Chapter 8Diaries and Diary Studies

RESEARCH METHODS FOR ENGLISH LANGUAGE

TEACHERS

I. INTRODUCTIONA. Diary Data

B. The Nature of Data

C. Analyzing Diary Data

D. Diaries and Diaries Studies

II. DIARIES IN LANGUAGE LEARNING AND LANGUAGE TEACHING

A. Language Learner Diaries

B. Expert Diaries

I. KEEPING A DIARY

Methodology

I. INTRODUCTION

• Diary is:– a daily record, – usually private, – especially of the writer's own – experiences, – observations, – feelings, – attitudes, etc.

Diary contains:

• Anecdotes,• Accounts (a description of facts, conditions), or

events of conversations,• Introspective accounts of one’s feelings,• Attitudes,• Motives,• Understanding in relation to things, events,

circumstances,• Should be kept on a continuous basis

(Elliot’s)

Diary Study

• A first-person account of language learning or teaching experience,

• Documented through regular, candid entries

• In personal journal• (and then analyzed for recurring patterns

or salient events)

(Balley, 1990)

Distinction between Logs, Journals and Diaries

• Logs:– A record of factual information

• Diaries:– The kind of subjective text

• Journals:– An amalgam of the two, containing both

subjective and objective data

Amalgam: a combination or mixture of different things

Example

Example

The Nature of data

• Four features of diary-generated text:1. Textual material for example - descriptive

observation

2. Self-evidently subjective and introspective a. The perspective of I dominates

b. Includes filtering the assumed and reported attitudes of others

3. Necessarily written retrospectively

The Nature of data

4. Possibly records

a. What happened

b. What the writer felt about it

c. What might/should have happened

d. What could change

e. Opinions,

f. Anticipation and immediate reactions

g. a more reflective tone

Analyzing Diary Data

• Studying one teacher’s diary could lead to:– A set of interviews with that teacher– Observation of his or her classes– The distribution of a larger-scale

questionnaire– The collection of comparative diary data

Three Features to be Taken into Account: (Allright and Bailey)

1. Frequency of mention

2. Distribution of mention (across writers, when several diaries are being

examined)

3. Saliency (the strength of the expression with which a

topic is recorded)Note: Mention of frequency and distribution implies that

Content analysis is likely to be quantitative

Diaries and Diary Studies

• Diaries:– Private space– A forum for reflection

• Diary studies– Going public– Contributing to a growing body of different

insights– Into the largely unobservable processes of

second language learning

Five Steps of the Production of a Diary Study

1. Account (mental record) of diarist’s professional background

2. Confidential diary

3. Revision of entries for public version

4. Analysis

5. Interpretation and discussion

(Bailey, 1990)

II. DIARIES IN LANGUAGE LEARNING AND LANGUAGE TEACHING

• Because of the growth of interest in naturalistic enquiry

• Diaries are used to investigate variety of aspects of teaching and learning

Language Learner Diaries

• The usual procedure: The Diary is – Confidential between teacher and individual

learner– Written in the target language– Not normally used as a vehicle for error

correction– Requires permission and a reading of the

research report by writers of any diary cited substantially

The Characteristic of Pedagogic Diaries

• Students are given guidelines before they start writing:– Lessons followed– What you found most/least useful and

enjoyable– What you found easiest/hardest– Reactions to your teacher– Reactions to other learners– Comments on specific lessons

Expert Diaries• Kept by language specialists: teachers,

applied linguists, second language acquisition researchers

• Using a detailed set of prompts, inviting successful language learners to write about their learning experience in diary-letter format (Pickett, 1987)

• The data was clearly very retrospective• Revealing about language learning

strategies and processes

Teachers’ Diaries

• Contains:– Planning the lesson and selecting material– Dealing with different types of learner : mother

tongue, learning styles, attitudes, pacing, proficiency)

– Whether the plan matched the reality– Coping with the unexpected– Using available resources and technology– Speculation (about learning, behavior)

Teacher Training

• Diaries kept by trainee teachers have several parallels with pedagogic learners’ diaries (Bailey, 1990)

• Encourages students : – to go beyond learning course content in

isolation – to strive to link this information to theories and

knowledge beyond the particular assignment and particular course

Teacher Training

• The diary is used for trainee self assessment:– Perception of self– Subject matter– Tasks and learners/learning– The development of self knowledge

(Thornbury (1991)

III. KEEPING A DIARY

• Writing under the guidance of a researcher:– Type of notebook– Model entry– Standardization of the time period allocated to

particular pages,– Checklist of items to jog the writer’s memory

Standard Advice• Set aside a time each day to write the diary• Tape recording is an option• Allot roughly the same amount of time to the

diary• Concentrate on recording data, not on style,

grammar or organization• Record facts and events as well as

reflections.• (Allwright and Bailly (1991)