So this afternoon I made up my questionnaire online on SurveyPlanet. It's the same questionnaire as the paper one I handed out last term that you edited (thanks, by the way!).
So, armed with an URL and a description of what my questionnaire is about, I posted it on my personal Facebook and Twitter page. Mum also shared it on hers.
Moreover, I posted the questionnaire and direct messaged organisations through facebook. The organisations and pages I targeted are:
- World Vision Australia
- 40 Hour Famine Australia (who have already responded to me and a representative completed my survey! They said they'd get back to me with any resources that could help me with my PIP!)
- Sutherland Shire Amnesty Group
- Amnesty International Australia
- Oxfam Australia (post to page only)
- Eurovision Song Contest (post to page only)
- Amnesty International (international page, post to page only)
- Plan Australia
So hopefully I hear back from these groups, and get some great responses to add to the collection I already have from my focus group!
Tuesday, 21 July 2015
Focus Group - 19/6/15
I'm back!!
It's taken me a while, but now is the time to get back to PIPing and blogging :)
So, late last term I organised (through Leonard) to do a focus group with Yr 9 International Studies. I had big plans to get some great discussion out of them, and I did by the end of the focus group, but it certainly took them a while to warm up to the idea of spreading their ideas about social justice!
After completing my questionnaire to start with, the discussion opened up on digital social justice. With some explaining of what I meant by digital social justice, the kids were pretty knowledgeable around the two examples I gave (Kony 2012, #bringbackourgirls) and some excellent discussion arose from this. They unanimously agreed that the examples I gave certainly did not cause much change, however when I asked if they could think of any that did cause change, no one could give any. I think this probably had to do with not much exposure on the successful ones, and that they were still warming up to sharing their own ideas, and not just reiterating my own. I certainly could have improved this by posing more open-ended questions to the kids.
The next round of discussion centred around Eurovision. When asked if they have ever heard of it, 9 of the 11 participants had, and most had a general idea surrounding what it is. Then I posed to them the question of whether Eurovision had caused any change, most believed that it did not cause any change whatsoever, one participant commenting that it was a "glittered chaos". However, when one student raised Conchita Wurst, Austrian drag queen and LGBTQI icon, most participants beleived that she had brought some change to the acceptance of LGBTQI people across Europe. While playing 'Rise Like a Phoenix', some students were quite shocked by Conchita's appearance, and this was reinforced by some discussion after around whether it was her song herself, or her image which pushed for change, one commenting "if it was someone else up there, they wouldn't give one [care]". Most of the students agreed that it was a combination of the both that helped the LGBTQI acceptance across Europe. The students were also quite engaged with the clip, so having the multimedia quite helped with engagement into discussion.
Moving onto USA for Africa's 'We are the World', they were no where near as engaged with the clip - probably due to the less of the shock factor with it. However, they believed it caused much more literal change than Conchita due to the financial benefits associated with the selling of the cassettes. Most did agree that the financial benefits of this method of social justice did cause change in Africa.
Finally, I posed to them the discussion of social justice in school. Most agreed that our school does a great job at promoting social justice in our school, through the multitudes of things we do, Wear it Purple being the first one they brought up. However, they noticed that some social justice programs in school were promoted really well, and others were it was just a mufti day (not WIP though) did not promote any desire for change within the wider school population. Some of the students who were in SRC noted that the conferences they attended as part of SRC certainly urged them to pursue change, and made them believe that they could cause change. However other events where they just donated money, they felt as if they were not helping out as much with causing change. This reflects my hypothesis of how participating in more grassroots, personal social justice causes made them feel as if they were causing change.
So overall, the focus group went really well! However, for my next one next week, I certainly need to focus on posing more open-ended questions, and have a bit more control over them so the discussion doesn't go on irrelevant tangents.
It's taken me a while, but now is the time to get back to PIPing and blogging :)
So, late last term I organised (through Leonard) to do a focus group with Yr 9 International Studies. I had big plans to get some great discussion out of them, and I did by the end of the focus group, but it certainly took them a while to warm up to the idea of spreading their ideas about social justice!
After completing my questionnaire to start with, the discussion opened up on digital social justice. With some explaining of what I meant by digital social justice, the kids were pretty knowledgeable around the two examples I gave (Kony 2012, #bringbackourgirls) and some excellent discussion arose from this. They unanimously agreed that the examples I gave certainly did not cause much change, however when I asked if they could think of any that did cause change, no one could give any. I think this probably had to do with not much exposure on the successful ones, and that they were still warming up to sharing their own ideas, and not just reiterating my own. I certainly could have improved this by posing more open-ended questions to the kids.
The next round of discussion centred around Eurovision. When asked if they have ever heard of it, 9 of the 11 participants had, and most had a general idea surrounding what it is. Then I posed to them the question of whether Eurovision had caused any change, most believed that it did not cause any change whatsoever, one participant commenting that it was a "glittered chaos". However, when one student raised Conchita Wurst, Austrian drag queen and LGBTQI icon, most participants beleived that she had brought some change to the acceptance of LGBTQI people across Europe. While playing 'Rise Like a Phoenix', some students were quite shocked by Conchita's appearance, and this was reinforced by some discussion after around whether it was her song herself, or her image which pushed for change, one commenting "if it was someone else up there, they wouldn't give one [care]". Most of the students agreed that it was a combination of the both that helped the LGBTQI acceptance across Europe. The students were also quite engaged with the clip, so having the multimedia quite helped with engagement into discussion.
Moving onto USA for Africa's 'We are the World', they were no where near as engaged with the clip - probably due to the less of the shock factor with it. However, they believed it caused much more literal change than Conchita due to the financial benefits associated with the selling of the cassettes. Most did agree that the financial benefits of this method of social justice did cause change in Africa.
Finally, I posed to them the discussion of social justice in school. Most agreed that our school does a great job at promoting social justice in our school, through the multitudes of things we do, Wear it Purple being the first one they brought up. However, they noticed that some social justice programs in school were promoted really well, and others were it was just a mufti day (not WIP though) did not promote any desire for change within the wider school population. Some of the students who were in SRC noted that the conferences they attended as part of SRC certainly urged them to pursue change, and made them believe that they could cause change. However other events where they just donated money, they felt as if they were not helping out as much with causing change. This reflects my hypothesis of how participating in more grassroots, personal social justice causes made them feel as if they were causing change.
So overall, the focus group went really well! However, for my next one next week, I certainly need to focus on posing more open-ended questions, and have a bit more control over them so the discussion doesn't go on irrelevant tangents.
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