Dear all
I had already decided to follow Sagor’s Trend Analysis to analyze the data.
According to Sagor (2005), the specific areas of development that are relevant to identify regards the change in performance, based on the research question and the general and specific goals. When analyzing data, researchers find a connection of the goal with two aspects: Identifying changes occurred, and understanding the factors that contributed to these changes. That is why I also complemented it with Inductive analysis, taking into account that all the elements identified (patterns, categories and themes of analysis) emerge from the data, instead of imposing before data collection. (Quinn, 2002)
In Trend Analysis, there are three questions that must be answered to make an accurate analysis:
ACR Question 1: WHAT DID WE DO?
It consists on evidencing if what I have planned to do was effectively done, considering four aspects: If the theory of action was followed as written, what the fashion that the theory implemented was, elements of the theory omitted or changed and significant actions taken from the original theory. (Sagor, 2005: 113)
ACR Question 2: WHAT CHANGES OCCURRED REGARDING THE ACHIEVEMENT TARGETS?
It refers to the comparison and contrast of trends in and the influence received by external factors. It needs to be built within at least one or two paragraphs
ACR Question 3: WHAT WAS THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ACTIONS TAKEN AND ANY CHANGES IN PERFORMANCE ON THE TARGETS?
In this phase, I used the findings in order to answer the previous questions. Then, I go went and looked for changes (positive or negative) and saw if there were any particular actions or activities that corresponded to those changes. With these elements, identifying pattern or patterns that can explain these changes was necessary.
RESULTS - FINDINGS
Based on the data collected and my intuition as researcher about the actions taken, the results of my study is as follows:
Looking for reasons why students do not feel confident when speaking in the target language, I found a close relationship between students’ feelings (in the survey) and what they experienced in the recordings. One of the strongest reasons that they have expressed regards the awareness in pronunciation. It was evident when participating in the recordings: the self and the peer corrections pointed out to the concerns of pronouncing accurately. Likewise, in the final survey, they found that pronunciation was an aspect that they improved more. On the other hand, students demanded more interaction among themselves; in other words, they recognized the need of practice.
During the lessons, students took advantage of their peer feedback, that instead of laughing and feeling anxious because their peers’ laugh, they started helping each. In this way, students improved their interaction, as was expressed in the final survey.
Furthermore, fluency and intonation were other aspects that evidenced an improvement in their speaking confidence. At the beginning, they limited their participation to read (in the first recordings), but after establishing as strategy to divide their scripts in small chunks in such a way they repeat many times, they experimented several ways to say them. It is something that learners saw too, according to what they expressed in the final survey. They called it “La forma de hablar”, which means that they moved to a mechanic speech to a more spontaneous one.
Finally, participation in a radio show was recognized a appealing strategy to face on students’ needs expressed before the implementation (need of practice). Students found it as the perfect way to practice with their peers, expanding the vocabulary, not only in terms of the meaning, but also in terms of the pronunciation. They had the opportunity to work together and achieve the common goal (a successful radio show).
The research question “To what extent can cooperative learning-based activities—participating in an online radio show—foster speaking confidence in 8th graders from La Chucua School?” can be answered as follows:
Cooperative learning-based activities allowed students to identify not only the reasons that explain lack of speaking confidence, but also the needs that they require to increase it. The activities planned helped teams to change their attitudes and assist each other to achieve the immediate goal (to do a good radio show). Radio show was the appealing opportunity of practice that students demanded previous to the implementation. They were also able to work on their pronunciation concerns expressed at the beginning. Summarizing, awareness, practice opportunities and self and peer recognition are elements that permitted to foster confidence in speaking.
REFERENCES
Quinn, M. (2002). Conceptual Issues in qualitative inquiry. Qualitative research and evaluation methods. U.K: SAGE, 55.
Sagor, R. (2005). Analyzing the data. The Action Research guidebook. U.K: SAGE, 109 - 128
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