When I think of Research.......
When I began this journey in this course I thought I had some good prior knowledge, but come to find out there was a lot more that I need to learn. I hvae gained a lot of Vidal information from taking this course. I learned about the different types of research, I learned what to look for instead of reading everything and trying to figure out what the research is about. I gained a lot of new vocabulary that helped me now to understand the language of research better.
Since I have learned about the research process I am able to relax more when I do research. I am able to go through an article and look for key information that will lead me to the main focus of the research and if what I am reading is legitimate or an appropriate resource. It is a lot easier to manage.
When it comes to planning, designing and conducting research I have learned a lot. The fact that I was able to learn how to do research or do background on the information that I wanted to study it made it easier to weave out the good from the bad resources. Once I had done that it was like the planning for the project was easier. I was bale to go through my topic and formulate what areas I wanted to focus instead of having just a broad topic. It allowed me to take a broad topic think about it, change somethings, add something even change my whole outlook before actually going into and conducting the research. All of these steps presented research to me as being not as complicated as I was making it; i just needed to learn how to better organize information that I was finding and my thoought process as well.
When conducting research I ran into the problem of understanding which type of research best fitted my research question and topic. After going back and review I now think that I should uses a mixed method approach because o f the way I will be obtain my information when conducting my research (interview, anecdotal notes, direct and indirect observation etc..) I just had a hard time trying to figure out from the text which method of research best fit my topic. To better understand the method that I felt would be best for my topic; it really took me going back and looking and all the comments from our professor and rereading about each design.
This course has allowed me to look at Early Childhood Professional's as strong minded and talented individuals. There are a number of things that we do as professional and not even realize it. This course has allowed me to see EC professional as being a researcher everyday because when you think about it we are observing and taking notes on our students so that we are able to better assist them. We are so unappreciated for the work we do.
I want to take the time out and thank everyone that has left comments on my page and have given me links to help me better find research on my topic of strategies to use in the classroom to manage behaviors of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder. You all have been so supportive and such a big help through out this course. Thank You all so much, I really appreciate it.
