Pilot Observation

Pilot Observaion

Having read various other blogs from fellow BAPP students, and focussing on which direction my enquiry plan should take next, I have decided it appropriate to pilot an observation with the intension of using this tool a way of data collecting for my enquiry.

I have decided, with specific help from Stephanie and Adesola, to focus my observations on a group of dancers who use Ludus dance on a regular practise. They are members of the Ludus Youth Dance troupe, a mix of female and males, the youngest being 19 and the eldest being 21. (Although Ludus works in conjunction with much younger age ranges a swell, conducting an pilot observation involving under 16’s was inappropriate without ensuring the correct ethical codes are adhered too. I simply did not have time to gather parental consent before conducting this observation – (however this will be something I need to consider for my actually enquiry.)

The group itself were taking part in a workshop class which took place over a few days, my observations were things I noticed during the middle day of the dance programme. Perhaps to gain a more in depth analysis of behaviours and attitudes observed I could have compared observation notes from day one until day 3, to note any significant changes as the programme went on.

The group were made a wear I was observing them, but it was stressed that it was not meant as an invasive process. I was not there to observe them, or their abilities, the aim of my enquiry being one where I hope to establish an insight into what dance means to them as the grounding foundation, and that as a researcher who only works for Ludus on a monthly basis, I may be able to expose new/fresh ideas which one often does not see when a structured day to day practise consumes them.

Explanation to the members of Ludus (both teachers and students and the company’s organisational team) was given about my ethical stance remains in the boundaries of the organisations code of conduct and in my application of my knowledge of their official child protection policies.

Important to remember when conducting observations, as an ‘insider researcher’ who had personal interest in dance, I may be inclined to want to pre-judge behaviours and assume people will act in a similar way or share attitudes similar to mine. Thought needed to go into how I remain un judgemental and objective. The benefits to being an ‘insider’ however are important to my enquiry’s effective development, often insiders understand the significance of what is happening because ‘they are very much in tune with the context’. (Campbell et al, 2004, P94) Being relatively new to the Ludus company, keeping an unstructured approach to observations seemed to be the most beneficial. Being a new face, establishing that my aims are as a researcher are ones of ‘good will’ prevented me from not witnessing normal practise in the workplace.

I used a method of taking field notes for the pilot, noticing behaviours on how the group walked into the room to their inter interaction to each other, their attitudes to the dance tasks set, their behaviours and how they changed at the day progressed to finally noting mood and attitudes upon finishing their busy dancing day. To really define what dance means to them, making record of interactions with the movements tasks during the dance class was really revealing, I would want to expand on this further to develop my enquiry in the future.

Observing as an enquiry tool will be beneficial to me to use in the next module, relative to the theory of triangulation, the beauty of the efficiency of the observations is that they facilitate means to ‘gather field notes which can be contextualised by background notes and are often supplemented by gathering data by other methods such as interviews’ (Hitchcock, 1989: 67). As I am already envisaging conducting interviews for  my plan, piloting in tandem these two tools has given light to how they can help each other to research and record broad ranges of mixed data.

Has anyone else conducted an observation? Have you seen links between the benefits of using observations and interviews hand in hand, research from one informing another?