“The researcher didn’t write the study, the method did.” That one sentence by Newkirk was a relief to me. The idea of composition and doing it well and then adding what appeared as surmountable research bogged my mind. I have to become a researcher and not a teacher of writing. My interpretation is that the narrative writing moves the research from totally scientific to a piece that takes the case study and turns it into a shaped composition of their accounts. Now that is interesting. It takes reality, picks it apart, and composes it into a study that will assist others to understand the why’s and wherefores of students and people alike. (Yes, students are not always people!)
Surprising, the one study of Atwell actually intrigued my interest. I haven’t been a fan of Atwell, but her discussion of the “Mislabeled” from “In the Middle” was so true. Taking a group of special education students and knowing that with modifications and adaptations, the students can learn. More than even that, by believing in them while encouraging them to succeed can often make the difference. Once reading this piece and then the chapter in Empirical Designs I can see how the difficulty is not only in finding the right piece to research, but taking the scientific method and writing a composition that is narrative. The hypotheses, variables and connections needed to put a well defined case study together takes more toil than it first appeared ~ it takes bias and personal input. Again, another week figuring out where I need to go and hopefully, it’ll become even clearer this week!
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