Slowly but surely I am starting to gather a number of participants – slowly being the key word. So far, I’ve tested seven people and I hope to test three or four more this upcoming Monday. Unfortunately, working around summer jobs in two time zones makes scheduling tough. The current game plan is to simply accept groups of two and three if necessary, but to aim for groups of four. Though this definitely helps with scheduling, it will change the resulting data. I’m not quite sure yet how the data will be different, but data is data nonetheless!
In the meantime, I’ll be learning to use that classroom mapping program this week, (our original meeting was pushed back), and have been transcribing the Zoom recordings from my first two trials. It’s so weird to listen to my own voice, but it will no doubt improve my public speaking skills! (Who knew I used ‘ummm’ so much?) With luck though I’ll have a few more groups to practice with – just as soon as I get the participants.
Hi Adeline, I totally understand that different time zones makes scheduling hard, especially when we want to schedule a time when everybody is awake but not too early or too late in their times. To try to solve this problem, probably you can use when2meet.com. You could ask them to fill out their available times according to your time zone and it will tell you when exactly all of your participants are available. Hope it helps! Good luck with your next sessions!
I absolutely agree that listening to yourself talk in the recordings is super weird. I find it pretty uncomfortable personally. But I know that being recorded is worth it if it means getting interesting data! I hope transcribing and mapping is going well, and that the monotony is not driving you up the wall too much 🙂
Hello Adeline,
Time management is certainly difficult with these different time zones, but it sounds like things are moving along for you which is great! I also realized as I have been talking to participants just how much I say ‘ummm’, but it is such a tough habit to break. I hope that all of your analysis and continued work with your participants goes well!
Good luck!