Recently I presented to my fellow postgraduates on the benefits of doing a pilot study during the initial stages of a PhD study. A pilot study can take many guises but usually refers to the study of the practicalities and feasibility of certain components of the proposed study. […]
ABSTRACT This working paper reports on the preliminary findings of a PhD study which examines the nature of the digital literacy practices that arise when an adult learner (Sara) in a UK Further Education college completes writing assignments for her course. Drawing on the concept of ‘literacy events’ […]
A while back Chris Bigum drew my attention to the delegation of work to machines in activity. Now that my doctoral pilot study is over, I have had the time to mull over some of my data, present, and write on it. Whilst literacies are best understood as […]
I’m hoping to start a pilot for my classroom ethnographic study very soon, and Heath and Street’s primer has been an excellent guide to preparation for an ethnographic study. Whilst my pilot will be a ‘light touch’ version of my doctoral study, it is important for me to […]
I just got back from a two day course by Vitae on “How to be an effective researcher for postgraduate researchers”. It was fun. And a few activities really left me intrigued. One such activity was a role play with one person behaving as a supervisor and the […]
Bateson (1972) draws our attention to the relationship between man and his tools. He asks: “Suppose I am a blind man, and I use a stick…Is my mental system bounded at the handle of the stick? Is it bounded by my skin? Does it start halfway up the […]
Having scoped the literature, although not completely exhaustively, a conclusion that can be drawn from the mass of differing evidence seen is that research outcomes appear to be dependent on their particular contexts and specific methodologies employed in each case. Whether writers – both skilled and un-skilled – […]
