Category Archives: Research & writing

Action research syllabus collection

Posted in Participation, public sociology & campus-community collaboration, Research & writing, Teaching by

Although all academics hope their research makes an impact in the real world, some take extra steps to make that outcome more likely.  This small but vibrant sector of academia talks about their work with terms like action research, participatory action research, public sociology, engaged scholarship, activist scholarship, applied research and more. I’ve recently acquired three fascinating syllabi in this genre and added them to my collection.  Two are intended for graduate students and one for undergrads.

I must say blogging is a great way to share my various little treasure chests of these sorts of things.  I hope you enjoy them too!

This collection also has a permanent home under the “Teaching” tab on the menu at the top of this site.

Teaching research methods – lab curriculum

Posted in Research & writing, Teaching by

With the click of a button I’ve just uploaded all of my students’ final grades and am officially done teaching for the 2010-2011 school year!  The class I just wrapped up was my department’s undergraduate research methods class, and I’ve posted what I’ve been doing with them below for others who teach similar classes.  You’ll find a basic overview of everything I did, some online resources, and some things I wish I had done.

I’ve worked as a teaching assistant for this class twice now, and it is the class I’ve enjoyed the most so far.  By the end of the class the students have picked a research question to answer, found out what work has already been done on it and modified their question accordingly to make it improve on what has already been done, written a basic literature review, chosen research methods to answer their question, designed their research tools (survey, interview questions, etc), pre-tested and modified their research tools, and speculated on where the research might take them if they were to actually pursue the rest of it.

It’s a difficult task but some of the students get really excited about their projects, and learn a lot about scholarship in the process.  The “Big Assignments” listed below were assigned by the professor leading the class, Gabby Sandoval, and appear here with my edits.  Some of the “lab assignments” listed below I adapted from the research design class I took with Katherine Masyn when I was a masters student at UC Davis.  The important thing is to help the students break down what can be an overwhelming project into manageable weekly tasks, especially during the first half of the class as they are getting started with their projects.

The lab plan below was designed around a teaching workload that involved students going to lecture twice a week with the professor, and then attending a 2 hour lab once a week with me.  I was responsible for two labs of twenty students each.  Students each sat at their own computer, enabling me to combine lectures, group-work, and time for students to work on their projects individually while I moved around the room to consult with them.  During individual work time, I made an effort to check in with each student instead of only those that sought my help, which helped nip problems with their projects in the bud.

Week 1: No Lab

Week 2 Lab

  1. Students bring first draft of their research question to lab
  2. Mini-lecture: Research methods are cool!
  3. Mini-lecture: What is the difference between a research proposal and a term paper?
  4. Go over handout: Common Problems With Research Questions and How to Fix Them
  5. Peer review of draft research questions
  6. Introduce Lab Assignment 1: 5 new and improved versions of their research question
  7. Individual and partner work on Lab Assignment 1
  8. Turn in first draft of research question and peer-review sheet

Week 3 Lab

  1. Students get back the first draft of their research question with my feedback on it
  2. Mini lecture: Operationalizing research questions
  3. Demo: Read aloud my first and final drafts of “key terms” for my thesis research, discuss significance of the changes made on my findings
  4. Demo: 2-3 students volunteer their research questions and we work on operationalizing them as a group
  5. Lab Activity: Individual and partner work to revise and operationalize research questions
  6. Mini-lecture: review literature review assignment
  7. Introduce Lab Assignments 2 and 3: find 20 sources and fill out one article summary table
  8. Hand back lab assignment 1
  9. Individual work and student-TA check-ins
  10. Students turn in lab activity and lab assignment 1

Week 4 Lab

  1. Hand back lab assignment 1 and week 3 lab activity – review operationalization
  2. Literature Review Quiz
  3. Check in on progress on lab assignments 2 and 3 – discuss common problems with finding sources
  4. Introduce Lab Assignments 4 and 5: literature review outline and more article review tables
  5. Workshop literature review outlines for 1-2 student research questions
  6. Individual work and student-TA check-ins
  7. Students turn in lab assignments 2 and 3

Week 5 Lab

  1. Mini lecture: Review Big Assignment #1 – Literature Review
  2. Guided discussion: trouble-shoot literature review problems
  3. Mini lecture: In-text citations
  4. Individual work and student-TA check-ins: Hand back and discuss lab assignments 2 and 3 while students work on literature reviews
  5. Students turn in lab assignments 4 and 5

Week 6 Lab

  1. Students hand in Big Assignment #1: Literature Review
  2. Peer review: literature review drafts
  3. Review requirements for Big Assignment #2: Methods Section
  4. Review class calendar
  5. Introduce Lab Activity: methods worksheet
  6. Introduce Lab Assignment 6: research tool
  7. Workshop methods that could be used to answer research questions for several students
  8. Groupwork: divide by method students plan to use, and discuss how they could design research to answer their question

Week 7 Lab

  1. Methods Quiz
  2. Workshop: discuss ways to pre-test the methods of several students’ research questions
  3. Mini lecture: filling out Institutional Review Board forms
  4. Mini lecture: assessing the ethical implications of your proposed research
  5. Students get back graded literature reviews
  6. Individual work and student-TA check-ins: students work on methods section

Week 8 Lab

  1. Students hand in Big Assignment #2: Methods section
  2. Mini-lecture: Pre-testing
  3. Individual work and student-TA check-ins

Week 9 Lab

  1. Review requirements for Big Assignment #3: Final Research Proposal
  2. Hand back graded methods sections and research tools
  3. Individual work and student-TA check-ins: Students work on revising literature reviews, methods sections, or research tool as needed

Week 10 Lab

  1. Students conducting surveys as their pre-test of their research tools conduct surveys in class and get feedback from the rest of the students
  2. Hand out and review Editing check-list
  3. Individual work and student-TA check-ins

Finals Week

  1. Students turn in Big Assignment #3: Final Research Proposal


Other resources for students:

To do list for next time:

  • Create a handout that shows one basic research question reformulated in many different ways.  For example, a quantitative version of the question and a qualitative version.  Versions that would require different methods to answer:  in-depth interviews, textual analysis, participant observation, survey, etc.  The students often have a hard time imagining all the different ways that their topical interest could play out in a research project, so I think seeing one question that has been developed in many different directions will give them a sense of the array of options they have.
  • Prepare some materials to teach different approaches to writing a literature review. In particular, I’m interested in helping the students explore the slightly different role of  the literature review for an applied research project as compared to a theoretical research project.
  • Create “Areas for Improvement” feedback forms.  The form lists common errors that many students need to improve on in their papers.  As I read a paper, I circle all the items that apply to that particular paper, add a few hand-written comments and then staple it on the back.  This has worked reasonably well when I’ve used it for other classes.
  • Mark up the model research proposal that I shared with the students. The proposal I shared was written by one of my students when I taught this class last year.  It seems like it was very helpful for the students to see a model written by a peer to meet the same requirements they had instead of looking at models written by established scholars for other purposes.  It was an excellent proposal, but still had some flaws and areas for improvement that confused the students since it was being held up as a model.  I think I’ll just make a few comments on it in ‘track changes’ and share that version instead in the future.  I’ll also add a few more models that I requested from my students this year, so future students get a sense of the range of research questions and methods that they can tackle.
  • In the future I’d also like to spend more time helping the students understand examples of research projects that have had real world outcomes so they can make better links between their own research ideas and the changes they would like to see in the world.

Tech tools for graduate students

Posted in Research & writing, Tech support, University life by

I seem to spend half my time keeping up with my computer.  It updates itself, deals with its own viruses, and is generally a miracle of the modern world.  Still, each update means some new twists to the programs I use, and figuring out how to make use of its massive capabilities feels like a full-time job.  Here’s a list of some of the tricks and tools I’ve been trying to master.

  • Backup your work!  Who hasn’t heard a horror story of the student who lost all their work in the final stages of writing their dissertation?  I double up.  My Mac uses Time Machine to automatically back itself up to an external hard drive.  I also use Carbonite for automatic online backup to a remote site (in case my house burns down and said hard drives become a gooey mess).
  • Accessing documents on my computer when you’re not actually at your computer (you know, in case inspiration hits while you’re on vacation or otherwise enjoying a perfectly good day away from your desk): Carbonite
  • Creating a virtual library to house all the crazy pdfs that would otherwise suffocate my desktop: Zotero.  I used to use End Note, but just switched over to Zotero.  So far it seems a lot easier to use.  Plus, it’s free!  They both also automatically format your citations and bibliographies in the style of you choice.  Wow!  Can they do my laundry too?
  • Finding things on the rabbit’s warren that is my computer: Google Desktop.  I just downloaded this yesterday so I haven’t used it much yet, but my friend Bernie assures me it does the trick.  It searches not only file names, but also what’s INSIDE the files.  Crazy!
  • Sharing massive documents and syncing e-mail accounts and other information across computers.  I use Mobile Me, but I hear Google does this pretty well too.
  • For when you go back to your desk and realize that although you thought you understood it at the time, you actually have no idea what your advisor was talking about:  Recorder app on a smart phone.  Record the conversation now, make sense of it later. Kind of like interviewing.
  • For organizing and analyzing interview transcripts: NVivo.  NVivo is designed for PC’s, so using it on a Mac also requires using Bootcamp or Parallels.
  • For recording and calculating student grades: Excel or Numbers.  They both work but I like Numbers because it has a pre-fab grading worksheet that automatically transforms number grades (92%) into letter grades (A-).
  • For staying up to date with the outside world: Google Reader, Tweet Deck, and that old fashioned thing called the phone
  • Task management software (otherwise known as to-do lists): OmniFocus.  I was thrilled with this when I first got it, now I’m closer to lukewarm.  I’m back to using my whiteboard for day-to-day to-do lists, but I still like it for storing my longer term to-do lists.
  • One of my writing buddies uses Foxit Reader to read pdfs online and highlight and take notes on them, but it doesn’t look like it works for Macs. Plus, I don’t like reading things online.  Still, I may snoop around and see what’s out there for Macs and give it a go.

And that marks the end of my tech savvy.

Creating “Principles of Collaboration” documents

Posted in Environmental justice, Participation, public sociology & campus-community collaboration, Research & writing, Teaching by

Activists and scholars often have a tough time working together.  One way to make it easier is by deciding the rules of the game ahead of time.  Some partnerships formalize these agreements into “Principles of Collaboration” documents.  The idea is that if everyone knows what is expected of them ahead of time, problems are less likely to come up.

I used these documents as a key part of a guest lecture I gave recently in an environmental justice class. I started out with a Daily Show clip to get the conversation rolling (see my post on the clip here).  We talked about the tensions between environmentalists and environmental justice activists, and then segued into discussing the similar tensions between environmental justice activists and scholars.

After the “problems” conversation we talked about “solutions.”  I described how I’ve navigated the scholar/activist divide in my project 25 Stories from the Central Valley (see also here).  I also described the San Joaquin Valley Cumulative Health Impacts Project. This activist-scholar partnership resulted in maps that document the many toxins that San Joaquin Valley residents are exposed to, together with demographic data on their “social vulnerability.”  I showed the students the project’s “Principles of Collaboration” documents (see here and here), and we read through a few of their specific agreements to see how they protected both the activists and the scholars.

The students were going to be working in groups on service-learning projects to support local environmental justice organizations. I wanted them to think more about collaboration by creating their own documents to guide their group-work (the professor had already worked out the details of the partnership between the students and the environmental justice organizations ahead of time).  I adapted an activity I learned from another organization for the purpose – you can download my version here.  The students interview each other about their best experiences with group work, categorize these experiences, and then turn them into a contract to guide their work together.  When I facilitated this activity for the first time in a previous job, I was paired with a high-school student for the interview.  It was great to get to reflect on things that have actually gone well in my experiences with group work, and to think about how to make them more likely to happen again.

As it turns out, we only had enough time for the students to do the interviewing part of the activity.  I was going to come back during the next class period to guide them through the rest, but got sick and had to cancel at the last minute (sorry Flora!).  So, I haven’t tested the whole activity in this particular context.  If you give it a try, let me know how it goes!

More about the San Joaquin Valley Cumulative Health Impacts Project:

More on working across the campus-community divide:

New article by yours truly!

Posted in Environmental justice, Participation, public sociology & campus-community collaboration, Photography, Research & writing, San Joaquin Valley, Voices from the Valley by

I’ve got an article coming out today in the inaugural edition of the new UC Press journal Boom: A Journal of California.  I wrote it with one of my Master’s advisors from UC Davis, Julie Sze.  I’m excited because Boom is designed to be a cross-over publication read by scholars and the general public alike, so among other things, it looks beautiful and some of the articles are available for free online (hard-copies are also for sale in some news outlets and bookstores).  The editors also tried to make it “count” for academic contributors by putting it through the usual scholarly peer review process.  I wish this new publication every success and hope to see more like it in the future!

Our piece features a short article on environmental justice in the Central Valley, some of my photos from the 25 Stories from the Central Valley exhibit, and excerpts from my interviews with Teresa DeAnda (Earlimart), Mary Lou Mares (Kettleman City) and Debbie Reyes (Fresno).  I’ll be attending one of the launch events at the Oakland Museum tomorrow night.

Here’s the intro text:

When Californians think of the Central Valley, they often think of its problems: poverty, pesticides, disputes over the allocation of irrigation water, farmworker deaths, and, most recently, a cluster of babies born with birth defects in the small town of Kettleman City. These are some of the ways this region makes the statewide news. But the Central Valley also has a rich history of community organizing and its own stark beauty. These photographs by Tracy Perkins and the oral histories she collected to accompany them document an important aspect of life there: environmental-health problems and the diverse network of advocates who are fighting to solve them.

Practically speaking, the Central Valley is all but invisible to those who live outside it. Over the course of the twentieth century, legislators and growers turned this 500-mile-long stretch of land into one of the most intensively farmed regions in the world, watered by one of the world’s most ambitious irrigation systems. Although California leads the nation in agricultural production, many Californians have little sense of what goes on in the agricultural regions of their state. This invisibility helps to explain why California has located two of the state’s three hazardous-waste landfills and many of its prisons there, while also continuing to allow high levels of toxicity in the air and water…

Read the complete article for free on the Boom website here, or to get the full impact of the beautiful print version, download the pdf here.