June 1st Class (Please post your reflections and questions under this topic)

Dear All,

I have uploaded tomorrow's readings to baidu pan. Please feel free to download.

If you have any other questions regarding quantitative research and data analysis, feel free to aks me anytime. I might not have answers sometime, but this would be a great opportunity for us to learn something together.

I really enjoyed Peter's class today. Learned a lot. Hope it is beneficial for you as well. Thank you.

Best,
Wendy

Class 3
Reflection
In today’s class, we are overwhelmed with so much pretty new and of course informative knowledge about qualitative research. We began with discussing what is qualitative research and it’s characteristics. Then I got to know several methodologies of qualitative research such as ethnography, conversation analysis and some methods of data collection such as observation, interviews and recordings, etc.
Qualitative research is totally different from quantitative research. Qualitative is just like a kind of exploration and inquiry where you may find a new focus during it while quantitative research is a process of testing and verification.
And thanks for Wendy’s detailed explanation of t-test and ANOVA. Now I clearly know what is t-test and ANOVA and their difference.

Question
In quantitative research, we usually need to analyze statistics, and in qualitative research taking the article we have discussed as example, there are just descriptions. Does that mean qualitative research doesn’t need any statistics analysis?
What kind of factors should we consider when we design an interview?

Reflections:
Today, the focus of the lecture was mainly on qualitative research. Instead of answering our puzzles at the beginning of the lecture, Peter started with characteristics of qualitative research by providing some key words, and we worked in groups to define the key words through our own understandings towards the paper. And then two qualitative research traditions in SLA were introduced, namely ethnography and conversation analysis. We can make a comparison between these two traditions from the aspect of data collection and data analysis. What’s more, Peter analyzed another paper to show an example of conducting a research in academic English. Lastly, Wendy answered our puzzles of yesterday’s lecture, which I think is the highlighting part of today’s lecture. She adopted good examples to help us differentiate t-test and ANOVA and then applied the process of explaining to the paper, from which I learned a lot and felt less confused than yesterday. My heartfelt thanks go to Wendy and Peter!

Question:
Qualitative research may use a sample of convenience, in which participants are selected because they are accessible to the researcher. So I’d like to ask under the circumstances, how can researchers generate the authenticity and validity? Thank you very much.

In today’s lecture, we mainly learned the qualitative research and analysis. Firstly, we read the article of Friedman(2012) in pairs, from which we got rich information on the 8 characteristics of the qualitative research. Secondly, two qualitative research traditions in SLA were mentioned in this article: ethnography and conversation analysis. Lastly, Wendy gave us a very detailed and clear explanation on t-test and ANOVA. I really harvested a lot.
Question: Would you talk more on the application of other aspects of SPSS, such as nonparametric tests, pearson correlation, multiple-regression, Cronbach’s Alpha, factor analysis?

What I have learnt today:
To select a research topic, one needs to be interest in it and be able to do it.
Different researcher has different ways to present statistics.
T-test: compare means of two groups
Independent t-test:
Between group: two groups, different participants.
Paired sample t-test:
Within-group: pre-test, post-test same participants.

ANOVA: compare means of more than two groups
One way ANOVA: between groups
One dependent variable and one independent variable.
One way repeated ANOVA measure: within groups
Pre-test, post-test

Question: Can we have a small lecture of the common data processing methods and their applications?
Best,
Doris

Today’s lecture is mainly about qualitative research, what is qualitative research, characteristics of qualitative research, and three SLA research traditions, while our focus was on two of them: ethnography and CA, their background, basic principles, data collection and data analysis procedures. In the next article we read , the notion of individual network of practice was introduced in analyzing academic socialization in L2 context ,and it is an good exemplar of qualitative research.
Then Wendy helped solving the puzzles left from last class. Her elaboration on both T-test and ANOVA was explicit and informative and we really appreciated that.
Question: In CA analysis, the data collected was transcribed in great detail, the minor phenomenon like intake of breath and eye gaze was taken into consideration, how does these factors affect the result?

Reflection:
Thanks to Wendy’s explanation in class, I have better understanding about T-test and ANOVA since then. Today’s lecture focused on qualitative study, which I used to consider as easier ways to carry out. However, after reading the literature and the discussion in class, it appeared that this way of research is more complex than I thought in that information should be recorded and described in high level of detail and it usually lasts for a long period of time. During the qualitative research, it is worth mentioning that the presence of the researcher should also be involved in “context”.

Question:
Would you please share with us your experience on conducting a quantitative or qualitative research? What problems did you meet?

Reflection of the 3rd day:
Today’s class give me some useful idea in the design of the qualitative researches, and the way of helping us to better understand the key points or some generalized methods is really good, I can closely follow the step.besides, Wendy’s explanation is rather clear and lucid, it is sure that she has done a lot of preparation. Then, some ideas of today:
1. Conversation analysis is a much more complicated research method than I expected, and it really involves numerous sorts of data.so be careful when decide to use it.
2. We can combine some old theories so as to get some new ideas.
Qs: what is real difference between insiders and outsiders? Or are there any fixed standards to differentiate these two?

In today’s class, we learned a lot about the research methods through Wendy’s teaching. It is better to listen to some basic introduction about the research methods before we analysis the paper and do some assessments. The combination of the basic theories and practice would be better for us to learn the thesis research methods. The research analysis of each time should be combined with the introduction of research method.
Question: What factors should we consider when we collect data?

Reflection:
I had learnt some basic definition and characteristics of qualitative research today, and I found out that a systematic method of data collection and data analysis may influent the research result a lot. And according to the sample thesis in class, I acquired that in the field of linguistics, there are so many issues we have to concern about, the data we collected have to make sense. And thanks to Wendy, I can have a clear mind of ANOVA and T-Test.

Question:
Questionnaire is a common method we used in the academic research, so what are the key factors we have to pay attention to before we starting to design it?

Reflections:
Today's lecture is about a totally new research method-qualitative research, which is quite different from what we have learnt yesterday about quantitative research. At the beginning of the class, we are required to read an article named How to Collect and Analyze Qualitative Data, in which i have learnt some basic knowledge of qualitative research, such as its characteristics, background and traditions in SLA like case study, ethnography and conversation analysis. Among the three traditions, I used to be ignorant of ethnography and conversation analysis. But after group discussion and peter's explanation, i have gotten a general idea about these two approaches and their differences. Besides, in Wendy's part, I have also learnt a lot about T-test and ANOVA, their differences and their appications in real experiment. It is really helpful. Much thanks to Peter as well as Wendy~~

In today's class, I have a better understanding of qualitative research through Peter's instruction of characteristics of qualitative research and methods of data collection and data analysis in doing ethnography and conversation analysis research. Again, I find the group discussion is a good way to organize the class and we each group can share our thoughts on the topics. Thank Wendy for giving us a better understanding of ANOVA and T-Test.
For conversation analysis, there are some articles that approach the topic from the perspective of pragmatics, so I want to know what's the difference between researches from these two different angles?

Dear Peter,

Today we gained some basic knowledge about qualitative research, including characteristics, background and traditions in SLA research. It is helpful to introduce the terms and other necessary information with real samples. Now I have a clearer picture of methodologies of qualitative study.

I have a question. In Friedman’s article, observer’s paradox is mentioned. It is said that one way to deal with this problem is to take the observer as one feature in an analysis. Can you explain this solution in detail? In addition, I think this still doesn’t answer the question how to mitigate the stress of participants. I mean it is still hard for researchers like us to investigate the real state of mind of foreign participants for various reasons.

Best,
Lucy.

Dear Peter,
In today's class, we talked about qualitative research and analysis in detail. Then we look into the characteristics of ethnographic research and the methodology related to it, whoch is of great help for us. Then we discussed discourse analysis and issues related to the methodology. I really appreciate it. Thanks a lot!!
Best,
Evelyn

Hey, Peter!
Actually, it is a new class with new knowledge, you introduced enthography and conversation analysis to us. I have learned about their features and difference. What's more, we have some understanding of qualitative research. I am quite interested in classroom observation.
When Wendy talked with me, she told me a very insteresting experience, that you asked students to do field research: go to a restaurant and observe people there, then write down what kind of information they have got. maybe I can have a try like this.
So, if I want to do a field note, what kind of topic or direction that you think is valuable?
Good night!