qualitative research 研究方法

Methodology

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This study is set in the qualitative research paradigm as defined by Strauss and

Corbin (1990) to refer to research about “persons’ lives, stories, behaviour…organizational

functioning, social movements or interactional relationships” (p.17).

The methods used in this

study were influenced by the constructs

of grounded theory where the purpose is to “reveal

participants’ views, feelings, intentions, and actions as well as the contexts and structures of their

lives” (Charmaz, 2006, p.26) in order

to form ideas from the data. That is, my goal was to

understand the writing challenges for students from the perspectives of both students and

instructors and in doing so, I needed to consider the social, individual and educational factors

that contribute

d to the participants’ opinions.

I chose interviews as my main data gathering instrument, as according to Creswell (1997),

these “play a central role in the data collection in a grounded theory study” (p.122) and I relied

on emergent design, integral to

a grounded theory study (Charmaz, 2006), where “one begins

with an area of study and what is relevant to that area is allowed to emerge” (

Strauss & Corbin,

1990, p.23), to design a set of questions that served as a guide for conducting semi-structured

interviews with the participants (see Appendix 1 and 2). The interview questions followed the

participants’ train of thought and at times, wandered from the pre

-scripted questions I had

prepared.

Participants

All participants in this qualitative study were situated at a medium sized Canadian

University within the Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences. They included five second year

individual students, a group of nine first year students and five professors. My sampling of

participants was strategic, as is suggested by Geisler (2004) to be a more defensible means

(rather than merely convenient sampling) with which to “guide (my) choice of cases within a

site” (p.18). I first used criterion

-

based sampling that “specif(ied) a certain relevant criteria”

(Geisler, 2004, p.18), in choosing the study participants. Thus, the student participants were

drawn from first and second year, which enabled me to acquire perceptions from first year

students on their current experiences and comparative reflections from second year students on

their experiences with academic writing in the first and second year. The professors are

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instructors of both first year seminars and regular first year courses, which are described below.

This duality provided an opportunity to gather data

on their perceptions of students’ writing

needs from each of these classroom environments.

After choosing the samples based on these criteria, I then used a stratified sampling

strategy to “take advantage of knowing something about the existing variations

in a site” (Geisler,

p.18) and chose both student and instructor participants from a variety of disciplines. This choice

allowed me to compare the perceptions of professors and students on a disciplinary basis. Further

stratifying amongst the second year students based on varying first year experiences allowed for

examination of a variety of pedagogical environments that could affect first year students’

writing ability. These experiences included enrollment in one of the following:

(1) First Year Experience, which is an innovative attempt to facilitate the transition for first year

students to university by providing smaller classes (maximum 100 students) that are enmeshed in

a cluster of four pre-

determined courses and then a fifth course of the student’s

choice

(2) First year seminar, either within or outside of the FYE, which provides an even smaller

environment of approximately 25 students where the instructor is expected to provide greater

focus on writing development.

(3) Mandatory writing course, which is established as one semester of an English literature

course.

(4) Academic Support Program, which provides the opportunity for university study to students

whose high school grades were below the acceptable standard.

(5) Regular first year course, which does not have any particular focus on writing and in this

study, may have up to 100 students enrolled.

The study participants and programs of study are identified by a pseudonym in this

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thesis for the purposes of maintaining confidentiality. The participants are described as follows:

Student Participants.

“I mean even if I get a good mark I think that anytime you get a mark less

than perfect there has to be a comment or else why didn’t you get perfect?”

(March 25, 2009).

Alana is 19 years old and English is her first language. Her major is Human Rights and her

minor is Mass Communications. Alana is more interested in Mass Communications than Human

Rights and plans to switch her major accordingly for next year. Alana was an above average

student in high school where she was on the honour roll for two years. Her grades were lower in

math and the sciences than in the arts or social science courses as she claimed “they (those

subjects) just came easier to me.” Both of her parents have university degre

es and they

encouraged her to go to university. Alana described herself as an active reader who enjoys

reading popular fiction in her spare time. In addition to reading, Alana is a competitive dancer,

works as a server in a restaurant and is a volunteer with a local youth organization. Alana was

selected for this study as she had participated in a mandated first year writing course at the

university she previously attended.

“I think it’s (writing) one of the cornerstones of education in university”

(February 25,

2009). Ryan is 20 years old and English is his second language, which he began learning at the

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age of 7. His major is History and his minor is Applied Language Studies. He described himself

as a motivated student who is interested in learning about the discipline of history. Ryan

described his high school academic experience as “pretty good” and he did not perceive any

major problems adapting from high school to university. Both of his parents have university

degrees and they expected him to go to university. Ryan enjoys reading, particularly fiction,

listening to music, boxing, working out at the gym, camping, cycling, reading the news and

surfing the Internet. Ryan was chosen for this study as he participated in a first year seminar

outside of the First Year Experience program.

“I expect the professors to give a very clear definition of what their expectations are so

that I’m not going off in a direction that won’t be beneficial towards the end product”

(February

26, 2009). Danielle is 39 years old and both English and French are her first languages. Her

major is Political Science and her minor is Religion. She is a highly motivated student and

anticipated that a background in political science would give her a better knowledge base from

which to understand the historical component of present day political issues and the Religion

courses would help her to understand the perspectives of other people’s cultures. Danielle was an

average achieving student in high school and did not find it very challenging. Her mother did not

finish high school and her father completed one year of college. Her parents are impressed and

supportive of Danielle’s decision to return to school. Danielle enjoys reading, particularly books

of a philosophical nature. When

she’s not a full time student during the academic year, Danielle

is an officer in the Canadian Forces, specifically in the field of logistics for the army where she

engages in military training during the summer months. Danielle was selected for this study as

she participated in a first year seminar within the First Year Experience program.

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“She kinda directed us through it and showed…like…this is one of the perfect papers, we

didn’t really go over it in detail but she definitely gave us access”

(February 27, 2009). Paul is

22 years old and English is his first language. He took two years off between high school and

university and now feels highly motivated to be in school. His major is philosophy, which he

believes he is well suited for as he claims this discipline allows him the freedom to argue his

opinions rather than regurgitating facts. Paul enjoys school and is intending to do graduate work

in this discipline. Paul was not a high achieving student in high school due to lack of motivation

and is grateful that his teachers encouraged him to go to university. His parents were also

encouraging, as his father, who has a university degree and his mother, who is in the midst of

attaining one, both value higher education. Paul enjoys reading for interest but is consumed with

academic reading during the school year. He also plays guitar and video games, enjoys on-line

chatting and hanging out with friends. Paul was selected for this study as he was enrolled in the

First Year Experience program in first year but did not take a first year seminar.

“First year was harder, obviously, and I didn’t have that much to go on…because in high

school you don’t do anything, you really don’t”

(March 14, 2009). Sarah is 19 years old and her

first language is English although she was living in an Arabic speaking environment for the first

two years of her life. Her major is Sociology, which she does not seem to have much interest in.

She feels there is too much of a focus on writing assignments, which she finds cumbersome and

research methods, which she finds boring. She intends to stay with Sociology as she does not

know what else to do. Sarah was not motivated in high school and her performance reflected that.

Her parents, who both have university degrees, were very supportive of Sarah going to university.

Sarah enjoys reading, drawing, painting, playing guitar, editing online music videos and hanging

out with friends. She was selected for this study as she participated in the Academic Support

Program for first year.

In addition to the identified second year students, there was a focus group of nine First

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Year Experience students in a first year seminar (in English) who participated in an open

discussion within the context of their classroom. Initially, I was to observe this class during

regular class instruction but their professor had suggested that I conduct an open discussion with

the students about their writing needs. She had offered this opportunity as the students had

completed their writing assignments for the year and therefore, she did not anticipate much

relevant discussion in her class regarding writing instruction.

Faculty Participants. The professors range in teaching experience from five to twenty- five years

and in the disciplines of English, Philosophy, Language Studies, Psychology and History. They

all currently teach first year students both within first year seminars and outside. In addition,

four of the five participants have also taught these seminars within the First Year Experience

program.

Data

The university ethics committee approved this study and I prepared and had completed

consent forms for the participants. The data gathering instruments used in this study included: (1)

interviews, (2) class discussion, and (3) samples of students’ academ

ic writing. Pre-designed

questions guided the interviews and class discussion, yet the semi-structure nature of the

interviews allowed for divergences as necessary (see interview questions in Appendix 1 and 2).

The writing samples that were used included two graded papers from each second year

student; one they had written in first year and one in second year, which facilitated our

discussion on their writing styles, changes to their writing that may have occurred between first