Podcast Podcast

At IRA in Phoenix, I'll be presenting about the nuts and bolts of podcasting. I'm developing a short podcast series to accompany the presentation. 

The topics so far:

Episode 1: What is podcasting?

Episode 2: Overview of the basic steps

Episode 3: What do I need?

Episode 4: How do I do it?

Episode 5: Planning Your Podcast

The audience for the series is practitioners, so I want to keep everything grounded in classroom practice. I'd like the tone to be informal. I think it will be tricky to strike just the right balance with the tone. First step, develop the scripts! I think I'll use Celtx.

Notes on Marsh 2006, Pop Culture in the Literacy Curriculum

Popular culture in the literacy curriculum: A Bourdieuan analysis
Jackie Marsh
University of Sheffield, Sheffield, England

Reading Research Quarterly, Vol. 41, No. 2 (Apr. - Jun. 2006), pp. 160-174
Published by International Reading Association
Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/pss/4151728 on 9/14/08.
----

1. Research Questions
1) "What are the beliefs and practices
of preservice teachers with regard to the use of popular-culture and media texts in the primary literacy curriculum?"
2) "How do structural and agentic elements shape the dynamic between these beliefs and practices?"

2. Subjects, Setting, Context
This longitudinal study looked at the attitudes, beliefs, and practices of preservice teachers in regards to the inclusion of pop culture in the literacy curriculum. Marsh uses a theoretical lens based on the work of sociologist Pierre Bourdieu to examine how the agency of the teachers was limited by the institutional stance on pop culture.
18 teacher education students were interviewed over the course of their 3 year program. Responses of 3 students were analyzed.

3. Procedures (briefly)
Group and individual interviews were conducted. Transcripts were coded using inductive coding. Validity was enhanced by having dyads of students independently code samples. The coded data were then organized into concepts.

4. Findings
1) Student teachers may be excited about the idea of incorporating popular culture texts into the classroom, but they are pressured to conform to norms of the school structure and not include these texts.
2) Teachers capitulate to the values of the structure that has become habitus for them and that is reinforced throughout.

5. Strengths and Weaknesses of Study
All of the data are based on self-report from the participants. Although member checks were performed, this remains the strongest limitation of the study.

6. Implications
More work needs to be done on the inclusion of popular culture texts in the classroom. There seems to be a disconnect between the vision the field of education has about what are appropriate texts for children and the actual texts that are present in the lives of children outside of school today.

7. Other Comments
Bourdieu believed that structures, such as a school curriculum, impose the sociocultural values of one unfairly advantaged group over all other groups in a society and that individuals within such a system can comply (passively or actively) or resist the reconstruction of the dominant value system.

In Marsh's section titled "Restricted beliefs and practices", the author discusses teacher concerns about the inclusion of popular culture texts in the classroom because of what is perceived as non-age-appropriate content. That section also discusses teacher anxiety over technological innovation and invokes the Freudian concept of the "uncanny" to explain this unease. This section applies to the tension that the counselors and I experience during the summer camp because of the inclusion of popular culture texts.

Discussion of Risko, et al.

The level of rigor and scrutiny described in this study is impressive, daunting, and inspiring. When I imagine something that I've written under this level of scrutiny, I shudder. Every time I thought they had taken their analysis of the studies as far as they could, they would back up and come at them a different way. Each decision that they made seems to be arrived at through careful and logical evaluation of the needs of the study. I would have liked for them to say, "and here's how we screwed up..." just to make them appear a little more human.

Of course, I'm also so grateful that they (a) did this analysis, and (b) published their procedures in such incredible detail. I have the feeling I'll be using Risko, et al., as a model for research for years to come.

Interestingly, the researchers note the lack of historical context provided in the studies they reviewed. I am interested in the progression of ideas through time and in contextualizing the work of individual researchers. I would be interested in doing some kind of paper that examined the relationships between different researchers' work, or perhaps tracing the movement of ideas across time.

Part 3 - Risko, et al.

Part 3 - Risko, V., Roller, C., Cummins, C., Bean, R., Block, C., Anders, P., Flood, J. (2008). A Critical Analysis of Research on Reading Teacher Education

Method for Data Analysis

Most of the studies were qualitative. The researchers applied "an inductive paradigmatic analysis process (Polikinhorne, 1995)" to analyze the remaining 82 studies.

They first categorized the studies by classifying details, events, and situations - producing 7 categories. Next, they identified the primary foci and reduced the categories to four:

1. beliefs
2. knowledge
3. pedagogy
4. program research

Next, they produced a detailed analysis of the layers of logic in each study. Finally, in contrast to their microanalysis, they produced a macroanalysis that produced a coding matrix of patterns within the studies.

Limitations

1. US only
2. Although their categories for analysis are supported by the data and methods, there may be other equally valid ways of organizing the data.
3. All research focused on prospective teachers.

Part 2 - Risko, et al.

Part 2 - Risko, V., Roller, C., Cummins, C., Bean, R., Block, C., Anders, P., Flood, J. (2008). A Critical Analysis of Research on Reading Teacher Education

Method for Lit Review

Risko, et al., evaluated the methodology and research design of each study in relation to its research questions. For this, they cite the "logics in use" concept from Kaplan (1964) and Howe and Eisenhart (1990).

Parameters for inclusion:

1. Published, empirical, peer-reviewed
2. Pub between 1990-2006
3. Pre-service K12 Reading teacher focus
4. In the US (this was added after finding only 3 from outside the US)

Search procedure:

1. Electronic search of databases (ERIC, InfoTrac, ISI Web, PsycINFO)
2. Manual search of annual conference yearbooks (NRC, CRA, ARF)
3. Manual search of recent journals not yet included in databases
4. Bibliographies of other reviews (Risko didn't list this source in the search procedure, but did list it as a source of studies included)

Sources of 233 selected studies:

• 79 electronic searches
• 53 NRC
• 24 ARF
• 40 CRA
• 8 manual journal search
• 29 from bibliographies of other reviews

The researchers established criteria to assess the quality of the studies, based on the work of others and in consultation with other experts. In addition to the 3 standards, they identified 7 criteria which could be used as a model for assessing quality of research. The standards are:

• Standard 1 - Clear and coherent argument and reasoning, connecting theory to research.
  
• Standard 2 - Clear disclosure of rigorous methodology.
• Standard 3 - Findings match the question and are supported by the data.

Coding for Inclusion

The researchers established a rigorous procedure for evaluating the 233 studies. They first carefully established inter-rater reliability. Then they went through several iterations of evaluating studies on a 3 point scale, rating each based on the 7 criteria. Those that met all 7 criteria were rated 3. The rest were eliminated.

They then coded each study for (1) level of explicitness, i.e. explicit instruction, modeling, etc. and (2) effect strength, examining what percentage of participants exhibited an effect.

Part 1 - Risko, et al.

Risko, V., Roller, C., Cummins, C., Bean, R., Block, C., Anders, P., Flood, J. (2008). A Critical Analysis of Research on Reading Teacher Education

Risko, et al., is a lit review of reading teacher education studies. I'm reading this primarily to study it as a model of how to conduct a lit review. Starting from a pool of 298 studies, they selected 82 to include.

------

• Began by reading lit reviews for "learning to teach" and reading teacher preparation. This helped them understand the characteristics of the field and set broad goals.
  
• Set the following objectives: 
  

1. identify criteria and quality indicators for evaluating research
2. conduct comprehensive search and analysis of empirical research meeting those criteria
3. analyze theoretical arguments and practical issues in the studies.
4. identify future research objectives

The researchers sought to include a variety of theoretical perspectives. They grouped studies into five theoretical categories:

1. positivist/behavioral - This represents a transmission model of teaching, an additive process. The theory was dominant in the 1970s. Characterized by lists of discrete, observable skills and behaviors to be mastered.
2. cognitive - Importance placed on connecting learning with prior knowledge and beliefs. Piaget and Bartlett's schemata.
3. constructivism - Focus on conditions for learning, problem-solving, inquiry, and collaboration. Shift away from transmission model.
4. socio-cultural - Focuses on individuals relationship to social context, "multiple forms of interaction with others".
5. critical theories - Focus on how literacy educators can address social justice issues, and on equitable learning conditions.

Researchers attempted to maintain "objectivity" by meeting and developing "shared and negotiated understandings of the papers"... "collaborative interpretive analysis and critique". They acknowledge that their personal histories influenced the meaning that they constructed.