A group of Ontario practitioners used journals as their main method to study the student-practitioner relationship (Trent Valley Literacy Association, 2004). Their research report includes a description of stages they went through as they learned how to use journals for research-from uncertainty, to developing a framework, to developing patience and confidence that the journals would provide data to address their research questions:
So we write in our journals, and though we try to write immediately following a session with our student or small groups, for most of us it usually proves to be impossible. A student stays behind to talk, a volunteer wants to discuss something, a meeting or appointment takes precedence. But we do journal. It may be at one in the morning with pillows and blankets invitingly close, or early in the evening after supper and the dishes, but we write. Our early jottings are straightforward and descriptive, and a few are reflective. We question why we do this or that, can we really help our student, are we capable of working with his problems, the challenge that he presents? And what is this journaling supposed to be revealing anyway? (p. 8)
Participants could be invited to write about their own life stories or experiences, in relation to the research question.
Evelyn Battell and her co-researchers (2004) used autobiography as a method in their research about effective ABE/literacy instructors. By writing their stories, they hoped to explore how childhood and life experiences affected their becoming effective instructors. For four of the five researchers, autobiography was a way to document their careers, which spanned the development of the ABE/literacy field in BC. Autobiography also provided a way for their voices to be heard, and an opportunity for them to explain who they are and what they had seen as ABE/literacy instructors.