Chapter 2 is rather boring: research methods. Yes, yes I know about case studies and surveys, and the problems there-in. Or so I think!
One of the things that I learned in my Philosophy course last term is that I do have a cursory understanding of lots of things, but not of the details, and my understanding isn't deep enough to actually talk intelligently about the topic: it's just all in there somewhere.
For example, this week I discovered my terms of reference are wrong. It turns out that there is a negative correlation between divorce in families and student academic achievement. At first I thought this meant there is *no* correlation, but a negative correlation is just as informative as a positive correlation; it just means that it's an inverse relationship.
I am still struggling with the completely online nature of this course. There are no planned interactions with anyone. Our only activity this week (other than reading the textbook and other suggested videos) is to study a research proposal and ask ourselves questions about it.
So, this time around, I'm wary that I need to do the work, and actually write things down. It's a completely different thing to draw it out of my mind into cogent statements.
It's interesting working with a digital textbook (kudos to Capilano for using a free digital textbook). This free textbook initiative is being provided through BC Campus' Open Textbook Collection.
I recall Clint Lalonde from BC Campus doing a talk on this at a BC-Net conference about 5 years ago. It's good to see it's come to fruition, saving a student close a $100 per book). The textbook has live html links, mostly to the BC Campus site for graphs, but also links to the famed Khan Academy site for specific and additional topics.
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