How can I enable a sense of connectedness among creative students through digital storytelling?
The aim of my research project was to investigate the power that digital storytelling has in supporting connectedness among creative students. My study touches on the power of community and belonging in engaging students in academic activities. This is based on the idea that connectedness among students may support their learning, and that feeling connected is an essential component of the student experience (Hehir et al., 2021).
As part of this, I am exploring connectedness as a collective experience with a creative output, and have defined engagement as the collaborative engagement of students with an online learning activity. The results of this study will inform the design of future digital learning activities for students engaged in online learning.
As part of the early planning stages of my action research project, I went through several iterations of different types of research questions. In fact, more than one question accurately captured my interest in digital storytelling. However, I wanted to make sure the research question was practical, achievable, and in line with our set project boundaries. While I remain incredibly interested in the idea of play as a disruptor with academic activities, and it would have been interesting to incorporate this element into my final research question, it would have expanded the scope of the project too much. It is without a doubt that my final storytelling activity will include a flavour of this, but I decided not to make it a focus of my investigation.
In addition, I wrote my research question in a way that it focused on my actions and my ability to make a positive change as a practitioner, rather than an evaluation of an entire field of study, hence the “How can I” part of the question. This means that my question is more reflective of my own practice, and the research project empowers me to implement changes directly within my own practice.
I also decided to focus on the idea of connectedness, rather than engagement or community, thinking about connection between individuals that could mean small-scale or large-scale connections amongst individuals.
And finally, I wanted to capture the idea of the creative student at the core of the activity, hence their explicit mention within the question.
McNiff and Whitehead (2002, p.7) raise a number of critical questions about conducting action research, which I found helpful in reviewing my research question, including: ‘What is my concern? Why am I concerned? What do I think I can do about it? What will I do?’ These reflective questions and my responses shaped the ultimate direction of my project as well as my overarching research question.
Open discussions with peers and tutors in the early part of the project also helped me review and reflect on some of my early questions. Seeing if questions made sense when being read out or seeing how others responded to some of my ideas was a helpful way of reviewing these.
- You can find out about how my early project planning helped me settle on a research question on my blog post about my rationale.
- You can read a short introduction about my wider practice on one of my first blog entries.
Bibliography
Hehir, E., Zeller, M., Luckhurst, J. and Chandler, T. (2021). Developing student connectedness under remote learning using digital resources: A systematic review. Education and Information Technologies, [online] 26(5), pp.6531–6548. doi:https://doi.org/10.1007/s10639021105771.
McNiff, J. and Whitehead, J. (2002). Action research: Principles and Practice. 2nd ed. London: RoutledgeFalmer.