[Goce]

This course introduces you to some of the qualitative research methods used in Communication Studies: ethnography, discourse analysis, content analysis, and focus groups. The course compliments CMST 2A03 – Quantitative Research Methods.

The course is very interesting and the professor, Dr. Savage, is amazing. Everything is straightforward, as he does not try to trick you. Just read the text, participate, and complete the assignments on time.

In addition, this course tends to have the outline posted in the CMST course listings page, whereas the others do not.

Link: http://csmm.humanities.mcmas ter.ca/courses/CMST2B03.pdf

Notes:
*There is much overlap at the beginning of both the quantitative and qualitative research methods courses.
**It is do-able but not recommended that you take both qualitative and quantitative at the same time due to the assignments usually being due on the same dates.

Course Workload:


Participation = 15%

-Tutorial = 10%

-Lecture = 5%

On-line Writing = 20%
-Weekly journal, to be posted by 12:00AM Monday (approx. 12) = 10% total
-2 Learning Summaries (mid-term and end of term) = 10% total

Research Projects = 40%

- 5 page mini-project (1st assignment) = 15%
- 12-15 page mini-project (end of term) = 25%

Final Exam = 25%

---Usually 2hrs in length---

-M/C 20 Qs
-S/A 5-6/10-11 (2 sentences that identify and explain concepts)
-2/5 Essays; topics are ranging and ask you to apply what you have learnt.

[sew12]

These courses (CMST 2A03 and 2B03) can be very dry and boring. I also would recommend you don't take both in the same term. There's a lot of cross over material, especially at the beginning and it can get confusing and overwhelming.

I didn't at all care for either course, but I took them b/c they were required. I just found you have to get through them.

They weren't too difficult but the final mini-project can be very daunting task. Don't leave it until the last minute. Make a solid plan with your group and work on it for as long as possible. Leaving it until the last minute was a very, very bad idea and didn't result in a good mark for me.

For the journals put a lot of effort into them. They can really help your mark a lot if you write insightful posts. He likes questions a lot so raise a lot of relevant questions in your entries. They're worth a decent chunk of your mark and don't take a ton of time, it can be like 30 mins a week to keep your mark high. The journals are another reason to not do these two courses in the same term, doing two journals weekly can be annoying and time consuming and you might not put as much effort into the entries if you have to do.

Also this seems like an obvious tip but go to class. He takes attendance for marks and it's easy marks if you show up to every lecture. It would be stupid to piss away marks b/c you don't want to show up. Only miss out if you absolutely have to, missing one or two lectures won't kill your mark.

Same goes for tutorials, they are worth attendance and participation marks. Easy marks again, just talk about the material you learned about in lecture. It's a good review and they help you to understand the material. Also I found a good TA helped make the material more interesting than the lecture slides.

Final note I found the exams were really good. They were relatively easy. If you went to class and tutorials and reviewed key terms and stuff prior to the exam you'd do well on it.

This review goes for 2A03 and 2B03.