A Group of Methods the Rapid Collection of Data - Assignment Example

I. Choice of ‘M’: M25

As I have learned from my experience teaching language and Arabic especially as a second language to my students, immediate feedback is necessary, because the topics build on each other, and because I believe that language teaching ought to be dynamic and relevant at every turn and moment of the teaching sessions. Because the teaching classes and topics build on one another, where a student or a group of students fail to grasp the essence of particular lessons, then they are unable to follow through to the rest of the sessions. This is problematic for those who are left behind. The only way to prevent this is to make sure that students are able to grasp the main lessons for the day. This is very hard to determine if evaluations and feedback occur infrequently. If the teacher only gives out periodic but infrequent assessments of student learning, then for many it might be too late, and interventions to correct the deficiencies in learning may be worthless as well. Mistakes and deficiencies in learning the nuances of a particular lesson must be corrected as they occur, in other words. Mistakes can pile up and the student can be left with less than optimal learning of the language as a result. It is therefore very important that the teacher has within his power the ability to gauge understanding and learning as the sessions unfold. The quick way to do this is via collection methods for data that are as prescribed in M25. The power of the M25 data collection modes is in the ability to be able to rapidly gather feedback and gauge progress in learning. This has very pragmatic applications in tuning the course work and the content and manner of the teaching of the language so that those are in line with the pace of learning of the students, and with the deficiencies that the students have as far as learning the new language is concerned (Data Collection, n.d., pp. 113-115).

As discussed above, also, I chose M25 because of the way the class sessions are structured, and also because from time to time I want to be able to revisit the learnings from previous sessions in order to reinforce them and to correct the deficiencies in the learning of my students. The M25 methods allow me to be able to find out just what the deficient areas are, and then tailor the review parts of the sessions to be able to tackle those areas that are deficient. Student inputs and feedback are very essential in this case (Data Collection, n.d., pp. 113-115).
III. How I Used M25

To gauge the effectiveness of the different methods, this researcher made use of all of the prescribed methods in M25 in different sessions. This is to gauge not only the effectiveness of the teaching methods and the level of progress of the students but also to get a feel of what methods work best in settings where students learn a second language in classroom settings. This is a two-edged purpose in other words. For different sessions I made use of 2 plus 2, the “Muddiest Point”, the “Minute Paper”, the “Plus-Minus-Question Mark”, and the RSQC2 (Data Collection, n.d., pp. 113-115).
IV. Sample Data

It is important to note that as far as getting feedback is concerned, the general structure of the M25 methods is not to be valued on their own, as much as the feedback quality of the students is. In this case, I encouraged students to comment as extensively and in a manner that is most free-flowing and convenient. In this regard, I find that the methods that have yielded the most useful insights and data are those that come from the plus-minus-question mark, muddiest point, and minute paper methods (Data Collection, n.d., pp. 113-115).

One sample set of data relating\ to the plus-minus-question mark method in one session is revealing for the kinds of detailed feedback that I was able to generate from the students. They are also revealing the many common elements in the feedback from the students. This to me reveals that the students are basically on the same page as far as progress in the lessons is concerned. This is also revealing in terms of what I am doing right and what areas I need to improve on as far as teaching and conducting the class sessions are concerned.