Before partaking in the BAPP WBL degree course I had no real experience of research and how to go about aquiring the knowledge needed for a successful research project.
One of the first tasks I did in Module 2 was creating a pilot questionnaire. I really enjoyed doing this and after reading about face to face interviews in reader 6 I feel that I can develop my questionnaire into an in depth interview with lots of helpful information.
Firstly we learn about Observations. I think the idea of using observations for a research project is perfect if you are analysing behaviour or possibly different teaching styles. However for my own inquiry I'm doubtful as to how useful it will be for my inquiry. I would like to discover more information on the transitions dancers make throughout their life time and how they deal with these changes. I could observe a graduate class of fresh faced student dancers and possibly look at how they are coping in their third year. Another idea would be to observe an audition to see if there was a noticeable difference between graduates and professionals who have been auditioning for a long time. This would be quite difficult to arrange as I would need to get permission from everyone I was observing and as you can imagine at auditions there are hundreds and hundreds of dancers coming through the doors. It is something I may look into. It may make more sense to attend an audition myself and observe within, like and insider-researcher.
From looking at reader 6 I think the most useful tool I could use for my inquiry would be Interviews. For me personally, I like to idea of face to face interviews as I enjoy getting to know people and I feel it is so much more personal. I believe you acquire more information from a person face to face as you not collect what they tell you but you can also look at body language, facial expressions and tone of voice. I would like to interview two samples of people and then compare their answers. I would ensure the interview took place on a neutral ground as I feel this is fair to both the interviewer (myself) and the interviewee. Prior to carrying out my interview I would need to look at who I was interviewing and why. It is important for me to also look at when is the best time during my research project to interview? It is not useful for me to interview people at the last step of my research project as I am looking at emotions and feelings etc which need to be considered at the beginning of my inquiry.
I really like the idea of using focus groups for my inquiry as I am looking at different sets of people it would be nice to have them all in a room together and get their opinions as one. As much as I entertain the idea of focus groups in my research project, I feel it would be very difficult getting my group together in one room especially as the people I have chosen to help with my research all live in different parts of the country. I will definitely look into getting the right group together for this. I did think about a possible skype interview but it would be very difficult to control.
Surveys and questionnaires again could be useful to my research inquiry. I know survey monkey is a fantastic tool and probably something I will be looking into. I think a survey would be a great tool to use at the very beginning of my research as a way of gauging the ideas people have towards transitions in dance. However, collecting and analysing the data may be too time consuming and probably will not have a large amount of benefit to my research.
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