Hahahaha...
Hari ni aku nak tepekkan satu thesis review yang telah membuatkan aku PASS pre-requisite course EDF6801 Qualitative Research yang sangat tapet semester lalu... I am very grateful... Terima kasih Ya Rab untuk ilham pada jam 4 pagi tersebut... Alhamdulillah...
It was a great thesis indeed... Here goes...
Schneider, Kristina (August, 2008). A Qualitative Study of Five Authors of Five Blogs on Training and Development. A thesis written in partial fulfilments of the requirements for the degree of MA in Educational Technology,
As noted in the opening sentence of the thesis, “One of the challenges of working in a profession is keeping current with the field.” The author of this thesis has discussed in great details about her study on professional development and blog as the training and development resource. As observed, much emphasis and care had been given especially in the research design and the report of the qualitative results. In view of its general organisational structure, this thesis is divided into six parts of discussions namely: Background on Professional Development and Blogs in Training and Development including its Research Questions; Literature on the Forms of Professional Development, Social Computing and the Credibility of Blogs; Methodology of the Study; Discussion on the Five Case Studiesin in great details; Analysis and Findings of the Study; and its Conclusions and Recommendations for Further Research. At the end of the thesis, appendices on the questionnaire and the related protocols were attached. The following paragraphs will present a critical analysis of the thesis particularly on the purpose/justification of the study, its design and instrumentation together including its data collection.
To find the broad purpose of the study is not a tough task. It is evident in the final sentence of the introductory paragraph. However, in order to understand the purpose in detail, it requires an extra amount of focus in reading and getting at the whole idea of the study. The purpose of the study is clear as stated on page 17 before the list of research questions; to quote,
Although the issue is most widely raised in the field of journalism, it is also one that concerns blogs in the field of training and development. How do these bloggers determine what to write about? From where do they receive their information? And how do they verify their information? That’s what this study intends to find out.
Therefore, the purpose of the study for this article can be put forth - without prejudice – as very logical, highly convincing and sufficient to prepare the audience [especially for those without strong knowledge on “professional development” and “blogs”] to establish the sense of the relationship between both professional development and trainings with blogs. An analysis of what it means to be a blogger in the field of training and development – edublogger; and also an analysis of the credibility of blogs intended for the training community are discussed in a clear manner. Touché on the evident and praiseworthy efforts in gathering supports and relevant literature for the study. In view of the research questions, the questions posed are highly qualitative in nature. The questions are inquisitive, open-ended and seek to understand the whole situation rather than to direct the study into specific conclusions. Those five research questions (p. 41) are:
1. Who are the bloggers in the field? That is, what motivates them to blog and what qualifications do they believe they bring to the task?
2. What is their purpose in blogging? That is, what do they hope to accomplish? What influence do they hope to achieve, if any?
3. What do professionals in the educational technology who choose to blog choose to write about?
4. How do they select the content to report? How do they verify the content, if at all?
5. What evidence do the bloggers have of their influence?
The questions are posed from the perspective of the blogger i.e. emic perspective and to depart from the above questions, phenomenological qualitative research design was employed by the author.
Upon first reading of the thesis, I was overwhelmed with the usage of the word “blogs”. It has been used extensively throughout the thesis and I was lost in the commonly accepted nature of blogs as a social discourse and their questionable credibility as resources, or the study’s artefacts. However, after repeated reading, the whole discussion of the study could be generated into senses. The author had undeniably given an amount of explanation on efforts to ensure trustworthiness and credibility of the conclusions by using measures such as triangulation (p. 51-52). Context was carefully established in order to provide a clear view on the study of interest.
Salute to the author because it is apparent that she had carried out elaborate efforts in gathering literature on the topics of interest. The list of references is noticeably lengthy. It has, therefore, provided an ample framework for the study. Yet, the author discussed professional development and training in academic endeavour in a humble manner. Focus was given more on edubloggers and the blogs. This is totally relevant because the study itself seeks to understand the phenomenon experienced by the edubloggers through their blogging activities. Though the study is illuminated by a good amount of literature, grounded theory is to be established through four-month cross-case analysis of five case studies and artefact analysis.
This thesis analysis has indeed suggested strong positive reactions towards the study from the eyes of the audience i.e. me myself. The strength of this study was observable in its Chapter 4, in which the author narrated in detail the five cases under study and also Chapter 5, when the author put forth her findings and analysis of the results. These two parts of discussions were interesting readings. The recruitment process of the participants was elaborated. Each of the chosen cases has its background information, analysis of the entries and also its author’s perspective on the blog as derived from an interview. Care has been given to ensure confidentiality and anonymity of the participants.
As for the design and instrumentation of the study, they were emphasised in detail. A working knowledge on qualitative research would be very helpful in understanding the whole design and instrumentation. The research questions matched the research design advanced by the author. The data collection comes from the analysis of the artefacts i.e. the blogs to assess the content and interviews to identify the intentions and motivations of the bloggers. The data was analysed, as mentioned before, through triangulation using two methods from five blogs in order to reduce assumptions (p. 46).
Finally, data collection of this study is to be scrutinised. The author did not give any mentioned on specific dates on which the research instrument was administered. This is understood as the author had to observe all the five blogs’ contents daily until she was exhausted with the data gained. As for the interviews, suitable time was identified because the participants were greatly separated by time zones and geographical spaces. To reiterate the observation made in previous paragraph, a questionnaire was used as the study’s research instrument. However, it is important to highlight that in this study, the word “questionnaire” is not to be misunderstood with the typical questionnaire employed in a quantitative study. Questionnaire in this study refers to the proposed interview guide to be followed. There are eight guiding questions and the 45-60 minutes interview session was recorded.
In summation, this thesis has definitely provided critical mental and intellectual challenges in comprehending its content; yet, with wholesome depth and understanding of the subject matter. This study was highly qualitative in nature that readers of the thesis need to have an amount of knowledge in qualitative study in order to better understand the valuable gist that the thesis could provide. To end, there is a sense of satisfaction and completion after reading the thesis because the study has ventured into unique findings rather than the directed-to-confirm findings. Indeed, as one has been exposed to a qualitative study, the sense of richness and depth is something that might not be compromised with the other statistical laden type of research. An obvious laborious and rigorous data collection methodology yet, with an infinite sense of fulfilment. This is what this selected thesis has achieved.
Bravo!
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