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Tuesday, June 7, 2011

Can you help me with my dissertation?

Huge thank you to everyone who responded to this post and volunteered. Obviously I couldn't choose everyone, so sorry if you feel you're missing out!


Hi all,

I've been out of [online] action for a few weeks, due to being hard at work with presentations and assignments for my MA course. That's why there has been a distinct lack of posts to this blog. I can happily say that I've got through all the work for the second semester and it's time to move on!

This means, however, that it has reached the time for me to embark on my dissertation, and for various reasons I have decided to focus on the use of Twitter by English language teachers.

The title of my research project is:

Teacher tweeting: Exploring the role of Twitter in teachers' professional lives.

I'm going to conduct three case studies of English language teachers using Twitter as part of their professional activities. I would like to find out what reasons exist for using Twitter, how other teachers use Twitter and also gain some understanding of peoples' experiences of using Twitter.

Criteria

The criteria for involvement are:
  1. You must be a practising English language teacher, in any context.
  1. You must currently use Twitter to interact with people or obtain information in a way which you consider to be part of your professional life, however you do not necessarily have to be an extremely active participant. In fact, I am looking for volunteers with different backgrounds and experience in using Twitter.
  1. You must be able to engage in the project for a period of one week.
  1. You must be able to connect on Skype for interview, with or without video.

What's in it for you?

I firmly believe in the benefits of reflection and I hope that you will find the process insightful, enjoyable and informative. Perhaps it will help you gain awareness of how Twitter affects your practice and development as an ELT professional. Also, you are entitled to an e-copy of my final research report, once it has been completed, marked and graded. Furthermore, understanding that this will involve a time commitment, I would also like to offer you a £10 Amazon gift certificate to thank you for taking part.


I now have my volunteers so it's on to data collection/ generation for me!


Thanks