Who me - a researcher?

On Wednesday 11 Sept, Jair, Radford and myself had an informal, meandering but interesting conversation about what it means to do research and become a researcher. We were reflection on our reading of the chapter 'Thinking in Print' in the book - The craft of research (Booth, Colomb & Williams, 2008). The chapter attempts to introduce students to the field and activity of academic or scientific research. The chapter gently invites students to join the community. Like in the chapter we all acknowledged that we have already undertaken many 'research' activities in our daily lives, from searching for a new car, TV or smart phone.

But we also tried to tease out what makes academic and scientific research, like the type masters students are expected to undertaken, different. Some of the pillar of scientific research outlined in the chapter includes; being trustworthy, tested, evidence-based (not only opinions), published (thus written), follows processes and procedures that validate and verify information gathered and the critical disposition taken on the topic.

Going Forward

We agreed that the focus of our discussions and activities in the MICT Writers' Circle over the next four weeks would be on the WRITING the RESEARCH PROPOSAL. Below is an outline of the session topics for the remaining weeks of this semester:

Sept 25 - What is a research proposal? 

• Share different formats, discuss what information to include, short demonstration on using Mendeley

Oct 2    - Working through the elements of the proposal

• Topic, problem statement, research objectives

Oct 16  - Working through the elements of the proposal

• Research Design / Research Methodology
• Constructing Research Questions

Oct 23  - Creating coherence in your proposal

• Fine-tuning the writing, language and style

Next Session - Wednesday 11 Sept 2019 - The research proposal

Welcome back to the final term of the academic year. It feels as if we are racing non-stop to the academic year-end finish line, which is just six weeks away.

I've had a few requests to put the research proposal on the agenda. On Wednesday I would like to discuss this idea and also present an informal outline of how we can tackle this topic over the next few weeks we have together.

To kick-start this learning trajectory, I'd like to share a short but incredibly stimulating reading about the uses of research and why its so important that we 'write' research reports. Find the reading here - The craft of research - Chapter One 'Thinking in Print'. On Wednesday let's discuss and share our insights about this very informative and short chapter. Also bring along any other pressing writing related matters you think the whole group could benefit from discussing.

Looking forward to seeing you all!

Writing an Introduction for an assignment - working with a 4-part approach

Yesterday the group experimented with a four-part approach for writing Introductions. After a short recap of the main functions that Introductions serve, especially in academic assignment writing, participants were asked to 'try-out' a four-part writing approach. This consists of a hook, focus on topic, thesis statement, structure of essay. Each element of this approach represents a clue or signal about the type of information that should be provided to the reader of the Introduction. More details and examples of how this might work can be found on the Writing Elements page of this blog.

A brief summary of the activities completed in the circle is also available here

Next week is the mid-term recess, so our next circle will take place on Wednesday 11 September at 4:30pm. Topics currently up for discussion are: giving and receiving feedback in an academic setting; writing thesis statements, working with paragraphs.

Enjoy the short break and happy, productive writing!

Introductions, Introduction - strategies to write them - 28 August 2019

In our next session on Wednesday 28 August 2019 we will be exploring different writing strategies that can be used to craft an Introduction for an essay or assignment. The session will be hands-on and participants will be asked to experiment and try-out specific approaches to writing an Introduction. Bring along drafts of any assignment you are currently working on, and use the session to creatively play-around with the writing of your Introduction.

Come prepared to write, share your writing, give some feedback and hopefully become more confident in writing the all important Introduction to your assignment. 

Understanding what your assignment expects of you

In our session on 14 August 2019 we worked with a strategy for unpacking assignments. The importance of having a thorough understanding of what was expected from the assignment was stressed. 

Students used a sample assignment and then subjected the assignment to the following question as a way of gaining clarity on what they might be required to do:

1. Instruction verbs – discuss, evaluate, assess, review, compare
2. Topic
3. Specific aspects of the topic – qualify or narrow down the topic
4. Restrictions imposed on the topic – limiting your discussion
5. Technical instructions – word count, layout, format, submission deadlines/requirements

We also discussed the purpose, function and work Introductions need to do. Again we used a few sample Introductions from the recent journal articles and tried to analyse them  and identify their specific purpose and function. Students were asked to try and identify WHAT functions or work the Introduction they read were doing. We used some guideline questions by Creme and Lea (2008). 

A key objective of this exercise was to raise students’ awareness of the work Introductions need to do. 

NEXT SESSION: 28 August 2019

In our next session we will work in a more concrete way with different writing strategies that you can employ when writing Introductions for your assignments. Because next week is BLOCK WEEK 2, we will only be meeting again on 28 August 2019.

Watch this blog space for a reminder and some instructions about what to bring long.

Next session - Assignments and Introductions

The next session of the MICT Writers' Circle will take place on Wednesday 14 August, 4:30pm, LENSLab.

We will focus our discussion on unpacking your assignment briefs and also look at the purpose and structure of, the all important, Introduction, in academic writing. 

Introductions and unpacking reading in IT

Lynn's annotations of the journal article

The MICT writers' circle held its first session yesterday afternoon. After some short introductions and welcoming a few students who unfortunately were unable to attend the residential block last week, we launched into a somewhat meandering, but interesting, conversation about our reading and writing practices.

Thanks to Radford, who shared two pages of a journal article he was currently reading, we were able to do a mini-analysis of the form the language and writing. We were interested in gaining a deeper understanding of how such insight could help us make decisions about the merits of the article, evaluate its usefulness (for example, was it better to read it after gaining a better understanding of the topic, or would the article provide basic and introductory information about the topic), or learn about how the writing style, its order and sequencing was helping the authors communicate their ideas.
This short activity became the spring-board for some lively conversations about journal publication, how different disciplines understood or used common words or phrases (e.g. critical discourse analysis), different expectations that  supervisors have of students' writing, the function of an Introduction, differences between journal articles and books and the writing demands of the thesis vs journal article and how this might shape the structure and form of an Introduction.

NEXT TIME
14 August 2019 we will look at the requirements of your first assignments. Another topic everyone was keen to discuss is writing The Introduction.