In qualitative research, purposive sampling is carried out with a specific group in mind (Flick, 2009). Here I will present how I gained access to the optional course, the teacher, and then, the participants.
With regard to the purpose of this research study, a two-hour-per-week optional class, called ‘Listening and Speaking in the Language Laboratory’, on Wednesday morning from 10:00 am to 11:50 pm in the freshman year was chosen. In a Confucianist society such as Taiwan, teachers are expected to be an authority in their classrooms and another teacher’s presence might bring some tension and uneasiness. To avoid this awkwardness of ‘being evaluated and supervised’ or at least keep it to a minimum, there needs to be a reasonable degree of mutual trust between the researcher and the teacher. After I learned she would be teaching this optional course, I sent an e-mail to the teacher to ask her if she would like to take part in this study. Since the teacher and I were similar in age, had worked together for two years and were both doing doctoral studies, the teacher felt
comfortable to let me sit in her class, and readily gave her consent by e-mail in March 2010. As mentioned earlier, there appear to be few, if any, speaking classes before college. By choosing to take the optional conversation class, it was assumed that all the twenty-eight students were interested in developing their speaking skills and my participants were no exception.
As I had been away for two years and since this is a two-year junior college, most students were new to me and vice versa. Based on the information of these twenty-eight students’ GEPT performance report, I chose three male students and two female students who were categorized into ‘holds GEPT elementary level certificate’, ‘passed first phase of GEPT elementary level’ and ‘none’. To ensure variation, the selection was based on the following criteria:
1. Gender: There were five females and twenty-three males taking the optional class. I decided to include both genders because this would allow me to reflect on my interaction with different genders. I chose the only two female students who were from the same original class in the hope that they might be able to support each other throughout the research process.
2. English proficiency levels: In the LLS literature, there appears to be a correlation between proficiency levels and strategy use. To maximize the variation, I asked for the students’ GEPT results because this is the institutionalized English language proficiency test in Taiwan: thirteen students reported that they had GEPT elementary level
certificates (three females, ten males); three passed only the first phase (one female, two males); twelve had never taken nor passed it (one female, eleven males). Of the chosen female pair, one had a GEPT elementary level certificate, the other had passed the first phase. I then chose three male students from other original classes, one had a GEPT elementary level certificate, another had passed the first phase, and the third had not passed any GEPT elementary level tests.
3. Their military English class teachers: Because of my regular contact with my full-time colleagues, I felt that working with students from my full-time colleagues’ classes could make it harder to maintain the anonymity of the participants, and should therefore be avoided. However, in the case of selecting a male with a GEPT certificate, I was left with little choice (Appendix 9) and I chose from one of my colleagues’ classes. Fortunately, the participant was able to stay ‘anonymous’ throughout the process.
The second time the class met, I was introduced by the teacher to the students very briefly as a teacher and a doctoral student in the United Kingdom. My five potential participants belonged to four different companies (the two female students belonged to the same company). The next evening, in order to have the opportunity to meet them privately in the English section office, I had to go to the Cadet Command Office to make a request. Though I did explain to the officers, they did not tell my potential participants why they were singled out. At first, they assumed that they must have failed their English tests or assignments. After we sat down on the sofa, I revealed more about myself to them and explained what I was doing. I then gave them the consent forms (Appendix 10) to
help them understand what it meant to take part in this research study through more concrete descriptions. I asked if there were any questions they would like to ask me before making their decisions. I had thought they might avoid ‘complicating their life’ in a new environment, but to my surprise, they signed willingly on the spot without any further enquiries.
In the male group, Nick (nineteen years old) had a GEPT elementary certificate, Dennis (twenty) had passed the first phase of the GEPT elementary level test, and Peter (nineteen) had not passed GEPT elementary level. In the female group, Cindy (nineteen years old) had a GEPT elementary level certificate and Fanny (twenty-two) had passed the first phase of the GEPT elementary level. The assumption of their interest in speaking English and the group dynamics proved to be true to a large extent and all the participants worked with me till the end of the semester.