December 2007 Archives

At the YRN launch conference there seemed to be a lot of issues and potential debate generated by the area of ethics and reserach. As a result we have decided to try and kick start traffic on this blog site by posting a regular ethical question. Dr Darren has come up with this one for you to get started:

Q1.  What have been the ethical dilemmas you have experienced doing research? For instance, you forgot to change the respondent’s name in a written report, you’ve lost interview tapes, you discussed interviews with friends and family, or maybe you filled-in your own questionnaires and past them off as someone else.  Let us know your ethical dilemmas and how you overcame them.

At last weeks Young Researcher Network launch conference Alex Farrow led a session in using online tools in peer-led research projects.

The session made use of a series of 'one page guides' to introduce the different tools available and many members of the network asked for them to be made more widely available - so here they are:

Google Earth

Using maps to explore local issues can be powerful - and 3D interactive mapping can really add to that. Google Earth is a free tools for viewing and annotating a 3D globe, with the ability to zoom right in to view a street-level satelite image of your area.

Download the Google Earth guide here (PDF)

You can also use the My Maps feature in Google Maps to record your views of your local area. This wasn't covered in the sessions, but a guide is available here.

Flickr Photo Sharing

Flickr is a tool for sharing photos online. You can accept comments on your photos, turn them into a slide-show, organise them with tags - and you can plot them on an interactive map as well. The Young Researcher Network session focussed in on using Flickr for its maps feature, but this guide offers a broader overview of getting started using this powerful online tool.

Download the Flickr guide here (PDF)

VoiceThread

Voicethread is a tool for collaboratively narrating an annotating a slide show of images or documents.

Download the VoiceThread guide here (Word)

Motion Box

If you haven't got access to video editing software on your computer, you want to share the editing of video between members of a group via the internet, or you have creative ideas for using video editing to explore an idea - then one of the many online video tools available could be just what you need.

The sessions used MotionBox, and you can download the MotionBox guide here (PDF).

These one page guides are part of a series from Practical Participation. You can find all of them on Tim's Blog over here.

The conference appears to have been a great success in launching the YRN. In the next couple of weeks we will be adding all the useful information from the event online, so look out for those resources!