I talked to Dr. Friedman this week and I think I am starting to move beyond the question of what I want to study to the question of how I can best study it. My main interest at this point is looking at how teachers use electronically based primary sources in their history classes.
Dr. Friedman had an interesting idea of combining multiple research methods to have a multi-tiered approach. We were thinking of doing a survey and then selecting a handful of teachers to interview in depth on these issues and to observe for a class or two. I would also gather documents such as lesson plans. I do worry though that that may be too many methods to try to employ in a short time period but it would make it a better study and it might prove useful to me as I think about how I want to run my own classes.
I’m also starting to go from my macroquestion to the smaller questions it encompasses. One issue related to electronic primary sources that I am interested in examining is what factors help influence a teachers decision to use these sources (i.e depending on year of student or type of course). I also would like to try to figure out what types of sources they use and if they are choosing to give the students the documents or are they having the students find their own (say in an assignment in the computer lab.)
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Alex, this is really developing. I agree with Dr. F. and it would be do-able to carry out a mixed methods study in our time frame. You will want to get enough data to triangulate your results.
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