A second submission, entitled types of research question lend themselves to ‘What condensed or was written exclusively with the needs of this longitudinal studies?’, study in mind, and was an attempt to identify both how long, chronologically, the intervention of this study might need to be, and also whether the length of a study had an implication on the title, and hence the focus, of that study. This assignment drew most strongly on the work of Brice-Heath (1983) and Hannon (1987) as examples of longitudinal studies, and Tobin and McInnes (2008) as an example of a condensed study. The latter was particularly helpful, as Tobin and McInnes showed how, with effective use of mixed but complementary methods, “compelling (p.3) could be procured, the quantitative data being analysed against a evidence” backdrop of insight gleaned from qualitative approaches. I sought to replicate the of Tobin and work, and believe I have done so. With regard to the ‘feel’ McInnes’ phraseology of the research question however, my analysis of these three pieces of research, together with a number of other longitudinal and condensed studies, showed no reliable pattern. The third submission was the research proposal, which of course gave an opportunity to explore in some detail the method, length, size, scope, ethics and feasibility of the final intended study. This was a helpful opportunity to define and defend the enterprise, and the successful negotiation of this proposal gave me confidence to consider that what was to come was a worthwhile and properly considered study. The intended title at that time was do reading skills pertaining to the decoding ‘How of text compare with those pertaining to the decoding of music and notation?’,
A second submission, entitled ‘What types of research question lend themselves to condensed or longitudinal studies?’, was written exclusively with the needs of this study in mind, and was an attempt to identify both how long, chronologically, the intervention of this study might need to be, and also whether the length of a study had an implication on the title, and hence the focus, of that study. This assignment drew most strongly on the work of Brice-Heath (1983) and Hannon (1987) as examples of longitudinal studies, and Tobin and McInnes (2008) as an example of a condensed study. The latter was particularly helpful, as Tobin and McInnes showed how, with effective use of mixed but complementary methods, “compelling evidence” (p.3) could be procured, the quantitative data being analysed against a backdrop of insight gleaned from qualitative approaches. I sought to replicate the ‘feel’ of Tobin and McInnes’ work, and believe I have done so. With regard to the phraseology of the research question however, my analysis of these three pieces of research, together with a number of other longitudinal and condensed studies, showed no reliable pattern. The third submission was the research proposal, which of course gave an opportunity to explore in some detail the method, length, size, scope, ethics and feasibility of the final intended study. This was a helpful opportunity to define and defend the enterprise, and the successful negotiation of this proposal gave me confidence to consider that what was to come was a worthwhile and properly considered study. The intended title at that time was ‘How do reading skills pertaining to the decoding of text compare with those pertaining to the decoding of music notation?’, and