Research as Inquiry

Research as Inquiry

An investigation of the social networking behaviour of grade 9 high school learners at john ramsay senior secondary school.

Learning Outcomes;
1) Learners will have intellectual curiosity in developing questions and learning new investigative methods.
2) Learners will understand where to go to look for appropriate or relevant help
3) Learners will be able to do introspection and uncover their poor social networking activities and he given the tools to improve it.

Activity 1: Seek divergent perspectives during information gathering and assessment. In this activity learners will explore the various ways in which a person can investigate. They will also via means of proper research conduct interviews, questionnaires, etc. So divided into groups each group will go on school computers with internet access and go on sites with information varying research methods. Knowledge Practice: Use a variety of research methods, based on need, circumstance, and type of inquiry

Activity 2): Learners will be given 30 minutes to draw a concept map stemming from the topic and discuss their findings. By creating or drawing this concept map learners will be exposed to finding new ways to search for information, eg. Different concepts may assist in broadening search strategies for a particular topic. A concept map for laptops might bring up notebooks and so allow a researcher to look up information on notebooks or various other synonyms. Knowledge Practice: Deal with complex research by breaking complex questions into simple ones, limiting the scope of investigation, conducting a series of investigations, and performing subsequent steps.

Activity 3): Learners will do 30 minutes of research on the topic of Social Networking, Social Networks, its origins, and how it was initially aimed to be used for and see the gap between its purpose and how they use it. And cite 3 different media sources. Knowledge practices: synthesize ideas gathered from multiple sources, use research appropriately to make decisions and take action, practice self-reflection and meta-cognition.

Information Literacy 'Research as Inquiry

The frame ‘Research as inquiry’ focuses or mainly surrounds the notion that there must always be questions asked. Questions form the main part of research, there can never be research, or new work done if there isn’t a question or questions. And constantly asking questions relates to inquiry based learning.

In this class I learned that research is iterative (a process of back and forth). This means basically that research or asking questions leading to research is basically a process of going back and forth. Eg. A friend says to you ‘tap water that we drink in South Africa is unsafe or unhygienic to drink’. Being an academic, or having an inquisitive mind you don’t just take things at face value and decide to do a bit of research on this topic. Let’s say for interest sake (This is just an example I haven’t done research to either support or disprove this phenomenon) that this is false but research uncovers that this is taking place in other places and one decides to investigate this and ask why isn’t anything being done by the governing body of that state. And this leads to political reasons as to why and why not and this takes us to economics and so on.

Experts recognise the collaborative effort within a discipline to extend the knowledge in that field. Many times this process includes points of disagreement where debate and dialogue work to deepen the conversations around knowledge. And as such one discipline learns or implements concepts or ideas from another discipline to broaden the depth of that discipline.

It extends beyond the academic world; it’s not just people holding high end degrees but also the lay person. People who have personal needs, or individuals trying to solve a community problem.  An example of a societal need that was seen is The Rylands-Gatesville Civic Association that was successfully launched this year, it was started to try and help with the fight against gangsterism, robberies, drugs and so forth. A societal need observed over a long period and someone (Sataar Parker) took the initiative to do something about it.

The frame deals also with the way a research questions are structured or formed in order to get answers. And it deals with identifying and finding the gaps in knowledge.

This frame explains or basically tells us that gaining new knowledge leads to asking new questions. And so it ends with the example that I gave earlier where the one friend tells the other friend about the impurities of tap water in South Africa and that leading to research and then new questions are formed and asked and researched and so the process is repeated and repeated.

 http://www.inspiredteaching.org/wp-content/uploads/impact-research-briefs-inquiry-based-teaching.pdf

Scholarship as Conversation Assignment

Choose a topic or research project for your students (1)

Investigate if parents should be allowed to censor literature in schools?

(This topic addresses current issues of parents who find it offensive for various reasons for their children to be exposed to content that they find isn't suitable for them. Religious reasons in most cases are chief among them.)

Draft three learning outcomes (3)

After today’s class learners must be able to discuss the advantages and disadvantages of parent involvement.

Learners should be able to describe the most common concerns regarding censorship 

Learners should be able to tell the difference between censorship/over-reacting/freedom of speech (involves the right to learn all the information and form an opinion).

Design three activities (3)

Show how each activity relates to a ‘knowledge practice’ or ‘disposition’ (3)

Activity 1: Give an oral account on what was learned. (Learners are to go out and read up on the topic of 'Censorship' and then present what they found to the class Knowledge Practice: not having a fluency in the language and process of a discipline dis-empowers their ability to  participate and engage. So by knowing what censorship is about and what it is not would help a person’s confidence when speaking about the concept.

Activity 2: Design a Role-playing activity. In order to assist the kids in understanding the concept or topic mentioned. We will have children acting as the parents, and researching from various sources (parents and teachers) and avenues from censorship as a parent perceives it. The Knowledge practice that this represents is to critically evaluate contributions made by others in participatory information environments. Show even though these are learners they will have to look at contributions made by various sources that write from the perspective of a mother and add to that conversation.

Activity 3: Third activity I would start a discussion forum for my class. And on that platform they must discuss things from a student/parent point of view. Openly discuss whether they agree or disagree or agree and disagree and also they must motivate on this platform why they feel what they feel and the validity of whatever they are saying. Where they got their information from. Knowledge Practice: contribute to scholarly conversation at an appropriate level (local online community, guided discussion, undergraduate research journal, conference presentation/poster session).