1. Diary Studies codrutagosa@yahoo.co.uk

2. 1. Defining Diary Studies A diary study is a first-person account of a language learning and teaching experience, documented through regular, candid entries in a personal journal and then analysed for recurring patterns or salient events. Bailey, K. M., 1991: 'Diary Studies of classroom language learning: the doubting game and the believing game', in Sadtono, E. (ed.) Language Acquisition and the Second/Foreign Language Classroom, Singapore: SEAMEO Regional Language Centre (Anthology Series 28): 60-102

3. Useful to distinguish between: diaries 'as an open-ended narrative genre' in which 'any kind of information - factual, feelings, attitudes, reactions - may in principle be included' diaries in diary studies 'commissioned for research purposes'. In this last case 'although the diary remains a personal account, the domain is quite tightly specified by the researcher...'. McDonough, J. and McDonough, S., 1997: Research Methods for English Language Teachers, London, New York: Arnold

4. Ethical issues The distinction is quite useful because it mitigates one of the major ethical problems posed by diary studies: namely how ethical it is to intrude on people's thoughts recorded in their diaries. If the diarist is aware that the diary is kept for research purposes, the question of intrusion is brought in the open.

5. 2. Development of Diary Studies First proposed by Progoff (1975), as a research instrument to develop self- awareness in psychotherapy. Schumann and Schumann (1977) - first researchers to use diaries as a language learning research instrument Bailey’s (1980) diary study where she retrospected upon her experience as a language learner of French - one of the most quoted in applied linguistics research

6. 3. Types of Diary Studies Diary studies with introspective (first- person) analysis - diary studies in which the diarist and the analyst are one and the same Diary studies with non-introspective analysis – diary studies in which the researcher does the analysis of the diary/ies kept by (a) different person/s

7. 4. Diary Studies Procedures 1) Gathering background details (account of diarist’s personal histories) 2) Keeping a daily record (systematic retrospective account of perceived experiences) 3) Primary editing (diaries revised for public consumption by diarist) 4) Preliminary analysis (preliminary reading of data and identification of issues) 5) Selection of issues to focus on (design a category system) 6) Final analysis 7) Preparation of the final report

8. Your Task Keep a diary for a week Record anything you consider important connected to your learning experiences, both curricular and extracurricular: what you have learnt under what circumstances where you were why you think you have learnt that particular thing whether you think it will be useful how you feel about keeping a diary