SCIMEC M2 English

Well, last time we met, we were thinking about what Documentation, Archives and Museums are and what they represent to the various 'stakeholders' involved. This time I want to go rather more specifically into what most of you are potentially going to be doing in your career (and certainly later this academic year in respect of your project/thesis: RESEARCH.

Why am I choosing research as the central topic for this English unit?

Essentially for three good reasons:

1. In SCIMEC M1 we 'sold' you the idea that whether Doc, Arch or Mus you have one thing in common: you are all ultimately involved in the process of education. Education cannot move forward and evolve without research. Question: and how do we grow the sum total of knowledge that is the bedrock subject-core of education? Answer: through research.  It is fundamental.
2. I have been teaching at Degree and Masters  level for almost 25 years now, and if I were to be asked the question: 'What do you feel is the principal reason for poor project and thesis results?', believe me, I would have no problem at all in responding immediately and with considerable conviction, such poor performance is almost always liked directly to a poor understanding of the research logic, structure and process resulting in an inability to carry out strong research and deliver valid and reliable results.   Even if you may have covered some aspects of Research Methods on your course, I am convinced that you will find useful the broader, overall-logic sort of perspective I will present that takes you through, step by step from Project Title Selection to the use and misuse of appendices.  In research, errors compound all the way down the line: a poor title will lead to weak aims and objectives, which will inevitably lead to poor analysis and almost certainly to inadequately underpinned conclusions and recommendations in the end.  I hope to help you understand the research process better and to be able to approach your research project with confidence.   In this way, I hope that your English unit can also give you a handsome 'payoff' in other units, most notably your research project/thesis.
3. This is containable within the very limited time that we have available.

The Teaching Schedule

We have just six hours together: 3 x 2 hours / 2 x 3 hours depending upon what the timetable is prepared to permit.

Part 1: Introduction to the research logic and process:

• selecting a good title
• producing clear aims and objectives that address the title.
• Letting the A & O 'drive' the secondary research.
• Defining the primary research requirement: 'the research gap'
• Selection of methodology

NB. This session will be led largely as a CM by the tutor in order to cover enough 'ground' to set up the unit assignment. Setting Contrôl Continu assignment: The Research Plan:   Hard copy to be submitted to the tutor in class on our last session together.

Part 2: From Methodology to Appendices:

• interview & questionnaire design
• data presentation
• data analysis and interpretation (produces information)
• evaluation
• synthesis
• conclusions
• recommendations
• bibliography
• appendices
• review against title and A&O
• readjustment /editing as appropriate

NB. This session will be partly led  as a CM by the tutor, but this will then be followed by a discussion of the research logic and process in the light of the contrôl continu work you will have undertaken (and from which I hope you will have learned). Submission of Contrôl Continu assignment in class Subject to workload, I will try to mark these pieces of work and to get them back to the Fac before the Christmas vacation.  Either I will try to have them delivered to you in  class by one of my colleagues, or failing that, leave them in the office for collection. I will post a notice under my website 'NEWS' tab telling you what I have done with your work, OK?

..

Your Contrôl Continu Assignment.

Date Set: our first scheduled class Submission Date: Our last class together (Hand hard copy to the tutor in class – please do not send by mail.  Late submissions without approval from the course tutor will be penalised) Length: as appropriate to the topic… guideline: 3 to 5 pages of A4  [NB. 5 pages is a MAXIMUM: overrun will be penalised: you have to get used to writing to a limit.] Language: English Required. In the light of the lectures given and the materials posted to this website for your reference and use you are to:

• IN PAIRS : Select ONE of the following 'areas of study' and narrow,  focus & develop it into a thesis/research report PLAN covering all stages from working it up into a good title right through to methodology (using the guidance and notes provided in my first lecture).

1. Museums and the revenue-earning imperative
2. Documentation and the need to be selective
3. Archives and demands for access
4. Archiving OR Documentation OR Museums and  information and communication technologies innovations (ICTs)

IMPORTANT NOTE: I am NOT asking you to actually DO this research, I am asking you to define HOW you would go about doing it: there is a vast difference between the two! Marking.  I will be putting as much emphasis upon your ability to follow instructions as I will upon your ability to be able to express it in English of a professional standard.  What I am wanting to see is something that is credible and valid and takes into account what I have been saying in the CMs.