Teacher Engagement with Research
“A key argument in [Evidence Based Practice] EBP is that teachers should be critical consumers of educational research, using it to inform their instruction decisions”
Borg, S. (2010). Language teacher research engagement. Language teaching, 43(4), 391-429.
Responsible Conduct in Research (RCR)
On reflection, research topics began early in the MAFLT program. In my experience with Professor Rajiv Ranjan, who instructed the FLT860 Course, his discussions explored the research role of language teachers in SLA and Instructed Second Language Acquisition. For language teachers to conduct research, we first agree that we MUST honor ethical research guidelines:
https://iteachlanguageportfolio.com/credentials/research-ethics/
The Effectiveness of Structured Input and Structured Output on Acquisition of Japanese Comparative Sentences
My FLT860 research topic, “The Effectiveness of Structured Input and Structured Output on Acquisition of Japanese Comparative Sentences,” seeks to understand whether or not explicit instruction is an effective tool for teaching comparative sentences and to what degree productive and receptive skills are improved. I designed around this research to create my own research proposal. The materials included can be adapted for use in support of the research topic. I chose research that informs my classroom practice in teaching grammar.
The research materials presented in connection with the research have been retrieved by permission of a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike Licence and can be reviewed below.
“Language education researchers do often want to collect and analyze quantitative data…though their quantitative data may not meet the conditions for parametric analyses, they may wish to read and evaluate studies in which these statistics have been used.”
Turner, J. L. (2014). Using Statistics in Small-Scale Language Education Research. Hoboken: Taylor and Francis.
FLT841 Special Topics in Literacy
My FLT841/842 research choice was to research how Japanese L2 learners approach Kanji. I also evaluated a study conducted on script switching from Kana to Kanji and its implications for reading, memory, and understanding Kanji meanings. Both projects informed my understanding of learner behavior and attitudes.