6.2
Teaching Journal Entries Content Analysis
The whole process of Teaching Journal Entries Content Analysis took place in
five stages. The first stage focused on matching each lesson plan and its journal entry
format. The next stage focused on the process of dealing with the data themselves. The
data, from all the 25 Teaching Journals Entries formed together so called ´basic array´.
The third stage aimed at categorizing and coding, described more in detail in the
following chapter. Then the next stage, focusing on rereading the categories and codes,
was done. During this stage, some new relations and categories appeared. The last fifth
stage included putting all the research results into connections and displaying them in
PC Excel software format.
6.2.1 Categories and Codes in Teaching Journal Entries
All the 25 Teaching Journal Entries in PC format were read again, and only the
notes concerning both the topic of English pronunciation and young learners were
highlighted using two different colours, see appendix No.9. Green was used for
highlighting activities concerning English pronunciation, blue for activities concerning
young learners.
After completing the stage mentioned above, all the information-highlighted
green [information on English pronunciation] was read again and a PC format table,
with categories and codes, was created, see appendix No.13.
Categories were created according to the nature of activities. These categories
included ´presentation activities´, ´practice activities´, ´receptive activities´, ´productive
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activities´, ´activities aiming at segmental level´, ´activities aiming at supra-segmental
level´. ´Presentation activities´ were such activities done by the teacher, but were looked
at from the viewpoint of learners. ´Practice activities´, performed by pupils, were further
divided into ´receptive activities´ and ´productive activities´. Activities focusing on the
´segmental level´ were further sub-divided into the categories aiming at ´vowels´ and
´consonants´. The activities aiming at ´supra-segmental level´ were further sub-divided
into categories that focused on ´strong forms´, ´weak forms´, ´rhythm´, ´linking´,
´elision´, and ´intonation´ divided even more into ´intonation in affirmative sentences´,
´intonation in questions´ and ´intonation in short answers´.
After sorting all the data, the process of creating codes started. All the created
categories were to be matched with codes in order to compare them later on with the
stated evaluation criteria from the theoretical part of the thesis. The codes were invented
by combining letters and numbers. To be able to decode what each code letter or
number means, whole words or just their parts were written boldly, see appendix No.13.
To make the codes as easy to decode as possible most categories were matched often,
but of course not always, with their initial letters. To distinguish between the words
such as ´presentation´ and ´practise´, here the combination of two letters was invented,
see appendix No.13. Numbers were used to distinguish between the segmental and
supra-segmental level and between the elements on the supra-segmental level.
After creating the categories and codes on the level of English pronunciation
activities, the activities concerning information with respect to young learners´
developments, stated in the theoretical part of the thesis, was highlighted blue. After
highlighting, the categories and codes were created and typed into a PC Excel table, see
appendix No.14. It was much easier to create the categories here, as the total amount of
categories was much lower. The categories are ´activities involving senses´, ´activities
involving movement´, ´activities involving simple language structures´, and ´age-
suitable topic´.
While re-reading all the 25 Teaching Journal Entries, it was found that most
activities were coded both from the viewpoint of English pronunciation and young
learners at the same time. The rest of the activities focusing on young learners did not
focus on developing English pronunciation, for example they included transition actions
between individual lesson stages.
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After completing this stage, the obtained results were further sorted and put
together according the relations they suggested. This topic is discussed more in detail in
the following chapters.
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