1. Note-taking practice: As you listen to the passage, try to condense it into a few meaningful units. Organize the information into groups. For example, if a person were to list the schools she had attended and the subjects she studied, you could group the schools by location and the subjects studied by topic.
Then render the information in Russian using your notes.
Presenting research results is a vital aspect of graduate work. It is an exciting time in a student's degree program because it represents the culmination of many hours of hard work. The communication of research findings provides a valuable opportunity to inform others of a current investigation and it and can lead to future speaking opportunities at conferences, grants for future research projects, school and business meetings and offer natural connections to new job opportunities! There are several major elements in preparing academic presentations that will help students to best represent their research while effectively meeting audience expectations.
Presenting academic material requires careful preparation and planning to effectively communicate to your audience. It is important to consider the diversity of expertise within a group of educators. Audiences will usually contain people who are experts in your subject area, others who have a general knowledge of the topic and the remainder who have basically little or no knowledge. How do you plan to effectively reach such a wide range of knowledge levels within one group? A popular communication strategy is to directly address the experts while integrating relevant and interesting illustrations and ideas into the presentation that make the results accessible to entire audience. It is a multidimensional speaking technique that demonstrates respect for those who attend your presentation.
Essential elements for action research presentations:
· Problem description and documentation
· Setting: population
· Solution strategy
· Analysis of results (anticipated & otherwise)
· Recommendations for change & for future researchers
· Solicitation of audience feedback
The problem statements should be presented in descriptive language that the audience can easily understand. The presentation should include several key studies from the literature review to provide solid support for the rationale for pursuing your research problem. There is a real temptation to share a host of studies but it tends to distract people who generally are more interested in understanding why an individual has undertaken a particular study.
Setting section should reflect a basic overview of the study participants and help acquaint people with the school or organizational setting for the research project. Due to the international interest in research efforts, be sure to share enough factual information about the study site and population to inform individuals from other countries. Also, it might be necessary in some situations to include a brief overview of key terms to effectively communicate with a diverse audience.
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Presenting possible solutions to educational problems is a vital part of the research process. Individual projects will often focus on issues within a specific realm of practice in a classroom or throughout a school such as disciplinary referrals. It is important to present information in a concise manner that highlights the specific changes to improve the educational setting. Therefore, stress three or four changes that will help you keep your presentation focused and reduce potential resistance to your ideas.
Interpretation of qualitative and quantitative data is always a very challenging task. The author recommends reviewing your results in light of the concepts of significance, generalizability, reliability and validity. The generalizability of an action research project requires you to ask specific questions which examine the degree of broader applicability of your particular study. Ask yourself the following questions:
· If you carried out a detailed study of a specific institution, group or individual, are your findings of any relevance beyond that institution, group or individual?
· Do they have anything to say about the behavior or experience of other institutions, groups or individuals, and if so, how do you know that this is the case?
Every study has a certain level of limitations involving generalizability. Action research projects are designed to address real problems in a school such as the quality of student writing or reading comprehension skills. Collaborative action research projects offer opportunities to increase the significance of an investigation by exploring and examining issues within a school or several schools. Individual case studies and action research projects remain an important part of today’s academic community.
Researchers need to carefully share conflicting or even somewhat confusing results because this represents valuable information. Often, it stresses the complexity of studying the teaching and learning process and the need to explore the topic in greater depth in a future research venture.
An individual study can benefit both a higher education institution and offer potential insights for online teachers. Here is a comprehensive chart of five facilitator or e-moderator competencies:
1. Understanding of online process - understand how to promote group work, pace online discussions, experiment with new ideas
2. Technical skills - use software to facilitate student interaction by monitoring student messages and create conferencing opportunities
3. Online communication skills - able to effectively interact with students by using concise and clear messages that encourage academic dialog and personalize the online experience
4. Content expertise - credible subject matter knowledge and experience to share comments/questions that stimulate lively debate
5. Personal characteristics - able to adapt to different teaching situations and demonstrates a genuine excitement about online learning
The five facilitator skills provide an excellent overview of distance educator competencies. The educational community can use the facilitator skills in a variety of ways: instructional design specialists that are creating online curriculum materials help assist distance educator administrators who are recruiting online personnel, trainers of online faculty members who need guidelines to help them make accurate assessments and individual instructors who want to develop a professional development plan.
(https://www.itdl.org/journal/Jan_04/article06.htm)
2. Translate the text from Russian into English in writing and discuss variants of translation with your groupmates.