October 6 Selecting questions and learning how to interview

Every student has created a list of 20 questions (and categories?) she or he would like to ask of their interviewees. Now we need to boil this down to a core of twelve questions that each of you will be asking. Of course, you can add and modify. These are just the core questions that will make interviews comparable.
I will ask you to organize yourselves into groups and come up with the final questions today. After that, we will sit in a circle and discuss interview techniques. And practice them.

Editable document for interview questions: here

Objectives and questions for the interviews

When writing your questions, please be sure

• not to lead (manipulating the questions; "And how do you like it here in the great US of A", or "You must certainly think..."

• to allow the interviewee to ask questions of you

• to wind down the conversation slowly (you could ask whether your interviewee would like to add thoughts and ideas that you did not ask for, you could invite them to ask you questions, etc.)

• to thank your interviewee for the time and effort invested on your behalf

Each interview will have four components:

1. A country report (1-2 pages) about the country or region that your interviewee calls home

2. A process description: How did you prepare, conduct, record and transcribe the interview?

3. A transcript of the interview (you may adjust words and sentences, make mild editing choices where sentences are incomplete on the tape, etc)

4. A personal review what you thought about that interview, what was new and exciting, or what disappointed you. Here you compare what happened to your objectives, and draw conclusions.

Q&A with respect to interviews:

Q-How many interviews with international students do I have to conduct and record?  

Answer: 3

Q-Do I have to transcribe all three?  

Answer: You may deselect the weakest one and only transcribe the two best interviews.

QWhat do I post if I de-select one interview?  

Answer: You post the country report, the description of the preparation process, your objectives, and the explanation why you chose not to transcribe this interview. Then you post all of that minus the transcript.

Day 6 - Sept. 29, continued grammar presentations

Today, we will enjoy the remaining 14 presentations and then take a closer look at MLA-style quotations. Your handout will show the correct use of MLA-style quotes, in-text references, works-cited pages, and other pertaining information. This is just one example and does not force you to use that style. APA, Chicago, other disciplinary requirements of your mayor determine which style you have to use.
If in doubt, here is the nutshell version (that you are expected to know by heart):
1. I must cite my sources.
2. I must say who wrote it, what the title is, who published it and where and when it was published.

Next week, we will start on preparing interviews. For that purpose, think of 20 questions that you could ask your interviewee and Add two or three sentences after each question providing the reasons, why you would ask that.
Example:
1. What are schools like in your country?
I want to learn about the different levels of schools from elementary to university, and how old students are. I want to know how satisfied the interviewee is with her education at home.
2. Do you have lunch programs in schools?
I want to understand where students eat, what they eat, and how often they eat outside their home.
3. How old are people in your country by the time they get married?
I want to know how long young people wait with marriage, when they think the time and conditions are right, and where they live, once married.

Day 5 Grammar presentations

By noon today, all students had to post their LEO topics and prepare a 5-minute class presentation. This presentation needs to be posted on the blog today. Students who have the note "no Leo" behind their names did not complete this task and receive a failing grade for this activity.
Homework for next week is the topic from LEO
begin clip

I'm writing a research paper and want help with citing and using sources.

• I need to know more about the basics of citing sources.
I have questions about when I should cite my sources. I need to know what plagiarism is and how I can avoid it.
• I need details about APA Style.
I'm specifically interested in APA in-text citations. I'm specifically interested in an APA References page.
• I need details about MLA Style.
I'm specifically interested in MLA in-text citations. I'm specifically interested in an MLA Works Cited page.
• I need help with writing citations for online sources.
• I need to know more about using sources.
I have questions about using quotations and punctuating quotations. I have questions about paraphrasing sources. I need help with introducing and integrating source material into my papers. I need help with an annotated bibliography.

end clip. Source: http://leo.stcloudstate.edu/#introtags (Sept 21, 2011)
Pay particular attention to the APA examples from LEO:

begin clip

Placement of Citations for Quoted Material

Specific page numbers for paraphrased or quoted material appear within the parenthetical citation following the abbreviation for page (p.). The location of the parenthetical citation for a quote depends upon the placement of quoted material within the sentence:

• If the quotation appears in midsentence, insert the final quotation mark, followed by the parenthetical citation; then complete the sentence.

  Branscomb (1998) argues that "it's a good idea to lurk (i.e., read all the messages without contributing anything) for a few weeks, to ensure that you don't break any of the rules of netiquette" (p. 7) when you join a listserv.

• If the quotation appears at the end of the sentence, insert the final quotation mark, followed by the parenthetical citation and the end punctuation:

  Branscomb (1998) argues that when you join a listserv, "it's a good idea to lurk (i.e., read all the messages without contributing anything) for a few weeks, to ensure that you don't break any of the rules of netiquette" (p. 7).

• If the quotation is long (40 words or more), it should be formatted as a block quotation, and the parentheses should appear after the final punctuation mark:

  Bolles (2000) argues that the most effective job hunting method is what he calls the creative job hunting approach: figuring out your best skills, and favorite knowledges, and then researching any employer that interests you, before approaching that organization and arranging, through your contacts, to see the person there who has the power to hire you for the position you are interested in. This method, faithfully followed, leads to a job for 86 out of every 100 job-hunters who try it. (57)

  end clip. source: http://leo.stcloudstate.edu/research/apaintext.html
  

Today's (Sept. 22) presentations by students:

Faisal needs to be connected
Abduraham Hassan

Rukhshod
Alghofaili, Majed I
Alotaibi, Eid M
Cai, Hanquan
Chen, Hanqiong
Coughlin, Timothy J
Crawford, Devon R
Girmay, Berekti K
Gu, Zhen
Isham, Jared N no Leo
Mutwa, Martha
Pan, Jiayin
Pokharel, Eliza no Leo
Qian, Wenda
Ren, Qing
Ren, Xiang
Schnapp, Brice H
Schnettler, Jena R
Shen, JiaLun
Wu, Wenjun
Xu, Cheng
Yu, Huan
Zhu, Xian
Sapkota, Puspak

Your blog needs to be complete for each class

Please be sure to post the homework at all times. When I ask you to pick a topic from LEO, you are expected to peruse the topics, read many of the offerings, and pick what you may need for your personal improvement. Then you have to post that choice and the reason why you picked it on your blog.
By now, each student should have at least the following posts on their blogs:
inventory
story-in-a-box
criteria
LEO topic selection.
Furthermore, you should have read and rated all stories and entered your ratings on the class sheet. Then you should have entered your top three in the list. You should be able to talk to the class today about the LEO topic your selected, and start preparing a presentation on that topic for in two weeks (9-22).

Day 3 Sept 8

You have read all stories and evaluated them. You have entered the values of totals achieved by each student in the document here.
You are ready to explore LEO. Find it in the right margin of this blog.

Day 2 --Groups for work on parameters

1Abdullaev, Rukhshod K

2Abdurahman, Hassan

3Alfayez, Faisal A

4Alghofaili, Majed I

5Alotaibi, Eid M 6Cai, Hanquan

1Chen, Hanqiong 2Coughlin, Timothy J


3Crawford, Devon R

4Girmay, Berekti K 5Gu, Zhen 6Isham, Jared N

1Mutwa, Martha

2Pan, Jiayin

3Pokharel, Eliza

4Qian, Wenda
5Ren, Qing 6Ren, Xiang 1Schnapp, Brice H

2Schnettler, Jena R 3Shen, JiaLun

4Wu, Wenjun 5Xu, Cheng

6Yu, Huan 1Zhu, Xian

2Sapkota, Puspak

Six groups determined the following parameters: here
Final for our class:
Criterion 1: Creative use of the 12 items (5 Points)
Criterion 2: Interest (4 Points)
Criterion 3: Organization/Structure (3 Points)
Criterion 4: Flow (2 Points)
Criterion 5: Grammar/Spelling (1 Point)

Day 2, Sept 1

Your blog must be up and running by now and your Story-in-a-box posted. In many cases the story is written as one block of text, no headers, etc. Let's now change the appearance of our story to feature the following:
Introductory paragraph: explain in abstract form what will follow. "This story is about..."
Then some white space.
Then a title
Story-in-a-box (new line)
title of your story
Then create paragraphs. Most students have about one to one and a half pages of text. Break it up into five to six paragraphs.
How does it look now? Turn to your classmates and get their critique.

--------
You already read a few stories. But now, after the editing has been completed, we need to establish criteria for evaluation and read and rate them all. The winner will get the bonus.

Criteria: ___ examples and entry form for group suggestions for final parameters to be used by all: here
Entry form for all student scores: here
Entry form for the three highest scores: here
--------

Homework for next week: peruse the LEO website and select a topic that interest you. Study it and create a blog post with examples of the topic. Be prepared to show all of us what you posted, and explain what you learned about your "problem" topic. Please note: We will start at 6PM next week, not at five PM. Same location one hour later (due to my work in the Twin Cities until 4PM).