When I'm really into a class and it's subject, I tend to 'accidentally' see the topic everywhere. This is akin to learning a new word, and it suddenly pops up everywhere in daily life. Yesterday I had an awful stomach virus, and spent most of my day on the couch sleeping and watching old flicks. An old favorite of mine is A Knight's Tale with Heath Ledger who plays Sir Orrick. In Sir Orrick's entourage is a female blacksmith among the four other males. After a particularly difficult episode between Sir Orrick and his love, the entourage was standing together commenting on what had happened. One of the men said: "Women! Hey?" He was standing right next to the female blacksmith and essentially talking to her. For a moment, she was such an 'insider' to the male group that her status as the "least-gender" was suddenly overlooked. In the movie she gives the man who made the comment a dirty look, however as a researcher, such a comment shows how she had achieved a helpful rapport with the other men.
Respecting Youth is a really wonderful compilation of research on youth. Most of the chapters we have read thus far have been related to ethnographic designs; personal stories laced with useful information on youth. I'm finding that this is really giving me a feel for how ethnography works, and I have come to respect this type of design in relation to studies on children. I believe that ethnography really assists a researcher in understanding youth from a child's vantage point. Making oneself into a "least-adult" also allows for a researcher to study children from a "least-adult" point of view.
The last few chapters assigned to us addressed some more controversial topics, yet concepts necessary for truly understanding methodological issues in youth studies: race, gender, and homosexuality. I think that the foremost idea that I learned from these chapters is that these types of topics need to be realized and thereby addressed by the researcher. Similar to memory and youth, the differences between race, gender, and sexual preferences, can affect how the researcher conducts and concludes a study. Sometimes, people tend to ignore any type of controversy, as avoiding conflict is certainly simpler than facing it head on. However, the idea here is that this is not possible when conducting research. There are undertones and overtones of these topics, and accepting and addressing their existence is a key factor in good research.
Although I was sick this week, I attended a children's program at my local library in order to write my program observation and evaluation paper. As a mother of three with one on the way, and the oldest of six siblings, there is a lot about children that I understand. However, I have also learned that there is so much to learn about children and their behavior. I graduated with a Bachelor's in Psychology and I took a few of the required child development classes.They taught me a lot about children, and the reasoning behind their behavior. While I was at the children's story-time program today, I noticed a few things about the children there that I felt could be better understood if I was more educated in child psychology and child development. As a youth researcher, I sincerely believe that taking general classes on child behavior would be vital in helping to understand children in a study.
Now that my small paper is mostly completed, and my group discussions are winding up, I can finally focus on my final project. Although I haven't completely decided yet, I think I would like to endeavor to write the paper on designing a youth program. It's challenging due to the time crunch, especially because of the bunched up assignments and the early due date. However, it seems fascinating and interesting. Our next book Dynamic Youth Services, is an integral component to this assignment, and is assigned to be read from now until the end of the semester.
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