advanced research method short course day 2

we learned about formulating statement of problem, research questions and research objectives today, presented by PM Dr Zaidatun Tasir. she's really good, energetic, and we had some meaningful activities to enhance our understanding of the topic. she showed us step-by-step how to produce not only ordinary but unique RQs & ROs. she also touched on theoretical framework, conceptual framework, and research/operational framework, and showed how those frameworks look like.

later in the afternoon, we learned about theoretical & conceptual framework, by another speaker. (i couldn't concentrate because i was so sleepy and i thought what the speaker told us was similar to what the previous session has done. and i think the previous speaker did it way better.

i also met some other teslians and am i glad to know that i'm not lonely! now i've got some circle of friends to talk to, discuss, and share things (academically, of course).

ok.. tomorrow is for quantitative research lessons. i really look forward to that ;)

advanced research method short course day 1

what a long day today! yeah, this week will be fully occupied with the short course for all research students in the faculty of education. since i'm only in my first semester, i need to attend this course. today, the first topic was the overview of the research, presented by Prof Dr Rashid. It's early in the morning but he has successfully made all of us wide awake with his style of presentation. no ppt slides. no use of projector. no notes that he referred to. 'chalk and talk' was his approach, but WOW! it was really good. i learnt a lot today from his 2 hour session. he showed us how mindmapping could help research students in producing all the important components in the proposal. he also showed the 'funnel' way to organise the background of problem, review of literature, statement of problem, research questions, objectives, and significance of problem.
one simple question - who is the reader of the proposal?

after the break, the 2nd topic is about plagiarism. i've attended this talk previously by the same speaker. frustratingly, he used the same slides today and his previous talk. and the content was the same. the style was the same. frankly but sorry to say, i did not learn anything new in this session.

after lunch, the topic is 'literature review', presented by Prof Ismail Kailani. He's my lecturer in Leadership class, and today, he looks really different. Leadership class is on Friday so he puts on baju melayu, but today, he's in formal attire, without songkok :). this topic is important, but probably because it's in the afternoon, and everyone is full, the class was a bit quiet. and Prof mentioned it clearly, that he knew the topic is boring and all looked bored. hmmmmm.....

besides that, i also met Dr Yusof to get the supervisory book for my SVs. then I met Dr Mahani and we talked about the conference in Spain. I also had the chance to discuss with other students about their research, and they said they want to learn more from me (which made me LOL!)

but, one of the sweetest things is that, i dont drive today. my dad, yes, my dad sent me to the uni. it feels like when i was still a child when my dad sent me to school. and yes, he fetched me up when i finished at 5, and he was still in his Imam's attire! terima kasih, Papa!

i look forward to tomorrow's session ;)


 

finally!

alhamdulillah, finally i completed the first draft of the proposal. sent it to my SVs. also, filled in the 1st semester progress report. what's next? submit abstract to a conference in Spain. deadline is 7th December. Allahuakbar!

email from SV

yes, early in the morning, i received an email from my respectable SVs! normally i am the one who send email to them. what does it mean? i've been pretty quiet for some time, that's why. but that doesn't mean i did not do any work. i do. ;)

ok in the email, of course, the important message is that i have to work on something for a forthcoming conference - deadline for abstract - 7th December! can make it or not? a week from now. fuhhh....!!!

'Ya Allah, tidak ada kemudahan kecuali sesuatu yang Engkau permudahkan, Engkau menjadikan kedukaan itu mudah sekiranya Engkau kehendaki.'

Amin.

the SILVER, that is!

i participated in the respectful research & innovation competition (R&I Compete 2011) organised by the Office of Research, Innovation, & Commercialisation (oricc) of my workplace (23rd-24th Nov). my poster was under the category of research, sub-discipline of Humanities, Social science, and mathematics. there were about 20 entries for this category. i presented about my research, funded by the short-grant given by the university, here's my poster:

panel no. 61

and here's what i won:

silver medal

and hamper - the larger one

silver is mine, bronze in my husband's

presented by Dato' VC, and Deputy VC of R&D

my husband also participated, his was under innovation category, sub-discipline of fundamental science. he won bronze, but, there was no silver or gold winner in that category. in my case, there was no winner for gold, which implied, (i could have been the gold winner, instead!).

this is my first time joining such event, and i was thrilled. and the most memorable part is i won!. i will surely do much better next time, and congratulations to my hubby too!!

self-managed teams

this is the topic that my partner & i must present for our leadership class. it went well, we had group activities for about half an hour, and another half an hour we reflected and gave some theories underpinning the activities. i personally was impressed with the groups' commitment and they showed high competitive level to complete the task within the limited time. here are some photos of the event.

team 5 - the 'top management'

team 4 - the 'research group'

team 3 - the 'writing centre'

team 1 - the 'technical group'

our respectable lecturer - Prof Dr Ismail Kailani

team 2 - the 'postgraduate committee members'

those photos were during meetings that they have to conduct. the following photos were during presentation: (note: the photo upload did not work at the moment, so i may insert the photos later).

and i also ordered breakfast for the whole class! happy faces!

important dates

the latest information from FP (miss Herda) is that the deadline for the SV to submit progress report will be on 15th January 2012, which means I have to submit it earlier to my svs.
on 14-15th December, i need to attend EDUPRESS, the faculty of Education postgraduate research seminar. on the 7th is the deadline to register.
on 23rd December, i have to give a short talk about leadership.
by 3rd January 2012, i have to submit portfolio for leadership course.
hmmmmm.......

almost there!

alhamdulillah, i've finally almost completed chapter 2 (draft only, though). but at least, there is some kind of 'skeleton' to it. so, i hope, insyaAllah, i can submit all the three this Friday. come on! i can do it!

log book

ok, today i borrowed the psm log book from mr norihan (he's a kind man). it contains all the information about psm - regulations, objectives, daily activities, assessment, but it doesn't mention about writing the report. i need to get hold of the university's thesis writing guideline elsewhere.

on the other hand, i still haven't found time to scan the psm that i borrowed earlier. i was quite occupied drafting review of literature. at this point i just managed to write 2 pages only. 2 pages only???. My next deadline is wednesday next week, i have to submit the first draft to my SVs.

while browsing the conference alerts (www.conferencealerts.com) just now, i found some interesting conferences coming ahead. i'm eyeing on the one organised by UPM, called MICOLLAC from this site: http://www.fbmk.upm.edu.my/micollac/. i'm attracted to its keynote speaker, Prof Bhatia (whose work I cite a lot in mine), i hope i get the chance to meet him in-person. But, of course, i need to write something first!

ok, till then, i need to work more...

progress

alhamdulillah i have completed the first draft of chapter 1 & 3 today. next, i must work on literature review. in the mean time, let's celebrate eidul adha first!

earlier this morning i attended the second workshop by dr sheila on 'writing for publication'. one of the things i was inspired about is that, she wanted us to write on daily basis, try to write 500 words a day. it will become a good habit and that we'll be more proficient in the skill and be a much confident writer.

(well, blogging is a good start, right?).

fkmp pusat sumber

it wasn't really fruitful day today...heavy head, backache, were 2 major reasons i stayed in bed. only after noon that i managed to get up, after hot shower and felt fresh again, i started working. i visited the faculty's resource room again, this time, hunting for more psms and focus on the 'thick' ones. there were some students in that room and they were not allowed to borrow the theses since next week is their semester break. when i heard the technician said that, i was a bit down (because i badly need those to bring home). when all the students were out, i asked politely, and he said, that rule is meant for students only, but not to academic staff, and i was relief!

i spent 3 hours in there, from one shelf to another, picked one, skimmed and scanned, then put it back if it did not match my criteria, and picked another one, skimmed and scanned again and the process went on until i was quite satisfied with my 7 choices. i 'stick-the highlighters-on' each page that i want to focus.

later at night, i checked on the university's calendar, only to find that 28th November is the deadline for progress report submission!!! (puff puff puff... i must work harder...)

dr sheila's talk

as planned i attended the talk entitled 'narrative inquiry research' by dr sheila trahar of GSoE, UoBristol UK today. i recorded the lecture and used my IrisNotes for the first time to jot down the main points. It looks good until i upload the files, i did not realise that i must push that little button everytime i write on the new page! so the result was, my 6 pages written notes were actually only in 1 page of the IrisNotes!! what a waste, it could not convert my handwriting to text as everything was overlapping. ok, that is a lesson for me, next time around, make sure to push that little button, must remember that. nevertheless, the voice recording was brilliant, i have successfully uploaded the audio file and listen to it over.

narrative inquiry is when a researcher is interested in stories with a purpose, and how the stories are influenced by the socio-cultural context, historical background, and it provides rich, in-depth data acquired from series of conversations between the researcher and the participants.

it feels good when opportunity like this comes as today i feel like i am really a student. the special impact it has when someone from the university i used to study and the place i used to live for 4 years talks about research. (now i wish i could study abroad, oh come on, don't start it). on friday, i will attend another talk by her, entitled 'writing for publication' at 9-10.30. i actually have a class at the same time, but i'm sure prof ismail will be ok if i come to his class a bit later (fingers-crossed).

after the session, i had some chats with her, and with dr mahani, her x-phd student in bristol. dr sheila gave some helpful insights about what i intend to do, and most importantly, i must read more and more and more (i'm now in the 2nd month of this journey, mind you).

well, that was a lovely day i had. and tonight, i feel much motivated to do some more work, and plan for tomorrow. :)

as on the 1st Nov 2011 (1.11.11)

at this point, i don't think i progress that well. yes my EndNote's list has multiplied, my printed articles to be read have grown, but not so much readings have been done yet. it took me ages to finish and understand a single paper. and i'm due to hand in the first draft of the 3 chapters to my supervisors mid of this month.
and yes, tomorrow i'm attending a talk by Dr Sheila Trahar of University of Bristol, who is the visiting professor of the faculty where i study. i really look forward to it, hoping that i will learn something new and that it will motivate me to do my work faster!

no progress

no progress at all this week. what i did was only photocopying some of materials and samples of psm, that's all. i am down with 'headache' that prevented me from reading and doing any work at all.

EndNote

masyaAllah... this is really testing my patience... i should've started doing this a long time ago. but, taking it positively, better do it now before it is too late... just that i need to be consistent with that. remember, everytime i  find new articles or books, include them in EndNote.

progress

after the meeting on wednesday, i've started to work hard again (with fresh ideas in mind). but i guess i am rather slow when i realised i managed to read only 2 articles by Bhatia & Hyland & Tse and came up with a paragraph of significance of my research on thursday nite.

got to work harder after this.

3rd meeting

alhamdulillah the meeting today was a fruitful one. firstly, i handed a file each for my both SVs that contain my mapping of what i plan to do, a sample form of psm proposal, together with 7 sample of psm2. then, we had further discussions about what i want to do for this research. i refer to the mapping as well as the previous diagram that i emailed to them earlier. it could be said that all three of us have finally 'aligned' our thinking for this research, which i feel is a great relief. of course i must work hard for this. i was also given a book about literature review & conceptual framework, and also a very recent phd thesis whom the supervisors are bhatia & flowerdew. and again i have to read those as well. we also resolved the research questions issues and the scope of the study.
now i'm given a month to read further and write up something too - the basic components of a proposal.
please pray for my endurance in doing this :)

postpone

early this morning i received a text from my main SV, saying that the meeting scheduled later in the afternoon would be postponed to another date. she was on her way to Perak to attend HRH Raja Zarith Sofia's mom's funeral. Al-fatihah... my condolence to the university's chancellor.

and me - i promised to send my prepared work to my 2nd sv. But, that is still pending, will do it tomorrow.

words of courage

i came across this from a professor while surfing, it says something like this, i can't remember the exact phrase;

"every morning we have 2 choices: to wake up and chase our dreams, or to continue sleeping and dreaming; the choice is ours"

my progress

i managed to discuss with the psm coordinator and also visited the faculty resource room to have clearer perspectives on psm. both persons-in-charge are very helpful in providing information and very cooperative at this initial stage. i seriously hope that they will permit my further 'nosy business' in the near future to their job. i've also prepared a summary of my findings to both my SVs, but i still havent got their reply till today. so, i have to proceed with what i have in mind now, and i hope i'm on the right track. my SVs said, it's my research after all and i have to live with it for the next 3 years.
at this stage, i must read a lot and i'd say it is a daunting job to do. really it is. i salute those who could produce 20 pages of references in their thesis or research articles as such how do they find time to read. is there any tip for speed reading? do they skim and scan?

on the other side of my field journey, i also have to attend dynamics of leadership class. it's a 3 credits course, but good news, there is no final exam for this course. it's beyond my imagination if i were to sit for an exam, i haven't done that for such a long long time... last Friday was the 2nd week of this course. i met new faces, majority of them are very young, some just graduated from their degree the previous weekend. they were curious about me (as i'm the eldest in the class). they asked questions about my age, my marital status, my children, my study, my job, which made me feel awkward. ok, i must not think them as my students, but they are my classmates, that's the fact!. another interesting part is that, the professor teaching this class is my mom's schoolmate!

ok, come back to my progress. at this point, i have read about 12 articles, in which i have summarized them all in a table containing authors' names, what the research is about, methodology, participants, and significant findings. but, i don't know how to do conceptual framework. where could i find conceptual framework? is it from reading the articles? is it from theories of teaching & learning, or from research methodology perspectives? i don't know. i have yet to find out.

as for today, i did not do any serious reading. i just browsed and searched for more information about the topic i'm investigating. but my husband always says this: 'kalau buku banyak atas meja & journals belambak dlm pendrive, tp tak baca, pun tak guna juga. biarlah tak banyak, tapi baca dan fahamkan betul2 apa yang ditulis, dan sangat2 berguna utk kajian kita'. ok, he is right!.

2nd meeting

it was on Monday, 18th September, where the 3 of us met together and discussed further about my proposal. There are several issues raised by the SVs, and the most important question thrown was: 'What do you want to do actually?'. And that question received quite detailed answer from me. But after that, they suggested that I should have focus, and not trying to do lots of things within a limited time.
They also wanted me to do lots of readings. Ok, a month is given. Then i must see them again with something.

This week, this is what I have been doing:
1. searched related journal articles as many as possible
2. borrowed 10 books from the library - they are mainly on research methodology, case studies, theoretical frameworks, genre, EAP, ESP.
3. bought a new set of PC and printer (that I'm using now), external HD, A4 papers and other stationery.
4. contacted 3 lecturers from FKMP and asked about their conduct of PSM. had discussions with them which I would then inform my SVs of the outcomes.

5. will be seeing the faculty PSM coordinator to discuss further about my project (set on Thursday, 22/9, 2.30p.m)
6. will report to my SVs of the discussion outcomes withe the coordinator.
7. will continue reading and reading and reading....

on Plagiarism

Of course, this is a very important issue for any academician (in this context). so, this topic was firstly emphasised by AP Dr Bambang of FP, in his seminar (Wed, 14/9) regarding plagiarism and the implications of it. not many attended the seminar, i counted about less than 20. he told that plagiarism can be in several forms, such as, word-by-word, ideas, authorship, secondary sources, thesaurus (inappropriate paraphrasing), images & other media, as well as self-plagiarism. I was attracted to the last type, 'self-plagiarism', which means that a writer uses his own writing which has been published previously in his current writing without acknowledging the source (i.e. he as the writer). So if i have published somewhere and I want to mention that in my current paper, i've got to write '(Ahmad, 2011), in her research....' to prevent 'self-plagiarism'.
UTM bought the license of plagiarism detection software called 'turnitin', which can be found at www.turnitin.com for staff & students use. It is the regulation of SPS that 20% is the maximum index of plagiarism of any paper or assignment or thesis submitted for evaluation purpose. While for FP, only 10% maximum is allowed.
I've yet to request for the ID & pin for this software from the administrator. But I had the chance to see how it works when Dr Bambang showed some samples of his students' papers. The software intelligently identifies & compares what we write with the original, together with the exact location of the source where we cut & paste it from, and then calculates the index. Isn't it smart?

1st meeting

the 1st meeting with 2nd SV yesterday was quite fruitful. she suggested some books about qualitative research, writing strategies and genre studies which could be found from the library. and she wanted me to read some journal articles related to that and gave me a month to come out with the synthesis. but there were some errors here and there about my preliminary proposal that she was not happy with, and for that, i will have to wait till Monday 19th September for further explanation. to sum up:
1. i should prepare the proposal (+- 100 pgs) for the presentation & assessment purpose with writing a thesis in mind, and that i must have it assessed after a year (deadline Sept 2012).
2. meet both svs fortnightly and give them something to read prior to that

3. remind me that thesis writing should be done 1 year solid

Later I met 1st sv, and told her the outcome of the meeting with 2nd sv. she agreed to many and need further discussion on some matters.

Ok, i'm off now to search for those mentioned above. May Allah shower me with His love & mercy.

it's official!

Alhamdulillah i'm now officially a student venturing into the highest level of education at one of the RUs in Malaysia. The registration was on Tuesday, 6th September, and there were lots of new postgraduates in the hall for the same purpose. Not only Malaysians but also those from Iran, Libya, Pakistan, (just to name a few) were seen hoovering the place. I'm impressed by the way the university officers on duty handled the quite chaotic situation especially when it involved these international students. The officers could effortlessly explained in English, gave instructions, and above all, were so cool (& patient) though at warm temperature of the hall.

Speech by Dato' VC was so inspiring. I've never seen a VC so comfortable speaking in front of 600+ students as if he was 'talking' to us rather than 'reading' the speech prepared for him. He was fast, dynamic, sometimes funny, but at time assertive. No singing of 'Negaraku' or the university's anthem prior or after the event. He arrived at 10 sharp, and finished his briefing an hour later, walked off quickly and smiled to all of us on his way out of the hall.

Briefings by the head of librarian and IT manager were also conducted in English. I'm again impressed that they could explain it well in that language.

Meeting my supervisor. That afternoon I was called to her office, which is in the same location of Dato' VC's. Again, i'm impressed. Someone waits behind the desk just in front of the room and asked whether I have the appointment. Yes, i replied and she pushed a button and the door automatically opens. That makes me : 'wah, security lock!' 

My supervisor is a beautiful lady. We discussed things related to the journey of my study. She would like to see me fortnightly. And she wanted me to read these 2 PhD thesis available in the library. And she wanted me to be proactive and work hard. She is a busy person. With an important role in the university. Because of that, I have a co-supervisor. I don't mind, as long as they supervise my work here, I am already grateful.

I have some fond memories of this university. 11 years ago, I was offered to become a tutor here. But I declined the offer as at the same time I have started working in the place I work now. In 2002, I did my master part-time but quit before the first semester ended, as I got the offer to study in Bristol. But, who knows, Allah the AlMighty knows better, I come back to this place to attain something more.

I also met several familiar faces here. I met Cik Din (from the Bursary), Cik Ram (from the Registrar Office), Dr Mahani (whom I know from Bristol), Aida (my ex-schoolmate in KTAM), and I am yet to find some others like Yanti (ex-primary schoolmate), Nazrinda (librarian), Dr Zairus (I know her from Bristol), Dr Zainudin (also from Bristol), Dr Narina (ditto), Dr Ety (my ex-KTAM friend), Dr Salinda (now FKEE lecturer & my ex-primary schoolmate), Dayah (counsellor, from SMKAS), and probably many many more which I just have not discovered yet.

And most importantly, my family, never ending supports from mom & dad, and little sisters & brother, who live just next to the university where I will find place for lunch, dinner, and love during my stay at this university. My hubby, of course, a loyal soul-partner, even with his limitation has driven me miles and miles and my children though at small age always remind me to take care and say that they love me. These are my inspiration to work hard and to be successful in my new adventure here. I pray that Allah will shower me with His Love and Mercy and that my journey will be a smooth sailing and ends with a success.