Research questions

In the last weeks I have been thinking about my research design and the methods which I am hoping to use. Gorard (2013) emphasises that research questions should be the beginning of every active research journey. My questions have evolved substantially over the first year of the PhD, but even the first thoughts on ‘film literacy’ have proven useful. Research needs research questions because ‘otherwise research is not really research at all, it is just data gathering’ (Gorard 2013, 36).

Gorard also argues that it is vital to divide an overarching research question into a series of puzzles, which are easier approachable and answerable. While my overarching research question could now be ‘Does the City of Film media literacy scheme have benefits to the students who are involved in it?’, I am really interested in the kind of benefits the scheme potentially offers and the reasons for this.

In accordance with my hypothesis above, the following sub-questions (or puzzles) have been phrased:

1)      What emotional impact does working with films in the classroom have on students? 2)      Is this impact connected to a motivation for writing and if yes, how so? 3)      Does the students’ engagement with the film literacy scheme impact on their writing scores and if yes, how so? 4)      What other potential benefits does the film literacy scheme have?

These questions have the advantage of drawing on a wide range of qualitative and quantitative research which will aid the triangulation process. I am also personally interested in their answers and feel connected to this research direction due to my personal believes and history.  In addition, I also have some potential answers in mind, which might prove beneficial to the warranting process (Gorard 2013).

To lighten the mood after all that heavy thinking, have a look at the wordl I made from the thesis as it is now: