Response 

4/15

The research roundtable this week offered me a great opportunity to work with colleagues and reflect on my own pilot study. To start with, the physical setting of the roundtable was perfect. The casual place, the background noise, the actual roundtable, and the beer, all contributed to an atmosphere that was conducive to unconstrained conversation between fellow student researchers. For me, I was not afraid of talking about something that was in progress and ask what might have been stupid questions. While normally I would hesitate in making suggestion, the setting sort of encouraged me to “offer advice.” Four people in a group made it just as cozy and comfortable to share something that is very, very rough in nature. Yet, I find the casual setting and event very beneficial for student researchers and research in progress. Everyone in the group was ready to be supportive by listening to the concerns and trying to answer questions. I believe I wouldn’t have said the same thing should the event take place in a conference room.

I was able to share some questions I had about my pilot study and the research design. I had always wanted to have someone audit my process of participant recruitment, which I found to be very hard. In my pilot study, I had planned to do an experimental study on teachers’ commentary on second language writing. I planned to have 2 composition teachers to respond to student writing in way to highlight cultural, rhetorical, and larger writing issues and 2 other composition teachers to emphasize the language issues, including grammar, vocab, sentence, and mechanics. Accordingly, I planned to have 2 second language students to evaluate one type of teachers’ commentary and 2 other second language students to evaluate the other type. Meant as an experiment, my original design needed only 8 participants. But the design involved a couple of issues. First, I will need to recruit my colleagues who teach college writing. I wanted to find out if it seemed like an ethical issue for my research colleagues. Second, I was not quite sure about the experiment. Would it represent the actual practices of composition teachers? My colleagues’ response will help me answer the question. Third, I was not certain if second language students may respond to teachers’ comments in similar patterns. My colleagues experience might offer my insights. While I had talked to my second language friends and found that they thought about teachers’ commentary differently, I would benefit from perspectives of colleagues with teaching experiences.

I also needed feedback from fellow student researchers on my revised design and recruitment process, which I carried out prior to the roundtable. In the revised design, I created an artificial essay with multiple language and writing issues. I wanted only student participants who were expected to evaluate each of a list of 23 comments from teachers and answer some extended questions. The design changed the experimental nature of the project to a qualitative study. I received really valuable feedback from colleagues, who pointed out that the artificial sample and the out-of-classroom context might have weakened the validity of the design. One of colleagues also offered a similar setting in the Writing Center. Writing tutors here at Kent State are trained to give different types of comments to students who have different needs. This case made me think that even with second language students, I cannot assume that they have the same concerns about their writing and expect the same from teacher’s commentary. My initial findings proved the case to be consistent with second language students.

While I receive value feedback on my own design, I also benefit from thinking about various issues in colleagues’ research. Our group touched on such important issues as entry into the research site, the contention between confidentiality and researcher’s positionality, and disciplinary concerns in research design. These issues provided an opportunity for me rethink about my design. I was led to ask other important questions about my project: How should I connect the research with the major disciplinary concerns? How does the project look like to intended journals? How should I incorporate the actual classroom practices to increase validity? And how can I recruit second language students efficiently and ethically?