The abstract of my project

Podcasting: a disruptive technique for improving teacher trainees’ ability
to make stress sentences properly.

This paper reports on a study carried out with twenty-six teacher trainees from the University of Tolima, in order to identify the effect of using Podcasting as a tool to improve the way they stress sentences. Participants were asked to record themselves reading aloud a piece of news. Then, the news —which has an audio recorded version read by a native speaker— was analyzed in terms of the suprasegmental features in it. After explicit explanations on aspects of connected speech such as linking, thought groups, content and structure words, students identified those features on the text, by highlighting the focus words, separating the thought groups using slant lines, and joining the words that were linked using curve lines.
Subsequently, students recorded the piece of news again and then peer-reviewed their partners work. I examined how the different stages along the implementation were perceived by students. The project intended to connect the concepts of Andragogy, podcasting, intelligibility, and sentences stress. The data were collected by means of a pre- and post test, surveys, artifacts, and logs.
The main categories that emerged out of data were the one below:
1. Self-confidence
2. Self-assessment
3. Professional development
4. Language awareness

Data analysis revealed that even though the improvement was not so significant, students perceived the project very positively since they find podcasting a very useful tool for them to self-assess their performance and to enrich their future praxis as teachers.
Further studies may seek to shed light on how suprasegmentals would be addressed in students not when reading but when speaking at the moment of create a non scripted-podcast.

Initial findings ...

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The results out of this implementation were used to see if the intervention improved students’ ability in stressing sentences properly and to obtain information about other effects the that implementation had.

Students could take the lessons beyond the classrooms and the implementation also motivated students to put their best foot forward. They were be able to listen to themselves, hear their own mistakes and go ahead setting specific learning goals to overcome their difficulties.
Even though some students felt uncomfortable when listening to themselves, the project was perceived very positively by students and they appreciated the fact that they were exposed to this computer enhanced language experience.

The project provided students with additional input and it extended their possibilities of interacting with the language outside the classroom.

Learners where self motivated to finally have an intrinsic reward of having worked hard and had a final outcome.

Final proposal for analyzing data...

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In last comments, I have said that I was going to use quantitive methods to analyze the data of my project. However, after having reflected and doble-checked the instruments, I have come to realize that even though some of the tools give data in terms of numbers, those numbers may support the qualitative analysis of all the other instruments.

Therefore, the process that I used in order to analyze the data is a grounded approach. According to Auerbach and Silverstein (2003) in this method the researcher builds an interpretation of what it is found in the data by describing patterns that are found in it, having the research concerns in mind. In a second stage, names to the common patterns are assigned and finally, those themes are organized into abstract concepts which aim to categorize those groups of themes into constructs.


Once I have all the data forms completed, I started by reading and analyzing the results from a final question of the final questionnaire, in which students gave their points of view about the different stages and parts of the process. I did this in order to know the impact of the implementation in their learning process. Then, I focused on the numbers and percentages from that online questionnaire to read and reflect on the data from a quantitative point of view. Additionally, I read and analyze the information from the logs in order to organize the information I had about the time students spent in using Audacity and in listening to podcasts.
Finally, I graded the pre- and post-tests.

Once I have a gist of the results out of all the instruments, I started with the final reflection from the final questionnaire. I selected the relevant texts and recurrent ideas that showed distinct thoughts and feelings related to my research concerns (Auerbach & Silverstein, 2003, p. 44) and I put them altogether in a document. Once I had a master list of such ideas, I color-coded them in order to organize them according to what they expressed so that I could have common items in them. I read again all the texts I had and I deleted the ideas that seemed to be not related to my research concerns. After that, with the relevant text accurately selected, I grouped the ideas in common themes that emerged from them.

I came up with the following set of common themes:

1. Self-confidence
2. Self-assessment
3. Professional development
4. Language awareness

The themes mentioned above respond well to the research question that I had set at the beginning, since that question aim to identify the effects of using and creating podcasts as a way to improve sentence stress in teacher trainees. The themes show that in the process not only language-related categories emerged, but others aspect of learning were incidentally addressed.


Research questions

• How do the use and the creation of podcasts improve teacher trainees’ ability to stress sentences correctly?

• How can podcasting enable students to self-assess and self-monitor their performance when making sentence stress?

Emergent themes in students’ feedback


• Ways in which podcasting enhanced non-language related learning.
• Reported increase in awareness/use of suprasegmental features of English.
• Reported increase of meta-cognitive strategies.
• Reported increase in motivation and self-confidence.
• Reported achievement of ‘better results’

On the way of sharing...

I have chosen a journal in which I would like to share the findings of my project. It is called, Colombian Applied Linguistic Journal.
Revista Colombiana de Lingüística Aplicada
“La revista se enfoca principalmente en divulgar investigaciones terminadas, discusiones teóricas o experiencias pedagógicas en el área del lenguaje que puedan informar a nuestra audiencia de docentes en ejercicio e investigadores de la educación sobre aspectos actuales de la enseñanza y la investigación sobre aspectos del lenguaje” (Universidad Distrital, 2009).

According to the description above, my article would be of interest to this journal’s audience, because it is highly related with the purpose of sharing the results of the classroom research project I have undertaken: ‘The majority of CALJ readers research and teach English and disciplines related to foreign language teaching in Colombia and abroad” (Universidad Distrital, 2009).

After reading on the requirements this journal has set, I came up with the following information:

• APA manual ought to be followed for style.
• It should be submitted to the editor in duplicate and with a magnetic copy.
• An abstract should be prepared for each article (limited to 120 words).
• Each table and figure should be submitted on a separate page and should be titled.
• Manuscripts should be typed and double spaced throughout not exceeding 15 letter size pages or 6,000 words.
• To assure impartial review each manuscript should be accompanied by a cover sheet with the title; author’s name, position, address, fax number and E-mail address; and a short (less than 50 words) biodata statement. Identifying information should not appear elsewhere in the manuscript in order to insure anonymity for the board of reviewers.
• The article cannot have been published in another publication and that it has not been considered by another publication.

References
• Universidad Distrital. (2009). Primera convocatoria para enviar artículos para el CALJ número 13 de octubre de 2010.

Reflecting on my experience as a researcher...

The only experience I have had in researching was like 9 years ago, when I wrote the monograph when I finished my B.A in English. Paradoxically, the work was done entirely in Spanish, and it was not related to English at all. It was about Organizational Climate in the university. Unfortunately, by the time I had to define a research proposal, there were not teachers available to direct any project in English, so we had to do the project with a PhD teacher who was more than able to help us with it. I say “us” because it turned out to be a very big proposal which involved six students. Each of us took one variable from the study and then, we put altogether. Formatting rules were far from being the international ones like APA.
Even though the project had nothing to do with didactic or linguistics, it was a very important experience for me as a student because it gave the possibility of knowing how a research project works and also gave me the opportunity to share the findings among the university community.

Now that I am analyzing the data of my project, it is too rewarding to see that I was capable to carry out this study!