Week 2 - IDT 8092

Busy week.

I started with 20 articles on Sunday and now have a total of 60 to support my literature review. I've learned a LOT of my topic, which is a good thing. It feels like I'm becoming an expert on the topic of adaptive learning/intelligent tutoring systems/computer-assisted instruction as it relates to math in grades K-12. Expert sounds and feels a little arrogant after only 2 weeks of intensive research, especially as I read the work of several key individuals who have obviously dedicated much of their lives to researching the topic. Maybe I should say I know a lot more about the topic today than I did 2 weeks ago. I'm sure I'll know even more by the end of the month.

I've also learned a lot about the process of finding articles. Google Scholar was my friend this week. The "Cited by" link provided me with insight into how many times the article was referenced in other works. The hyperlink continued to open doors to new articles, reports, and authors. I know other databases (Scopus) has this "cited by" hyperlink feature, but Google Scholar just worked for well for me.

A week ago I was thinking, I'm not sure how I'm going to find 60 articles. Now my thought is when will it end. If I had more time, I could probably find another 60 articles. (Please, Dr. Weaver, don't make us do that.) Granted a lot of this comes down to finding articles that specifically address my guiding research questions. Many articles touch on elements or begin to take me down different paths. Keeping my guiding questions in mind is important. I know that. I'm not sure I'm always good at doing it.

A couple key takeaways from the week:

1. I created a Google Form to capture my notes on the articles I was reading. The fields on the form are based on what Dr. Weaver was looking for, guidance from my advisor, Dr. Mims, and a few things I added. Capturing info for all of those fields probably took extra time, but I'm hoping having all of the data in a spreadsheet helps as I identify themes and begin writing. The spreadsheet allowed me to do interesting things like create the graph below with a few clicks. I'm not sure how useful it is, but it's interesting.



2. On Thursday I paused (briefly) from reading articles and created a very quick outline of my themes and possible flow for my paper based on my research questions and what I had read thus far. I used that outline to help guide me on my last 20 articles. That seemed to really help. I was able to quickly identify areas that I didn't have very much evidence to support my questions.

I'm glad I have 60 articles, but now I think the difficult part begins -- writing and trying to make sense of all of it.