware expert, you said software novice, although I bullied you into being competent, what software do you know how to use?  

B      you know, what everyone else knows how to use, word, frontpage, powerpoint, excell, spreadsheet things

Ch   so it's interesting, games aren't really considered software are they?

B      they are – agrees - reluctantly

Ch   so you know lots of software

B      yeah, but it's just games (laughing)

Here I have highlighted B's initial answers to CH's questions. We see his natural way of answering the first question. CH then pushes him to consider his abilities in games as an expertise in software. His answer to question two shows his agreeance with resistance. By  question number three, he agrees and goes back to his initial answer that it was just games with a laugh. I would argue that this might be an awkward or nervous laugh since its obvious that she kept pushing for the software connection. 

Example B:

Ch   that's literacy - you have the basic tools, the right basic set of assumptions for how to read, understand, interpret a program.  And so what I'm looking for is the connection between all the gaming experience you have and your ability to do that with the applications - the academic applications

B      well like a lot of games, in the beginning, there's menus.  You don't just start playing.  There's menus, you get to customize your decal your spray, clothes,

laughing

It's not all playing the game it's a lot of process to prepare for it, there's like box, scripts, you practice it, and you're not playing with other people, you're

 Ch   OK so all those things - same kinds of processes, same kinds of moves - so navigating menus is something you learned from games that can carry over - anything else?

B      I think that is the main thing, I can't connect a First person shooter with Microsoft word, that would be a real stretch 

This example shows how CH continues to show resistance in B's answer. Only in these questions there are specific instances where CH is telling B exactly what she expect from his answers (blue highlights). CH states "what I am looking for is..." and "so navigating menus is...". Here B has not excuse but to follow her direction. There is another laugh within his answer. And while he agrees with her in the last question, he still manages to interjects some of his original point that its just games when he states that making the connection "would be a real stretch".  

Blog 7

My name is Tania Flores and I am an undergraduate student at Kean University. I am a senior majoring in Bilingual Elementary Education and English writing. I am researching teacher comments and responses on student work. I am interested to find out what are the common grading practices. I chose you because you are a current teacher. If you agree to partake in my study, I will email you to coordinate a mutually convenient time and place to meet. I will ask you a series of questions which should not take longer than 30 to 45 minutes. I would like to engage in a conversation; therefore I would like to record our conversation as a method of taking notes.  Please let me know if this is okay.

Research focus

 

Focus:

Teacher’s responses to student work

 Questions:

How do teacher respond to student work?

What theories do they follow, if any? Why or why not?

What negative and/o r positive effects do their practices have on students?

 What do I need to do to get an answer to my questions?

Interview active teacher on their process of grading and responding to student assignments. Ask them about why they go about their specific process of responding and/or grading. Research benefits and disadvantages of responding to student papers one way or another.

 

Blog 4- Analysis of Ethnographic Event

Tanaera Green, Silvia Shenouda, Tania Flores

Question 6

6.a Which organization structures supported strong note taking? 

6.a Everyone takes notes differently. Our group believes that a mixture is needed in order to master note taking. However, jotting allows you to be quick and get the information that you need down on paper. They are notes that trigger memories, in a language that you can understand. You can recall these memories on hand and then give information in greater detail at a later time. For example, group 1 in the jottings analysis was bullet points with single words (or a few) whereas in the headnotes, this same person was able to expand and write a full paragraph in greater detail. Six out of the ten participants used the bullet point tactic.

6.b Which strategies worked in the different kinds of notes?

In jotting, the bullet point strategy seemed to work best because it was important keywords that incorporated full ideas and gave allowance to expansion in the later organization structures (for example, #9 in the jotting analysis).

In headnotes, the paragraph strategy seemed to work best because it allowed for more detail and a higher level of organization. This level of higher organization can be seen through the chronological order of the paragraphs as can be seen in example #7 of the headnotes analysis. In this example, we are able to see the higher level of detail.

In observations, the strategies that worked best were shorter style paragraphs in narrative form. This form of organization allowed for notes and observations about everybody else which included their feelings. For example, example #2 in the observation analysis stated how (s)he felt cramped in the classroom which did not lead to successful interaction between the participants. Another example is #6 of the observation analysis which stated that everyone in the classroom was nervous including the note taker. These types of notes were not present in the previous strategies.

6.c When did note takers tend to look close in – and when far back? 

Note takers tend to take a closer look in the observation strategy because they expanded on the keywords by including larger forms of writing. In these paragraphs and narratives, the note takers not only included basic information about what happened, but they included their feelings and the feelings (at least from their perspective) of everybody else.

The jotting note taking seemed to take a look from a far back perspective because it was not filled with specific information. It was taken from a generalized perspective. They used keywords such as names, items, colors and places. This was a method used to write down what you would forget (example #7 of jotting) but it did not convey full ideas to anyone else reading these notes.

 

6.d How did the note taker ‘perspective shape his/her notes (the details s/he wrote)?

We found that in the observation analysis, note takers used the perspective to shape their notes. For example, in examples #1 and #4 of the observations analysis, they each wrote about the people in the classroom feeling uncomfortable. Taking a closer look at each of the observation examples, we found that nine out of the ten examples included some type of perspective which shaped in large the outcome of those notes.

Ethnographic Fieldnotes

Jottings

• Everyone was confused about what to talk about
• most did not see the point of the activity- awkward
• I heard Silvia talking to Carolina about her job as a prek teacher
• I started up a conversation with Bree who asked if I was a prek teacher. I told her it was Silvia but that I was studying to be a teacher
•   Bree used to run a daycare and never wants to be around children ever again. She is an English major.
•     I talked briefly in one group but moved to another bc I knew Silvia in it
•  I then went to talk to another group but they weren’t really talking
•   I asked a girl if she came from work bc of her formal attire. She did. She works a kay jewelry. I asked her questions about engagement rings. She was excited about the subject.
• I started to talking to Julissa and Danielle who had already started a conversation. I noticed Julissa was wearing a name tag. She works at Wegmans.
• I overheard Julissa and Danielle talking about her being a teacher. I inserted myself into the conversation.  

Headnotes

• At first there were 4 groups formed (front of the class, middle, and back)

Things I remembered later

• conversations were not loud
• random laughs
• I was standing in the middle. 
• people would constantly stop talking and look around to see what everyone else was doing.

Observations about what happened.

• People stayed within steps of where they ended up originally in the walkway
• Some people were talking but many  people were just watching or listening 
• Groups were not moving so the professor then asked us to move around. Without her instructions, people would not have moved. 
• Everyone was self aware since we knew that everyone was observing one another

Shaggy Dog Stories

2. PANDA STORY:

-Immediate punch line
-Only essential information was presented
-Rules of three; eats, shoots, and leaves" (Pandas eat bamboo shoot leaves)
-No prior knowledge

3. STRING STORY:

-Rules of 3
-Rhyming phrase; "Bartender, give me a beer." "I'm sorry, we don't serve strings here"
-Repetition
-Conversation
-Characterization; you get a feel for the string

4. FRIDAY STORY: 

-Dialogue
-Characterization
-Prior use of cultural knowledge "TGIF"... You would need to know that to put it in the correct order

5. LAWYER STORY: 

-Non essential information
-Cultural knowledge; You would need to know the rep that lawyers have (liars) in order to understand
-Dialogue

So... what features do all the jokes have in common?
*They all have characters, conflict, and of course... A PUNCH LINE :)

Research Writing Studies

In terms of writing studies, I want to research the influences behind parent's choice to place their children in a regular classroom setting instead of a bilingual setting. I am currently doing my junior field experience at a bilingual classroom in Elizabeth. The total number of kids is 12 as compared to the kindergarten classroom next door which has 37 total students. Many parents wrote letters requesting that their children be removed from a bilingual education classroom and moved to the regular classroom. I find this of interest because I am an advocate of bilingual education. I would like to research the myths and misconceptions that influence these parents and their decisions to remove their children from bilingual settings. I would also like to research statistics in terms of bilingual education, the students, and the ratios around the nation.