Tianzhe's first week joining our project

I started my SURE programme on Tuesday formally. Meeting with the two supervisors, we discussed my plan for this programme and how to use the data. There are two strands of data, one is from the global strand and one is from the focus group in Sheffield. When I decided to attend this programme, I chose to analyse the data from the focus group and created a new project based on the collected data. However, during the meeting, I learned that the focus group data may not support me in my project. As a result, I was also provided with the data from the global strand. In the first week, my main task is to familiarise myself with the data by listening to the recordings and reading transcripts as well as using thematic analysis to code the relevant themes according to the following categories: “family’’, “the language talk in’’, “the language talk about’’ and “other important aspects’’. I was asked to finish this task by Friday and send it to my supervisors, they would listen to my explanation towards my codes the next week. 

I started my code work by looking at the 6 focus groups. Both of my supervisors advised me to use NViVO to code because this software can help me code these documents more easily. However, I did not know how to download it appropriately. Thus, I decided to use Google to code and tried my best to send these documents to my supervisors on time. When first interacting with the data, I felt very excited because this was the first time that I was allowed to access bigger data. Sometimes, I felt a little confused when coding the data because there were some aspects I was not very sure whether I should code according to my categories. Moreover, by listening to these young people’s descriptions, sometimes I felt interested and wanted to laugh together with them; sometimes I felt pity about their situation. Anyway, this interaction with the data made me feel more interested in my project. After my supervisors saw my work, they sent me useful advice. For example, Sabine suggested I code the data according to the research question, she also advised me to code the data according to more specific categories. This advice is very useful since it can help me use my data more conveniently when writing the publication. I will use it in my future dissertation writing. I also learned about how to use the N ViVO thanks to Yue’s advice. I tried to use their advice in my work and hope that I can represent my work clearly on Monday. 

Sabine also provided me with relevant articles. I am trying to engage myself with this one: Little, S., & Cheng, K. (2024). Digital funds of identity: understanding a young child's plurilingual development through mediagrams. Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching, 18(3), 208–222. https://doi.org/10.1080/17501229.2023.2276952. I feel that reading this article is not just learning about the relevant theories, but also a good way for me to know how to write my future publication properly. Although I have read some relevant articles before, I feel that this one can help me think of my project from a new perspective. Thus, I value this article significantly. 

This is what I did this week, for me, things are different from the past. Previously I regarded myself as an undergraduate student, but after starting this project, I felt more like a doctoral student. This feeling is interesting and I consider this project as a valuable experience for me to experience doctoral life in advance.