Category Archives: Potential papers

Rumpus research

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Research question: ‘In what ways is the Covid-19 pandemic changing understandings of the relationships between learning and fun?’

A limited case study of a research group in a UK university. We expect our findings to have implications beyond that group.

Data collection using epistolary interviews (via email – one question per email, enabling thoughtful responses that can build over time) with everyone in the research group who wants to take part. Participation is voluntary and participants can drop out at any time.

Questions for epistolary interviews:

  • What have been your main experiences of learning and teaching during the Covid-19 pandemic?
  • What have been your main experiences of fun during the Covid-19 pandemic?
  • How has learning and teaching changed (if at all) during the Covid-19 pandemic? In your answer, please take into account your own perspective and the wider perspective.
  • How have you experienced fun changing (if at all) during the Covid-19 pandemic? In your answer, please take into account your own perspective and the wider perspective.
  • How has your understanding of the relationship between fun and learning/teaching changed (if at all) during the Covid-19 pandemic?
  • In what ways (if any) do you think the relationship between learning and fun will change after the Covid-19 pandemic?

Method:

According to Yin (who I like following for case study research because he has a clear structure to work to) there are five important components of case study design.

  1. Five components of a case-study research design are particularly important
  2. Its questions (see above)
  3. Its propositions, if any (Prop 1- there is a relationship between learning and fun. Prop 2 – this relationship will be highlighted during the pandemic Prop 3- this relationship may be changed by the pandemic and some of these changes can be foreseen)
  4. Its unit(s) of analysis (individual members of the research group)
  5. The logic linking the data to the propositions (data are collected from people who have reflected on the relationship between learning and fun and who have thought deeply by what is meant by fun and by learning. Also we engage in fun and learning. Also we are influenced by the pandemic)
  6. The criteria for interpreting the findings (thematic analysis to support explanation building, themes drawn from the data but also compared with existing frameworks of fun that were covered in our frameworks of fun paper. Interpretations are originally drawn together by one or two of us but are checked against the understandings of all participants. This is a reflexive case study and this phase of comparing understandings will enrich the analysis)

 

Why reviewers/editors reject articles

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Notes from a workshop on ‘Writing for peer-reviewed journals’ run by Pat Thomson.

Reasons why reviewers and editors say they reject articles:

  • Lack of focus – saying everything, focusing on nothing, cramming too much in one article
  • Not locating the contribution and the position – for a particular audience, in relation to wider debates. the specific conversation int his journal
  • Poor organisation – not guiding the reader, poor headings, not enough signposts, too many signposts
  • Failing to convince the reader – does not adequately deal with the methodology
  • Not significant – too local, done a lot, doesn’t add anything
  • Sounding like a n00b rather than an equal – assumes significance, sounds tentative, overclaims

Journal impact

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I’ve spent the day looking at the impact factor of various journals.

The ISI Web of Knowledge lists 1985 social science journals (according to a workshop I attended recently, only about 15% of education journals are in ISI). The ‘Annual Review of Psychology’ comes in top for 2008, with an annual impact factor of 16.217.

The impact factor is obtained by looking at all articles in the journal over the last two years (2006-7), and all citations of those articles in 2008. Divide the citations by the article and you get the impact factor. So if, on average, every article was cited once in 2008, you get an impact factor of 1. If every article was cited twice, you get an impact factor of 2. If only half your articles were cited, you get 0.5.

Of the social science journals that are listed (and many of them are not), 1685 have impact scores of less than two. On the bright side, there are 300 journals out there where your article will, on average, be cited twice a year. I’m assuming that this means it will be cited in one of the 1985 journals listed in the social science section of the ISI web of science – but I can’t find that information on the site.

Social science, though, is a broad field. Educational technology journals in which I am likely to publish tend to attract fewer than two citations per article. ‘Computers & Education’ is the honourable exception, It comes in at 244 on the list, with an impact factor of 2.19. I’d be better off becoming an expert in psychology, psychology or marketing. Education doesn’t really make it into the list until no 75, with the US Journal ‘Educational Psychologist’.

Does it matter? It does in two ways. First, the REF will be looking at impact – so we are increasingly being encouraged to go for quality, not quantity. Don’t just publish; publish in the top-rated journals. Second, I like to think that my work could/will have impact. I’m not convinced that the best way to achieve that impact is through journals (two citations a year may not be as good as five links in a blog or ten retweets on an education list). However, given that my career prospects rest, in part, on my publication record, it makes sense to prioritise the journals with the most impact.

So, I’ve sketched out some potential articles and where I might publish them. The list is significantly different from the one I had this morning when I started looking at impact factors. I may not end up writing these articles – I may not end up publishing what I write in these journals – but their impact rating is definitely affecting my thinking about what and where to publish.

Applied Linguistics (2.22)
Building knowledge in the short term
Computers and Ed (2.19)
Methodology paper
JCMC (1.9)
Building knowledge in the long term
Discourse Studies (1.16)
Avoiding disputational talk
JCAL (1.06)
Interaction on distance-learning courses
BJET (1.04)
SL paper
Improving Schools
School Visions
Learning, Media and Technology
Young users of Web 2.0
JIME
Epistolary interviews – research ethics

Writing for publication

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Researchers write all the time, writing is the means through which we work on and work out our ideas. We don’t just write up – we have not found a transparent truth which we then just put into words. Writing is a representation – we make choices and what we choose to write is a situated approximation.

In writing an article we are advancing what we know and also producing a representation of it. We are not just producing a text, we are producing ourselves as scholars — we are doing identity work.

Rhetorically, we are producing persuasive texts that persuade the reader that what we have done is a contribution to knowledge. The genre of the journal article is an argument. Research writing is dialogic. There are internal conversations which invite readers to make meaning. Don’t make it like a laundry list. Invite the reader in to make meaning. Encourage readers to make associations with other conversations (mainly through references).

When looking at a journal, consider the editorial board. Would you like to meet them and have a conversation with them? Look at recent issues. Which conversations are going on? Do you want to engage with them? Why do people need to know about what you are writing about – this gives a method of selecting a journal. What is the readership and what do they already know? This helps to create a space for your article. Significance is so what and now what? What’s new? What’s different? What does this add to the conversation? Don’t let other scholars do all the talking in your article. Refer to them, but don’t be overpowered by them.

The strongest papers usually have one point to make. They make that point powerfully, with evidence, and they locate that point within the orevious literature.

Can you do an elevator pitch on your article?

Palindrome Intermedia performance group

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You can see them in action at http://www.palindrome.de/

We had two performances by this group, who use motion tracking software and a host of other gadgetry to foreground the ways in which human conversation involves a host of other things beside words. Eye motions, body position, movement, they’re all involved.

So sound and dance and movement and visuals are all brought together. And it looks good. On paper.

Can’t say I took much from it, except a reinforced consciousness of how many real world cues are lost when you move online. On the other hand, they’re probably replaced by a host of other cues. There’s a paper in there somewhere about the myriad social cues available in an online conference.

I’m going to create a new blog category – papers that could be written and I’ll never get round to…