Exercise 4.1

1. My present research question is what is the process of using limited shared communicative resources to reach learning objectives in a higher education setting for native English speaking content instructors?

Setting that aside, I would say my present conceptual framework (as I understand it) is the combination of three theories: ICC (intercultural communication competence), CS (communicative strategies) from the field of second language acquisition, and intelligibility studies. If I were to represent it visually, I would probably use a Venn diagram. 

I don't think any of these concepts really address the phenomenon that I want to look at, which is the process of communicating cross-culturally that is both strategic and behavioral (versus knowledge and attitudes in ICC), and oriented toward non-linguistic learning objectives (not necessarily the focus of CS or intelligibility studies). I want to look at communication strategies that do not include traditional forms of language acquisition (such as vocabulary, accent, and grammar). I'm still struggling with how to describe this concept. For now I call it limited linguistic resources, but most people don't get that and I have to break it down every time. Maybe I should adopt the term "Communicative strategies" but what I really want to focus on is the resourcefulness of being able to achieve learning goals with few of the conventional tools of language (extensive vocabulary, shared accent, standard grammar of some kind). 

Honestly, I've thought about this a lot and I still like my research question.

2. I want my study to outline the natural strategies that teachers have come up with. I don't want to be limited by what three separate concept have told me might be those strategies, because I don't think the research that established those concepts were looking at quite the same thing.  

3. I am hoping to identify strategies that are used by teachers, determine whether those same strategies help students (different study), further define those strategies (grounded theory study??). Develop an instrument to measure those strategies. Test whether those strategies really aid learning objectives (quantitative study)... and maybe some day far down the road establish a theory and establish training for teachers in these kinds of skills. However, I can't do any of that until I've conducted this study first. 

4. I only have one question so far, but I suppose if that question is too simple, I can proceed to the next step (I think the step after a phenomenological study would be trying to do a grounded theory study...). 

5. I think I need the phenomenological approach, unless I got really ambitious and wanted to try to do a grounded theory approach. I plan to interview teachers and ask them to share their strategies with me. I expect I will also find epidemiological implications for why and how teachers choose to use those strategies. 

6. I come into this study with several strong biases. I believe that language is a tool rather than an ideal. I think I am naturally motivated to be strategic about the way I communicate which informs my research interests. This may mean that I am over emphasizing the importance of the phenomena I am looking for. Further, there is some questions about my data sample. If I interview teachers that I know, I might bias their answers because they know what I think about the topic.