Between one research geek and another

How exciting is this - actual students creating my research! Okay I admit it, I'm a research geek. This insight is based on the extraordinary rush I felt watching students complete my pre-assessment (more on this on my own blog). How goofy is that! Hopefully this excitement will carry over as I begin the arduous process of plowing through my data.

Preliminary sifting of data has unearthed little gems of information that pique my interest. Some of my favorite, and perhaps most inane bits of data that SURELY I'll be able to use SOMEWHERE include: how many minutes each student spent on the pre-assessment writing activity, the length of each writing sample (which doesn't necessarily reflect time), how many students I observed engaging in some type of pre-writing activity, and whether or not they completed a spell-check on their own. Can't wait to correlate this data with the student's self-evaluation of their writing skill, the number of college classes they listed that included a strong writing component and how well they 'perform' on the pre-assessment scoring rubric. Not to even mention the writing samples themselves.

So much data for just the pre-assessment, and the project itself doesn't start until next week! EEK! And I was concerned that I wouldn't have enough data!