For me, this MOOC is less about my research topic (which really doesn’t exist just yet) and primarily about refreshing and enhancing my knowledge on the topic of social research methods itself.
A secondary benefit is being part of a blog group that includes #MScDE students who are ahead of me in the programme and so I’m hoping to learn from them and perhaps get more ideas as to where my research should focus when the time comes.
I admit that I have signed up only for the post grad dip in DE in the hope that by the time my individual courses are complete I’ll know whether a doctorate is something I might be able to do or whether it’s an (unachievable) aspiration and that I might have to settle for my MSc. Either way, research has always interested me and my primary degree way back majored in Social Research Methods so in a way, I feel like this MOOC is bringing me full circle. Forgive the rant, just sharing some background, all done now!
This is the first MOOC I’ve taken on the EdX platform and it seems okay to navigate around. Coursera however, is my first love and it will take a lot to remove it from the top of my list of favourites!
This week I really liked the multiple choice element which, based on the answers I provided, proposed some types of research methods I should consider –
- ‘The social world is… made up of many different contexts and perspectives, that we have to interpret.’ Therefore, I ‘should probably consider research methods which seek understandings of specific people, groups and contexts. These kind of methods tend to be categorised as ‘qualitative….’; Yep, my research paper for my masters in project management was qualitative and I really enjoyed that process. Quantitative has never grabbed me but of course that’s not to say that I wouldn’t consider it, it all depends…
- ‘I’d prefer a research project… where I know exactly what I’m looking for before hand’. That’s not to say that I don’t want to address unintended things that might emerge, rather, for the most part I like to deal with the known rather than the unknown. At masters level this might be okay, but perhaps not at doctorate level so I’d need to give that some thought going forward. The anomaly of course, is that this type of project typically uses quantitative methods to test hypotheses so perhaps I should be more open to a research project ‘that leaves room for unintended things to emerge’.
- ‘I like to work with…. people and groups’. Quantitative methods leave me cold, I didn’t like SPSS as an undergrad many years ago and I don’t expect that to have changed much, but who knows???
- ‘The best insights come from… joining the people you want to study and trying to experience what they experience’. This might not be practical from a research perspective when the time comes but I had to smile when I read Helen’s post that referenced Margaret Mead and brought me back to my undergrad module on anthropology! I’ll keep an open mind on this one.
I like to keep my weekly blog posts to about 500 words so will leave this here for now, and on the topic of consistency I will set it to publish in wordpress for Monday but post it to the MOOC discussion forum now.
Sandra Flynn 
Hi Sandra,
I really enjoyed your response to the multiple choice exercise in the MOOC and your discussion of the seemingly contradictory nature of wanting to undertake a predominantly ethnographic approach even though you’d prefer to know exactly what you were looking for beforehand!
And you did an undergraduate module in anthropology too! I did, and it’s been interesting to start to scratch at some of the ideas and approaches which formed part of that module over twenty years ago!
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Thanks Helen, I fear the path forward is not altogether clear but I thought the multiple choice questions were a great exercise even if things do change…
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